We went to the rifle and pistol ranges and qualified with the M-14 rifle and the .45 caliber pistol. We also fired the shotgun for familiarization, because many Lieutenants in-country elected to carry a shotgun. A platoon commander ought not be shooting, because if he is, he is not commanding his platoon. If he has to shoot, he should not be concerned about firing a long-range weapon when his troops might be in front of him. Additionally, if he must shoot, it will probably be in a quick-fire situation.
The bullet of a rifle in the hands of a trained Marine has someone’s name on it. Fifteen double-aught buck from a 12 gauge shotgun are addressed “To whom it may concern.” That's a handy distinction in an emergency.
Rifle qualification was not hard. The course was 50 rounds as follows:
200 yards: 10 rounds slow fire in the off-hand (standing) position.
10 rounds rapid fire (two five-round magazines) standing to sitting in 50 seconds
300 yards: 5 rounds kneeling
5 rounds sitting
10 rounds rapid fire (two five round magazines) standing to prone in 60 seconds
500 yards: 10 rounds slow fire in the prone position.
Slow fire allowed 10 minutes at each of the three firing lines. The 200 and 300 slow fire targets were, I think, 8-inch bulls-eyes and the rapid fire was a head and shoulders silhouette. The 500 yard slow-fire target was a ten-inch bull.
To qualify as a Marksman, you had to accumulate at least 190 points. Sharpshooter was 210 points and Expert was 230 points. A bulls-eye was 5 points per round.
Failing to qualify was a very serious matter indeed. Accurate aimed killing rifle fire has long been a hallmark of the Marine. Marines were originally detailed as snipers in the fighting tops of sailing ships, assigned to kill the officers on the enemy’s quarterdeck. At the Battle of Belleau Woods in WWI, the Germans were stunned by the losses they began to incur at 500 to 1000 yards. They had had some experience with British snipers, but to experience thousands of shooters who could hit at those distances was distressing to say the very least. They assumed that the Americans had created a special sniper regiment. When captured survivors learned that such accuracy was the norm in the Marine Corps (and the regular Army units of the day), they were stunned!
I qualified as a Sharpshooter and started a string of possibles (50 for 50 at the 500 yard line) that I maintained throughout my career. While the ability to hit at any range is important, I have always thought that the ability to “reach out and touch someone” from a third of a mile or more away is a skill that anyone who does not want to be a victim ought to have.
This was also the last time I ever qualified as a Sharpshooter. The crossed rifles of the Expert badge look so much better!
The .45 caliber pistol was another story. I cannot recall the details of the course other than that there were two strings of fire at 15 and 25 yards, one slow fire and one rapid fire at each.
My problem was that the pistols we were using were so old that it was hard to tell if inaccuracy was due to the pistol or the nut behind the pistol. I finally qualified as a Marksman when the Chief Range Officer, a Warrant Officer Gunner (and Distinguished Rifle and Distinguished Pistol shooter) discovered that the rear sight on my pistol was loose. He made that discovery on Qual Day and fixed it by banging away on the rear sight with a brass hammer until he could drill the bull with the pistol. My shooting that day increased by 109 points.
When I returned from Vietnam, I purchased my own M1911A1 .45 caliber pistol and took it to a friend who was an armorer at the Base pistol range at Camp Lejeune. He made sure that it was good and tight and that it met the standards of the Marine Corps. Thereafter, I consistently qualified as an Expert.
I still have a .45. The 9 mm pistols do not have the punch or knockdown power of the lovely, but hard to handle, Colt. What is interesting is that the Marine Corps is re-issuing the .45 to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan for that very reason.
Having gotten the introductory and administrative work out of the way, in week 9, we really got busy for the last 8 weeks. We were in the field constantly, five and a half to six days a week, practicing squad, platoon, and company tactics, patrolling, ambushes and counter-ambushes, calling for and adjusting supporting arms, and spending time on the grenade, machine gun and mortar ranges. We also ran a number of cordon and search exercises in the mock-up of a Vietnamese village.
We paid particular attention to scouting and patrolling, recognizing that that was an integral part of the life of a rifle platoon in Vietnam.
