At Officer Candidates School, giving 110 percent isn’t enough

[thedrifter]

September 19, 2005
The ultimate test
At Officer Candidates School, giving 110 percent isn’t enough

Stories by Christian Lowe

Wayne Dunlap stood at rigid attention, jaw clenched in nervous anticipation. This was not where he wanted to be: a large, ill-lit conference room in the headquarters building of Officer Candidates School, standing before a panel of officers and enlisted instructors who held his fate in their hands.

His platoon commander spelled it out plainly. Dunlap wasn’t officer material.

It wasn’t because he couldn’t handle the physical demands. It wasn’t because he couldn’t keep up with the academics. In fact, Dunlap was squarely in the middle of the pack.

He was trying his best and working hard. He was enthusiastic about becoming a Marine officer.

But there was something missing — Dunlap’s instructors concluded that he could never be a leader of men — and certainly not a leader of Marines.

“I think he got lost on [Interstate] 95 and ended up in my squad bay,” said the platoon commander, Capt. David Hill.

It was true. At Marine Corps Base Quantico, Va., where the Marine Corps molds its future officers, Dunlap just seemed out of place.

“He’s probably the nicest guy in the entire world, but when he gets his commission, his Marines are going to eat him alive,” said Capt. Tom Warren, 3rd Platoon commander. “They will totally manipulate him.”

Make that if he gets his commission.

The next day, Dunlap faced the OCS commander, Col. Louis Rachal.

“This candidate really wants to be here, sir. This candidate is determined to improve, has improved and is determined to graduate in August, sir,” Dunlap said, speaking, as required, in the third person.

Under questioning, Dunlap admitted his confidence had suffered, but said he was working to toughen himself and get with the program. His instructors agreed this was so.

“This candidate has a desire to make a difference. This candidate has a desire to be a Marine and to lead Marines,” Dunlap assured the OCS commander, his jaw muscles tensing as he stood.

Rachal was unmoved. “Trying hard and putting out 110 percent isn’t enough. For some reason, you haven’t sold yourself as a leader.

“I’m going to disenroll you from the program. ... You have the potential, but you’re not there yet.”

And just like that, there was one fewer member of Officer Candidates School Class 186.

Why they join

Rachal’s decision on Dunlap’s fate offers a window into the usually shrouded world of officer training and the tough standards leaders apply as they identify who will — and won’t — be entrusted with the responsibility to lead Marines. And their choices are all the more critical today because the nation is at war.

Most of the Corps’ newest officers can expect that, at some point early in their careers, the odds are good that they’ll be called upon to lead men and women in combat.

And as many candidates learn, it sometimes doesn’t matter how hard you try. It’s not always your smarts or your strength and stamina. It’s not about how well you march on the parade deck or lead troops in squad maneuvers.

You’re not going to fail if you don’t make it through the obstacle course first, or if you can’t figure out how to get a barrel over a wooden wall on the leadership evaluation courses.

But as Dunlap and dozens of others who tried and failed learned, no one will make the cut as a Marine Corps officer if he or she doesn’t have that special something — that intangible quality Marines say sets officers apart from all others: leadership.

Of the nearly 300 men and women who began the journey in June 2004, 63 would leave before the course concluded with a graduation ceremony 10 weeks later. Some quit voluntarily, some, like Dunlap, were simply sent home unfulfilled.

And here, unlike at the Corps’ two recruit depots, which train enlisted Marines, instructors don’t talk candidates into sticking with the program or goad them out of quitting. Instructors will help when asked, but candidates can drop — or be dropped — in a flash.

The volunteers of Class 186 attending this 10-week course — a program for college seniors and graduates — come from all walks of life. When the course began June 6, in the ranks were a candidate from Cottonwood, Calif., who has a doctoral degree in finance; a plumber’s apprentice from Houston; a lawyer from Spain; a youth counselor from Omaha, Neb.; a newspaper copy editor from Pennsylvania — all men who think they have what it takes to become a leader of America’s elite.

Their motivations for submitting to the stinking mud, steamy heat and brain-numbing classes that make up this “weeding out” program are wide and varied. Some see their experience in the Corps as a stepping stone for future careers in law or politics. Others, such as Joshua Piper, 27, of Longview, Wash., want to fly jets — a job that can mean a long military career.

Antonio Contreras, 30, of Labadie, Mo., wanted to get into the Corps so badly, he committed to become a lawyer — the only option available at his age — even though he wanted more than anything to join the infantry.

Patrick Amalfi, 26, the plumber’s apprentice, simply wants to lead Marine grunts into combat.

Whatever their goals and backgrounds, all of the nearly 300 officer candidates of Class 186 share a desire to serve their country — a common patriotic call to make a difference.

