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Thread: Boot Camp Then and These Days?
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03-06-11, 12:11 PM #46
posts 4 and 12 for starters. Observations of some new Marines in the field.
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03-06-11, 12:16 PM #47
I can definitely say I was changed by boot camp and by the Corps as a whole. But even when I went there were certain things that were not stressed to us as recruits as I pictured it would be coming in. But again later I learned that the SOP for boot camp has changed in that direction. Whether that is a good or bad thing is really not for me to answer. What I can say is that Marines now are better trained and educated than ever, we complete the mission at hand even with the media over our shoulders watching every move, and the politics/liberals tying our hands. If that doesn't say something I don't know what else would.
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03-06-11, 12:22 PM #48
The PT is a joke. We had a guy in our platoon fail the PFT twice, CFT once (he only passed because he had someone that weighed like 30 lbs lighter than him as his buddy) and he still graduated with us.
The most "physical" thing a DI did to be at boot camp was choke me for smiling on line once. A DI from another platoon was also notorious for hitting recruits, though i dont think he ever just straight up punched someone.
The mind games never end though. Right now id say boot camp is 95% mental, 5% physical.
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03-06-11, 12:37 PM #49
I see those Marines also and while they are probably more frequent now than before I am sure they are still few and far between.
Here is another question to go along with this, where are the NCO's role in all of this? If these Marine are hitting the fleet/their units this way why are the NCO's not stepping in, correcting them, and nipping it in the butt before it becomes a real issue? I have no problems correcting another Marine even an NCO if necessary(tactfully of course). For those of us who are still in, instead of blaming boot camp and b*tching about these new Marines why don't we do something about it.
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03-06-11, 12:49 PM #50
By reading this, I take it that the Marines who fought in WW II, Korea, & Nam were nothing but a bunch of dumb people, who did not complete their missions. By the way, I have seen and trained college graduates who never had the common sense to pour pizz out of a boot before putting it on.
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03-06-11, 12:50 PM #51
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03-06-11, 12:57 PM #52
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03-06-11, 01:01 PM #53
I think one thing everyone is failing to see is what is done today to prepare the poolee to be a recruit. Back when I went in, we had poolee functions once a month. The standards for shipping to MCRD were lower. They were looking for bodies. So, I would say 30% to 40% were not up to the physical rigors of boot camp initially in that era. The Drill Instructors could choose to keep them and work with them or send them to PCP. These kids today are better prepared physically than we were.
There was also a deficit of approximatly 15 years without ITR for all Marines fresh out of boot camp. During that era, we had what was called "RFTD" during boot camp which lasted about a week and was a joke with the exception of all that humping (that was supposed to be a mini-ITR).
GEN Gray re-instituted ITR during his watch. He is an exceptional Marine. A mustang. He also challenged us mentally by instituting the "Commandant's Reading List" and introducing more academic conditioning along with returning the PRT to the fleet. GEN Krulack saw what was obviously lacking in the generation he was working with.. "character". He instituted the "Crucible". He also introduced training on "core values".
Did I get thumped in boot camp? You betcha! Three times in fact. All three were wake up calls. I believe the kids today are better trained than my era. The only draw back I see is that their parents wanted to be thier friend and not thier parent along with the marxist philosophy with today's public education system. So we have a different type of recruit to work with today. The Drill Instructors have the same mission, to unscrew 18 years of coddling and mold recruits into Marines.
Is it harder? Who knows? Is it easier? I think senior SNCO's who have been on the Drill Field and been around 20 years could better judge that. I do see active Marines from time to time. I have not found them unsat. They are still highly disciplined.
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03-06-11, 01:01 PM #54
With the stated mission of the Marine Corps and the doctrine and the traditions and the justified reputation we have with our enemies and our allies, both who either fear us or regard us with respect, I don't see how any young man that knowingly enlists in the United States Marine Corps today can have any doubts about the veracity of the brotherhood he aspires to belong to. Rather boot camp is easier or harder then in my day is irrelevant if the objective of producing dedicated ass-kicking intelligent Marines is achieved. On a personal note, like others have mentioned on this thread, in my day, the summer of '68, personal instruction with the laying on of hands and physical conditioning and mental toughness took precedence over any politically correct or officially sanctioned means of instruction. Right or wrong, it seems to have worked for me and I was one of those who often wondered if I would make it, to myself of course, never expressed any doubts to our DI's. What with shin splints attacking me late in the game and being a man with a huge heart and desire to be a Marine, but definitely lacking any extra physical abilities to achieve this goal, I did not have an easy time. But I persevered and I graduated and became a Marine and went to Viet-Nam where I found myself among brothers, who like me, quickly learned what really mattered in this world. The reality of the war, especially a Marine grunt's life in 1968-69, and the fact that I became a good bush Marine and did rotate home, indicated that both my training and myself accomplished what I wanted the most to achieve..... to survive and not bring dishonor on myself or my country or my Corps and never to let my brothers down.