One morning, we had a Law of War class taught by our Military Law Instructor. He was a judge advocate (military lawyer), who also happened to be a recipient of the Navy Cross, the second highest decoration for heroism in the Naval Service. We knew that in his first six months in country he was a rifle platoon commander, before becoming a prosecutor in the Office of the Staff Judge Advocate of the 3d Marine Division.
The tenor of the instruction can best be summed up as follows: “If it don’t need killing, don’t kill it!” That is still a pretty succinct statement of the international Law of War.
That night, he happened to be our Assistant Instructor in an ambush problem. We set in the ambush and shortly thereafter, five Marines from Schools Demonstration Troops (who played the role of the enemy) entered the killing zone and we triggered the ambush.
After all of the enemy were seen to be “down,” the patrol leader for that problem sent out the search teams, per SOP. The patrol leader happened to be an attorney in civilian life.
The search team quickly reported, “Four pine boxes and one WIA. [Pause for effect] [Bang] Make that five pine boxes!”
I was radio operator for the problem. My classmate turned to me and said, “That’s a war crime!”
Our instructor—the guy who taught law of war that morning—put his hand on the arm of his colleague at the bar and whispered, “This morning, we were in a classroom back in the world [slang for the USA]. Tonight we are in an ambush in Indian Country. It’s all a matter of perspective, Lieutenant! See the difference?”
Yup! Lesson learned.
In all, in 17 weeks, we had about 1400 hours of instruction, not counting the physical training and administrative time (inspections, counseling, etc.). That is close to the classroom hours one spends in 4 years as an undergraduate.
And we made friendships that last for a lifetime.
My best friend was Lt Patrick P. Oates, a former enlisted Marine who was an old man of 28. My dear Patrick gave us all the benefit of the views of the enlisted Marine. As a former Sergeant, he had the leadership down cold. His roommate, Lieutenant Oliver Lawrence North, Jr. (yes, that North) was a Naval Academy graduate (Class of 1968) and a natural leader. They became two of my best friends.
Pat was Larry’s (for as Betsy North says, we were part of the “Larry” days, before Oliver North, Senior passed away) best man and I was one of the groomsmen at North’s wedding.
Pat and I sat side-by-side from St. Louis to Danang. Our families were very close, and we served together time and again until I retired in 1988.
Pat had served at Marine Barracks, Washington, DC, the "graduate school" of drill. He and I used to argue about drill issues. In 1977, when our Reserve battalion was at Camp Shelby, Mississippi, we staged a “Combat Review” for the Adjutant General of Mississippi. I was the parade Adjutant and Pat took command of Company H when its Reserve Company Commander went on emergency leave.
At one practice session, we were arguing over some arcane drill question. I said, “Well, let’s see what the Landing Party Manual says.”
Pat looked at me and said, “You brought the LPM with you?”
As luck would have it, it turned out that I was right. He laughed and said, “Well, if you die first, I’ll really have to study, because I don’t want you sitting up in the casket saying, ‘Damn it, Oates, you’re doing it wrong.’”
Years later, when he was Commanding Officer, Headquarters Battalion, Fleet Marine Force, Atlantic/Headquarters Commandant, II Marine Amphibious Force, he would often be at Camp Lejeune for field exercises of II MAF. As CO, Headquarters Battalion (which was up in Norfolk), he also made it a part of his mission to visit officers and their family members if they were transferred from Naval Hospital, Camp Lejeune to Naval Hospital, Portsmouth, VA.
One afternoon, I heard my secretary say, “Why, Colonel Oates, it is soooo nice to see you.”
He strolled into my office and sat down with a sigh. He said that he had just learned that the wife of an officer from Second Marine Division whom he had visited in hospital had gone home to be with the Lord.
He was in the field in Camp Lejeune, but the viewing was going to be held that night in Jacksonville, the city just outside the gate. Then we got to the nub of his problem.
“Michael, my boy, you can color me an idiot. After all these years, you would think I would know how to pack. Well, I don’t. I’ve got a civilian shirt, tie, and a pair of khaki slacks, but I don’t have a blazer. Do you have one I can borrow?”
I was stunned into silence, and then I started to laugh so hard I almost fell out of my chair. I finally caught my breath.
“Oates,” I said. “I don’t know what hits me harder—that you actually have a shirt, tie and trousers with you in the field, or that you are beating yourself up because you didn’t take a blazer to the field!”
