Uncle Sam needs you to join the army

[billywan]

Nice Pic Flash, Love the M-14, fired Expert with it when I went through Parris Island in 64. Did not use it when I got to VN in 66, used 2 different types of weapons while I was there.

[TheCorinthian]

They bitch about it now. Wow, 8 week boot camps? Damn.

 

I have never understood why the Army, ect., does not teach and keep teaching its men to shoot. It just seems, well, stupid.

 

The second week is known as "Grass Week". This week is partly spent in a class setting to learn about marksmanship principles of the M16A2 and how to shoot efficiently. When not in class, recruits are snapping in, or practicing their firing positions. Recruits are taught how to shoot by a Primary Marksmanship Instructor, a Marine of the MOS 0931. While range personnel wear campaign covers similar to drill instructors, PMIs are not drill instructors and generally not as strict in enforcing discipline upon recruits, focusing on marksmanship and expecting recruits to uphold their own discipline.

The third week is called "Firing Week", which ends with Qualification Day. This week recruits are awakened early in the morning to prepare the rifle range for firing. They spend all day running through the Known Distance Course of fire (also known as table 1), in order to practice their marksmanship skills with live rounds. Half of the platoons will fire at the 200, 300 and 500 yard lines (182.88, 274.32 and 457.2 meters), in the standing, sitting, kneeling and prone positions; the other half will mark targets in the pits. Friday of that week is qualification day, where recruits must qualify with a minimum score in order to earn a marksmanship badge and continue training. Those who fail to qualify are given a second opportunity during Team Week; if they fail again, they are dropped and will repeat Grass Week. The Marines are the only branch of the United States armed forces that require the 500 yard line qualification. A trophy is awarded to the platoon with the highest cumulative scores.

[TheCorinthian]

More captured weapons:

 

 

[Flashermac]

We had several weeks on the rifle range in BCT, but it was almost all pop up targets. Aim, fire, shoot. We also had moving targets that ran diagonally on tracks -- which was a helluva a lot of fun. I fired so many rounds that I burned my hand with the red hot rifle barrel and had a scar for years. But 350 was the maximum range we fired at. We got a lot more rifle training in AIT, especially after we got our orders for RVN. But still 350 meters max. Wonder who decided on that range.

 

In RVN I usually kept my M14 on fully automatic. The first round would be fired off to make the bad guys keep their head down. Then it was time to switch to semi.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Flashermac]

Nice Pic Flash, Love the M-14, fired Expert with it when I went through Parris Island in 64. Did not use it when I got to VN in 66, used 2 different types of weapons while I was there.

 

 

Hiya, BillyW. Didn't know you'd been a young fella in the Big Green Latrine.

 

I trained with a guy who'd gone through Parris Island around the time you did. He went in right out of high school, before Vietnam got going. He'd completed boot camp and his advanced training (as a clerk) when somebody detected he had bad hearing in one ear. The USMC gave him a medical discharge. In 1968 the draft board looked at his file and saw he'd only spent 6 months in uniform. According to the Selective Service Act all male citizens owe the government up to 6 YEARS in the military. They grabbed him and stuck him in the Army. From being unfit to be a Marine clerk, he went to being an Army combat engineer. I once met another medically discharged peace time Marine who'd been let go for bad knees. The Army made him a grunt! Go figure.

 

Come to think of it, my dad told me he'd trained with a fat guy who had been discharged from the Army as a captain because of his weight. In WWII they drafted him as a private - and the guy was not happy about it!

 

 

[TheCorinthian]

Fat guys are a sore subject for the Army. They got into a lot of trouble for sending people like this to war.

[Flashermac]

I was a civilian instructor for the Army in the early 1990s. The weight standards were enforced very strictly. I saw an LT get kicked out for being overweight, and he was an Ordnance REMF. The standards for enlistment were high, and commissioned occifers absolutely had to have a university degree. Took an MA or MS to get promoted above captain. No more "motivation platoon" for recruits back then either. You shaped up, or they kicked you out early on. In the '60s and '70s, you would be "encouraged" to get into shape and also to get over any "attitude problems" you may have had. The NCOs at the motivation platoon were experts at it.

 

I imagine Bush's wars in the Middle East caused standards to go to hell. Isn't that fat guy the Army shrink who murdered those GIs at Fort Hood?

 

p.s. After the way the Army was forced to become so PC in the 1980s, I often said that except for Army combat arms the Marines were the only "real soldiers" we had left. Coming from an Army vet, that hurts.