Steve Posted March 20, 2010 Report Share Posted March 20, 2010 Never went to infantry training, but when I went to basic in 1972 we had about 2 hours of bayonet training. It was pretty much a joke and even the instructors, all Vietnam vets, did not take seriously. TH Never went to infantry training either but in HS I went to a house party in west Philly and that neighborhood had a crazy drug war going on. Stupid me. EVERYONE at the party was packing. I had my lock blade. Talk about bringing a knife to a gun fight. Almost pissed my pants with fear and cussed out the girl who invited me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave32 Posted March 20, 2010 Report Share Posted March 20, 2010 Ha. How about this Steve -- when I was in HS my first job was as a dishwasher at Ponderosa steakhouse in Gary Indiana. Right here. They had some permit at the time where they could hire 16y/o kids and pay them slightly under minimum wage, but only in 3 hour shifts. I hated that job, the manager was a prick who got off on his petty authority. Anyway, one night I'm out after closing sweeping up in the parking lot with my headphones on. Assistant manager and the cook are walking out with money to deposit when these gangbangers walk around from behind the bldg holding pistols. My fucking heart pounded. POUNDED. But also felt calm in the head. These guys took the money and left. The brothers got me dude! Mom let me quit the job once the police called pops to pick me up after we gave statements. Postscript: Turns out it was an inside job, the cook was involved (robbers were his friends). Gary will always be a lot scarier to me than LA. Pps. Infantry training was a 4 week extension of basic training and nothing special. Think of summer camp in camo fatigues with a lot of hyped-up kids. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flashermac Posted March 20, 2010 Report Share Posted March 20, 2010 Huh? In combat engineer AIT, we got 2 weeks of pure infantry training (not counting land navigation) and 6 weeks as engineers (including demolitions and mine warfare). Once we got our orders for RVN, we got another 3 weeks intensive infantry squad and platoon tactics. Thus we ended up having 5 weeks infantry and 6 weeks engineer. Good thing, since we were 30 miles in advance of the nearest American infantry unit! Silliest thing was one week when the infantry was short handed and my platoon had to go help them. We still couldn't get a CIB though. Engineers don't qualify ... except to do the job when needed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave32 Posted March 20, 2010 Report Share Posted March 20, 2010 Hmmm. Rough number. You're making me think. Our Basic/AIT was all combined, we never separated. It was 13 or 14 weeks total from the time we got off the bus. So, assuming average Basic is 8 weeks(?), the precise number would be 5 or 6 weeks. This was in '91. We never had a basic training graduation then a start for AIT though - it was all rolled up into the same stretch. Engineers definitely had a longer AIT. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cavanami Posted March 20, 2010 Report Share Posted March 20, 2010 Ha. How about this Steve -- when I was in HS my first job was as a dishwasher at Ponderosa steakhouse in Gary Indiana. Right here. They had some permit at the time where they could hire 16y/o kids and pay them slightly under minimum wage, but only in 3 hour shifts. I hated that job, the manager was a prick who got off on his petty authority. Anyway, one night I'm out after closing sweeping up in the parking lot with my headphones on. Assistant manager and the cook are walking out with money to deposit when these gangbangers walk around from behind the bldg holding pistols. My fucking heart pounded. POUNDED. But also felt calm in the head. These guys took the money and left. The brothers got me dude! Mom let me quit the job once the police called pops to pick me up after we gave statements. Postscript: Turns out it was an inside job, the cook was involved (robbers were his friends). Gary will always be a lot scarier to me than LA. Pps. Infantry training was a 4 week extension of basic training and nothing special. Think of summer camp in camo fatigues with a lot of hyped-up kids. WOW...you were out there at Miller Beach...we (I) was there at the gang graduated from high school for the summer...we never had $$$ for food, but always had beer in the 'frig!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave32 Posted March 20, 2010 Report Share Posted March 20, 2010 OT: Miller Beach. West Beach. Miller was where you could drink openly, no lifeguards or park rangers. Lots of girls. Nobody wore sunscreen then and people set out to get as dark as possible using 0 spf oils. LOL. Bunch of Illinois people and Chicagoans there all the time because it was much better than their polluted 'Oak st beach.' Yeah, I saw your ref to the sand dunes before. Wondered if you were close. I guess you were. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cavanami Posted March 20, 2010 Report Share Posted March 20, 2010 In my day, they had that big building at Miller Beach and had dances on the weekend, great time. We had a house right off the beach, beach parties, skinny dipping at night...used to acquire milk off porches in the morning to use on our cereal in the morning if we ran out of beer to put on the cereal, the real breakfast club! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flashermac Posted March 21, 2010 Report Share Posted March 21, 2010 Hmmm. Rough number. You're making me think. Our Basic/AIT was all combined, we never separated. It was 13 or 14 weeks total from the time we got off the bus. So, assuming average Basic is 8 weeks(?), the precise number would be 5 or 6 weeks. This was in '91. We never had a basic training graduation then a start for AIT though - it was all rolled up into the same stretch. Engineers definitely had a longer AIT. I was a civilian instructor in the early '90s, and I knew the Army kept cutting back on training. Never heard of them combining BCT and AIT though. Now during WWII, the training was combined - but took about 16 weeks total. My dad went throught artillery from start to finish at Fort Bragg, which then was the Field Artillery Replacement Training Center - abbreviated FARTC and pronounced "farts". But once upon a time there was no military training, only OJT. Then somebody decided maybe boot camp would be a good idea. My grandmother's brother was one of the first Marines to train at "Paris Island" (as it was) in WWI. We got a couple of pictures of him training there in early 1918. He got to France just in time to get wounded in action. p.s. I was born in Illinois. We moved when I was a kid though ... aerospace folks moved often. I looked up my old home on Google Earth ... couldn't recognise a damned thing! Even my school has been torn down. We had lots of open space, with rabbits, pheasants and quail running around across the street. Now it is solid houses and businesses. Could have been looking at google views of another country. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cavanami Posted March 21, 2010 Report Share Posted March 21, 2010 ...where in Illinois? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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