We ran out to my quarters and fixed him up in fine form.
Pat died, on his 52d birthday in June 1992, after completing his daily three mile run. His battalion commander called me to inform me, and I got to Norfolk the next morning. His wife, Rita, said, “I want to read something to you.” It was from Pat’s “To be opened…” letter that we all have.
“Well, old girl,” it started. “You got the bad news. Take 5 minutes to cry and then call Mike McCarty. He’ll take care of everything.” I consider that to be one of the greatest honors of my life, along with the honor of walking his middle daughter, Stephanie, down the aisle at her wedding.
We drove a poor young Captain at Headquarters, Marine Corps crazy that weekend, trying to track down Larry North. He was retired by then and in business. At the viewing in DC on Monday night, as we approached 2100, Rita resigned herself to not seeing the Norths.
As I stepped out of the viewing room to round people up for evening prayers, there was Betsy, whom I had not seen in 10 years.
“Hi, Mac.”
“Where is he, Bets?”
She just pointed, and there he was, signing in. He had been informed that morning in San Diego. He caught the first available flight to DC to come to the viewing, and then flew back to San Diego at midnight for a Tuesday breakfast meeting. Before he left, after all were gone and all but the night lights were turned off, he took me by the arm.
“C’mon. Let’s say ‘Good night’ to Pat, just one last time .”
And we did—it was just just the three of us. I hope that when it is my turn to “cross over the river and rest in the shade of the trees,” when memory begins to dim, that that memory of that night will stay with me to the end.
Pat and Rita are waiting for us now, in a corner of Arlington National Cemetery, where Pat can keep an eye on the comings and goings at Disneyland East, aka, the Pentagon!
He has been gone for 16 years, and I sometimes still reach for the phone to call him when I see something that I know we would laugh over. I cannot wait until we are together again, with shipmates and our Marines at Marine Barracks, Heaven.
I have it on good authority that Heaven’s streets are guarded by United States Marines, much to the chagrin of the Army and the Navy, whose presence there is doubtful (except for our Corpsman, Surgeons and Chaplains who are really Marines, anyway—led by Father Capadano who was awarded the Medal of Honor (posthumously) for gallantry while serving with 3/5. Last I heard, he is only a miracle or two away from sainthood in the Church. How many armed forces in the world can have a patron saint who was really one of us?)
Oliver L. North is a complex man. As do we all, he has flaws. Most of us have many more. But in all that counts, in matters of duty and honor and loyalty and friendship, there is none better. I am proud to call him my friend.
That friends, is the essence of being a shipmate. And that is the real value of TBS. We learned that there are men who would be our life-long friends and who would rather die than let us down. And we assumed that same privilege and obligation, willingly, just because that is what Marines do.
On November 13, 1968, we graduated from TBS. I was ordered to report to Commanding General, First Marine Division then located at Hill 327 in Danang for duty as an infantry officer, MOS 0302.
After North’s wedding the next afternoon, I headed home for 30 days leave. Six officers gave up their leave and left almost immediately, including Larry North and Jim Burke.
For another 138 infantry officers in our class, we had a report date to Travis AFB, California of 18 December, 1968, forty years ago this coming Thursday.
We were getting close.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
15 December 2008
14 December 2008
THE BASIC SCHOOL
The Basic School is a unique institution in the US military. Only the Marine Corps has a Basic School.
OCS is a screening program, designed to weed out those who are unqualified to lead Marines in battle, due either to a lack of physical or mental stamina or a lack of motivation.
Once a candidate is commissioned, whether from the 10 week OCS program or the 12 week PLC program, he or she is ordered to The Basic School (TBS) for a lengthy course of instruction designed to qualify the officer to lead Marines and to qualify him to serve as a rifle platoon commander no matter what his military occupational specialty. “Every Marine a rifleman” is not a hollow slogan in the Corps.
When my son, Molson, graduated from Air Force flight school, his class had a formal dinner. As I was talking to one of his instructors, another LtCol, he said, “We need that. If I ask you, ‘What are you?’ you’ll say ‘I’m a Marine.’ I’ll then ask ‘And what do you do in the Marine Corps?’ to which you’ll reply, ‘I’m an infantry officer.’”