Semper Fidelis, Scott
* If I get off tangent or start to ramble, forgive me... I'm on some strong medication and I'm reading and writing on this forum as a way to distract myself from some recent issues.
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03-06-11, 01:07 PM #55
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03-06-11, 01:43 PM #56
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03-06-11, 11:02 PM #57
I went through bootcamp in 1961. Being fairly fit ( I went from 165# to 180# in boot camp, believe it or not!) the physical part of it didn't bother me very much. I was a little older then, than most of my platoon brothers, so I knew to keep my mouth shut and not to offer much beyond the Yes Sir!, or No Sir! I saw that the first few days in camp when another boot was asked by the D.I. if he was some college smarty dropout, and he answered "yes he was". That was all it wrote for him. He paid hell the rest of his 16 weeks in boot camp. I was in the same boat, but fortunately in college I had been in R.O.T.C. and had even been on a drill team so I knew the manual of arms and how to march, and even how to dress and shine my boots. So the mental training wasn't very hard on me either. One thing I did learn while in boot camp was that Marine Boot training is not set in stone. Marines who fought in WWII many times went through boot camp that was only 6 weeks long. Think about that. 6 weeks of training and off to the southern Pacific! I got out just before Vietnam heated up, so I don't know how long their boot camp was.
As for today's Marines - I have long noticed that they don't seem as physically fit as we were once upon a time. Not being near a military base, I don't get to see many of America's warriors, but the ones I see on TV look like they are being pretty well fed, and not too overworked. I could be wrong, but that is my impression. But have you old timers seen any policemen today. When I was just out of the Marine Corps, even then I wouldn't have tangled with an Indiana State Policeman. Today at 70 years old, I don't see many that I have much respect for as being physically fit. I might not still tangle with one because I was raised to respect law and order, but it makes my skin crawl to know that they are "protecting" us night and day. Oh well, enough said.
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03-07-11, 01:22 AM #58
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03-07-11, 02:45 AM #59
One of the things I've noticed over the last few years. This forum represents a small piece of a large pie but still ... The number of potentials that come on here requesting information on how to lose weight. Recruits shipping one pound under max shipping weight (which is about 10 lbs over the max Marine Corps weight). There are even questions from the X-box generation about what will happen to them in PCP as though they already know they are going there. As I said the potential Marine members of this forum are just a small piece of a large pie and may not be representive of the whole.
I do find it disturbing though to see so many posts of "Hi I'm Fat and need help losing weight and also I have 3 kids" . At the recruiting level I think the requirements should be even more strigent and also I think the pressure should be taken completley off the drill instructors to graduate anybody. Hey drill instructor I see you only have the guide left and everyone else sent home with an application to McDonalds? Good job!!
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03-07-11, 06:45 AM #60
In 1967 when I went through with the Vietnam War going on the DI's certainly didn't graduate everybody. The DI's were not interested in mass bodies but rather the focus was on proficient well trained Marines.
We started in forming with 96, during the course of training we dropped half that number, and with pick-ups we graduated about 86. We had 5 mean-assed DI's. Those dropped went to motivation platoon, and many in our platoon, 10 at a time, would be pulled out of training in the early morning and sent to one day motivation platoon. Their horror stories kept the rest of us straight.
I keep hearing on this forum that the emphasis at the MCRD is on better training with less focus on discipline and overall more irrelevant matters. I would suggest that during our time there was no better trained fighting force in the world. I would suggest that we became proficient in all MC areas including drill, Phy fitness, discipline, marksmanship, MC history, etc.
In essence, we were so well trained we could do it all. Where's the proof - look at our combat record. Not just the big battles but the endless weeks and months in the bush under totally adverse conditions losing our brothers day to day.
Were we less trained - I don't think so.
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