Each left a comfortable life for the sweat, pain and uncertainty of OCS. What they have to look forward to is more of the same — months away from family and friends and the kind of stress and responsibility that would give Fortune 500 executives the shakes.

For many, life in the Corps could take them to combat patrols in Iraq or Afghanistan in little more than a year.

“I got offered a lot of jobs, and it just wasn’t fulfilling” said finance graduate student Wesley Gray. “I figured I gotta pay my dues someday. I’m young, and I’m healthy, and I don’t want to be out of the action next time around when we got to take care of business.”

‘You’ll be a man’

Standing in the dappled shade of Quantico’s hardwood forests nearly three weeks into his training, Candidate Alex Wilschke’s wry sense of humor, laid-back attitude and perceptiveness seem a bit out of place behind camouflage face paint.

Waiting for his team’s turn on the Small Unit Leadership Evaluation Course — a mind-bending series of obstacles that force candidates to solve problems quickly and under difficult conditions — Wilschke, a law student at Denver University, Colo., doesn’t seem your typical Marine. In fact, he seems exactly the opposite. And he’s going to be a lawyer for the Corps.

So, why go through all of this? Why endure the long, early morning runs, the harassment of the sergeant instructors and the hours of classes?

“Most lawyers are a bunch of weenies. And I didn’t see the point of becoming an officer in any other service,” Wilschke said, grinning. “I mean, would I want to become an Army lawyer just so I could have it easier? What’s the point of that?”

To understand his motivations, he recommended reading the poem “If,” by Rudyard Kipling.

“If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with kings — nor lose the common touch;

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds worth of distance run — Yours

Is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And — which is more —

You’ll be a Man, my son.”

It’s a message of manhood, Wilschke said, of subtlety and strength. That’s why he chose the Corps and eschewed the easy route.

What they want

Josh Piper and James Landree circulated around a hot supply room during uniform issue. As prior-enlisted Marines, they and another candidate were showing those new to the Corps how to fold the sleeves of a camouflage blouse, thread belts through brass buckles and how to properly fit a cover. As fingers fumbled through unfamiliar motions, the men and women of Class 186 spoke in hushed tones about what lay ahead.

This was the first day they were allowed to wear the green, brown and black pixel-pattern Marine camouflage uniform. It also was the day they’d be “picked up” by their training platoons.

The dread was almost universal among the candidates. Tales and horror stories about “pick-up” permeated their conversations like a foul odor.

Folding his crisp new uniforms into neat piles and awaiting the inevitable, Patrick Amalfi didn’t look much like the leatherneck officer he aspired to be. Despite his freshly shaven head, the Texan still looked more like a college student than a warrior.

In his easy southwestern twang, he spoke plainly about his career goal.

continued....

[thedrifter]

“Infantry, without a doubt,” Amalfi declared. “If I’m going to push myself to do OCS, then I’m going to do that job. I think it would be an absolute honor to lead Marines into combat — to have 40 men look up to me and ask me what to do. It’s an honor.”

Most of the candidates, besides those with guarantees as aviators or lawyers, aspire to be in the infantry.

Now, the journey toward that goal was beginning. And no matter how much Amalfi and his fellow candidates thought they knew about what to expect from the Marine Corps, they were about to learn first hand what stress is all about. There would be no time to think about the future — only time enough to contemplate the next two hours, 20 minutes or two seconds.

Resolute, high-minded officer candidates were about to be turned on their heads in an alien world. Amalfi’s rock-jawed pride would yield to indecision, confusion and fear as his platoon’s enlisted instructors hammered away at him with orders and nitpicked his every failure.

In the chaos of those first days, the sergeant instructors would begin stripping away the civilian exterior of each candidate, pushing each to either find the strength to make it through the next 10 weeks — or just walk away.

Pick-up day

Amalfi sounded confident at uniform issue a few hours earlier, but when the sergeant instructors started bellowing into his ear and scattering the neat rows of desks and chairs across the cold concrete floor, he was anything but sure of himself.

His eyes scanning side to side, Amalfi wondered what to do as his fellow candidates scrambled out of the building known as “Classroom 3.” At that moment, Amalfi looked as if he’d opened his eyes and realized the nightmare he’d been having was real.

This was pick-up.

The sergeant instructors who would be a source of unrelenting discipline during their 10 weeks at OCS set them into motion, barking orders, hustling them out of the classroom and across the black asphalt of the parade ground. The candidates were so confused and frazzled that they could barely maintain a ragged formation as the sergeant instructors buzzed in and out of their lines like angry bees, shouting orders that seemed to make little sense.

As sweat poured down Amalfi’s pale face, it was clear the idealism of those first few days was gone. Now, it was all about just making it through.

And so it starts

At five minutes before reveille, everyone was already awake.