“Now, if you ask one of these lieutenants ‘What are you?’ he will probably say, ‘I’m a pilot.’ If you ask ‘And who do you fly for?’ he’ll say ‘The Air Force.’ There is a critical difference in the mind sets evidenced by those answers.”
He is right. Marines are Marines first and always. TBS teaches lieutenants to be officers of Marines.
The peacetime course in the early 1960’s was about 26 weeks long. When the war broke out it was shortened to about 21 weeks. For my class, it was just over 17 weeks.
We were a 400 man class (BC 12-68) organized into two 200 man companies, N or November and O or Oscar.
I reported to TBS on Thursday, June 13, five days out of college. On Friday morning, we met our company commander, Major John Flynn.
“Welcome, gentlemen,” he started. “We are glad to see you. You are the first class we could organize to replace the Hue City dead. Look to your left. Now look to your right. Two of the three of you will not complete a tour in Vietnam.”
He was right, at least as far as the infantry officers were concerned.
Hue City was the ancient imperial capital of Vietnam. The NVA occupied the ancient Citadel in the center of the city at the start of the Tet Offensive and held it for a couple of weeks, inflicting severe casualties on the 1st Marine Division before it was recaptured.
TBS was another blur. There was a real sense of urgency.
We started with three weeks of land navigation (map and compass), because you cannot train effectively unless you can read a map and locate yourself in the field.
The first 8 weeks or so were heavily academic: Personnel Administration, First Aid, Military Law, Operation and Functioning of the M-14 and M-16 rifles, the M-1911A1 .45cal. pistol, the M-79 40 mm grenade launcher, the M-60 7.62 mm and M-2 .50 cal. machine guns, the 60mm and 81 mm mortars, the flame thrower, the hand grenade, the Claymore anti-personnel mine and other tools of our chosen trade.
We learned about the AN-PRC 25 FM radio, wire communications, and how to use them to call for and adjust mortar and artillery fire and close air support. We spent more time on the bayonet and hand-to-hand combat training fields and we were all swim qualified.
We learned to plant mines, to clear mine fields, and to spot all sorts of booby traps. Little did we know…
We also held week-long leadership billets on which we were graded, stood countless inspections of our newly purchased uniforms (about $1,200 per officer, out of our own pockets) and our swords (another $400). We attended leadership panel and small group discussions, and met frequently with our staff platoon commander for critique and counseling.
It was on our first payday that a burning question was answered.
All through PLC, we had been told that we were lucky, because we had longevity. When we got paid the first time, I realized that I was getting $90.00 a month more than a classmate who had just graduated from The Great Severn River Small Boat and Barge Institute, also known as the United States Naval Academy. Nope, no longevity for them. Longevity is $90.00 per month.
We ran and ran and ran. We completed the timed and graded Physical Fitness Test (pushups, pull-ups, situps, squat thrusts, and a 600 yard shuttle run—in PT gear), the Physical Readiness Test (knotted rope climb, 18-inch step-ups, 25 meter casualty evacuation, 175 meter low crawl and advance by fire and maneuver, and three mile run, all in combat uniform, steel helmet, light marching pack, cartridge belt with two canteens, first aid kit, two magazines, bayonet, and M-14 rifle), timed hikes and timed runnings of the obstacle course and the confidence course. We rappelled from 60 foot towers, 90 foot cliffs, and from helicopters at 120 feet.
We quickly learned that we were in a new world.
In the regular training environment, such as that at Quantico, there was always a concern for safety. There were a series of flags that denoted the current “heat condition,” i.e., the heat/humidity index. A yellow flag required that unacclimatized troops knock off all strenuous work . A red flag required that all unacclimatized troops move in doors and commence training that was not physical in nature and that other troops knock off heavy exercise. A black flag required that all troops be moved indoors.
On the morning of our Physical Readiness Test, we were on the exercise field at 0500 and started the test as soon as we could see. At 0605, as we formed up and moved up to the road for the three mile run, some wag noticed that the black flag was already flying. (It was already 92 degrees with 96% humidity.)
Major Flynn heard him. “Gentlemen, they don’t fly those flags in country. It’s a mile and a half out and a mile and a half back. Good luck.”