The tension of pick-up hadn’t yet worn off, making for a fitful night in the rack. When the clock read 5 a.m., sergeant instructors walked into the squad bay on cue, the heavy thud of their boots filling the room over the noise of the industrial-sized fan blowing at the other end of the long row of bunk beds.

The squad bay was dank with the sweaty odor of the night’s harried events, when something as simple as making a bed took nearly an hour with the shouts of sergeant instructors blasting in everyone’s ears. Organizing clothes and shoes took just as long, as the team of enlisted Marines pushed and pushed the candidates to execute their demands to the letter.

Candidates awoke to a view of dingy gray linoleum tiles, dented green lockers and chipped wooden trunks, home for the next two months.

Tumbling out of their racks, the candidates’ bleary eyes grew wider with each new shouted demand from their instructors.

Piling into the bathroom, the 57 men of Charlie Company’s 4th Platoon frantically shaved, showered, brushed their teeth and stumbled back to their racks as the instructors counted down the time.

“Put your PT gear on!”

Heads turned left and right in confusion; hands tumbled through government-issue footlockers looking for thin nylon shorts and a green T-shirt. Amalfi’s face was dripping sweat, his eyes blank with confusion.

“Get those go-fasters laced up! Ten, nine, eight, seven ... You better be ready when I’m done,” bellowed Gunnery Sgt. James Dixon, a sergeant instructor who would soon earn a reputation as the least liked by the candidates.

“All right, let’s go! Go! Go!” shouted 4th Platoon’s top enlisted instructor, Gunnery Sgt. Ruben Velez.

The candidates rolled out the door, down flights of concrete stairs and out the side door of their barracks. The air was already hot and sticky, a typical June morning in Northern Virginia.

For the next few hours the candidates would be driven to the edge of exhaustion — and some well beyond. It was their first meeting with the obstacle course.

The physical training

Moments after tackling the first obstacles, the candidates’ faces were drawn with fatigue. Concentrating on the instructions offered by the enlisted staff who demonstrated how to negotiate each obstacle was next to impossible.

Men struggled up the 25-foot rope climb, wrapping arms and legs around the rope, grasping for every possible advantage.

For the women, the rope climb was a distant worry — the obstacles preceding that last challenge were tough enough. Many hurled themselves against wooden walls and horizontal telephone poles in vain, unfamiliar as they were with the tricks and techniques that would become second nature later in their training.

Cramps and dehydration felled many, and one candidate collapsed in the squad bay, his legs locked in spasms from dehydration.

It wasn’t going to get easier, though. At the Navy’s Basic Underwater Demolition School, where SEAL commandos learn their trade, there is a saying: “The easiest day was yesterday.” That’s equally true at OCS.

Within three days of meeting their sergeant instructors, the candidates would be enduring three-mile platoon hikes, humping packs stuffed to bursting, through the steamy woods and negotiating a 25-foot rope ascent wearing a rucksack — a task that would prove nearly insurmountable for even the strongest candidates.

That second week was a pretty fair indicator of the intense physical tasks the future lieutenants could expect for the rest of their time at OCS.

For anyone who believes officers have it easy during their version of “boot camp” — which is essentially what OCS is — think again. The 10 weeks are designed to prepare officers to lead from the front in every way.

Candidates are told over and over again that they must be at the top of the heap physically. If a newly commissioned second lieutenant were to fall behind when leading his platoon on a run through the pine woods of Camp Lejeune, N.C., for example, it would be a huge loss of face with his men. The idea that officers should be at the top of the heap physically is drilled into every officer candidate here, and the amount of physical training at OCS was a shock to some.

“You know, when you first see these guys you think ‘Oh yeah, another boot lieutenant,’” said Sgt. Jennifer Truslow, 22, a supply Marine now assisting with OCS training at Quantico. “Since I’ve been here, I definitely have a different perspective on officers.”

One can’t help but see that when the Corps says it wants its officers to lead from the front, that means literally as well as figuratively.

Much like boot camp

Much of what the officers endure mirrors the enlisted training experience, and anyone who’s been through enlisted boot camp will recognize the formula.

For the prior-enlisted candidates, there is a strong sense of déjà vu as the shouts ring out through the squad bay.

But unlike enlisted recruit training, the emphasis here is not on breaking down a candidate and building him back up as a Marine. These college grads are expected to adapt on the fly to use the skills and apply the talents they bring from the civilian world as they learn to lead Marines.

But in the early days of their training, applying talents was far from the candidates’ minds. Just two weeks into the training, their goals were simple. Keep moving. Stay out of trouble. Survive.

NEXT WEEK: The tough road to graduation.

Ellie

[dscusmc]

Good article...I was just there this summer. The instructors don't play as many games, but the pt is harder than boot camp and the instructors are looking for reasons to send candidates home.