I was running with Pat Oates, Larry North, Blackie Mohr, Tom Mahlum and a couple of others. It was well and truly miserable. At about two-miles, one of the other guys (I know who it was, but it is nobody else’s business—could have happened to any of us) started to suffer from heat stress. Still on the run, North and Oates began to remove his gear and pass it to the rest of us, while keeping our brother vertical. At two and a half miles, he fell for the first time. At two and three-quarters miles, he had stopped sweating and was brick red.
A Corpsman tried to pull him off the course, to no avail, so Doc ran with us and (contrary to regulations) carried some of our shipmate’s gear. That’s what makes our Docs the best in the world. (If I was on a major city street today and someone was seriously injured, I would start yelling “Corpsman up! Corpsman! Corpsman!” even as I moved to help. I will guaran-damn-tee it that if there is a former Corpsman in earshot, he’ll come dashing up, yelling, “Whatta we got, sir?)
We were all hurting—sopping wet,gasping, hardly able to talk to our shipmate to let him know the end was in sight. By now, all of our canteens were empty, having been poured on the heat casualty.
As we neared the finish line, our Staff Platoon Commander was running with us, shouting “Well done! Well done! But remember he and his rifle have to step over the finish line on his own!”
“Step” is a pretty broad term. We got him to the line, Oates holding one arm and North the other. I was steadying his rifle as it was slung over his shoulder. Tom Mahlum was holding his helmet. We all then let go, as he fell across the line into the waiting arms of two more Corpsmen.
As we policed up his weapon and gear, the Corpsmen immersed him in a kids’ swimming pool full to the brim with ice water.
We all finished the run in just under 24 minutes. He was back in the saddle by that afternoon, although he was on light duty until the next morning.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
OCS is a screening program, designed to weed out those who are unqualified to lead Marines in battle, due either to a lack of physical or mental stamina or a lack of motivation.
Once a candidate is commissioned, whether from the 10 week OCS program or the 12 week PLC program, he or she is ordered to The Basic School (TBS) for a lengthy course of instruction designed to qualify the officer to lead Marines and to qualify him to serve as a rifle platoon commander no matter what his military occupational specialty. “Every Marine a rifleman” is not a hollow slogan in the Corps.
When my son, Molson, graduated from Air Force flight school, his class had a formal dinner. As I was talking to one of his instructors, another LtCol, he said, “We need that. If I ask you, ‘What are you?’ you’ll say ‘I’m a Marine.’ I’ll then ask ‘And what do you do in the Marine Corps?’ to which you’ll reply, ‘I’m an infantry officer.’”
“Now, if you ask one of these lieutenants ‘What are you?’ he will probably say, ‘I’m a pilot.’ If you ask ‘And who do you fly for?’ he’ll say ‘The Air Force.’ There is a critical difference in the mind sets evidenced by those answers.”
He is right. Marines are Marines first and always. TBS teaches lieutenants to be officers of Marines.
The peacetime course in the early 1960’s was about 26 weeks long. When the war broke out it was shortened to about 21 weeks. For my class, it was just over 17 weeks.
We were a 400 man class (BC 12-68) organized into two 200 man companies, N or November and O or Oscar.
I reported to TBS on Thursday, June 13, five days out of college. On Friday morning, we met our company commander, Major John Flynn.
“Welcome, gentlemen,” he started. “We are glad to see you. You are the first class we could organize to replace the Hue City dead. Look to your left. Now look to your right. Two of the three of you will not complete a tour in Vietnam.”
He was right, at least as far as the infantry officers were concerned.
Hue City was the ancient imperial capital of Vietnam. The NVA occupied the ancient Citadel in the center of the city at the start of the Tet Offensive and held it for a couple of weeks, inflicting severe casualties on the 1st Marine Division before it was recaptured.
TBS was another blur. There was a real sense of urgency.
We started with three weeks of land navigation (map and compass), because you cannot train effectively unless you can read a map and locate yourself in the field.
The first 8 weeks or so were heavily academic: Personnel Administration, First Aid, Military Law, Operation and Functioning of the M-14 and M-16 rifles, the M-1911A1 .45cal. pistol, the M-79 40 mm grenade launcher, the M-60 7.62 mm and M-2 .50 cal. machine guns, the 60mm and 81 mm mortars, the flame thrower, the hand grenade, the Claymore anti-personnel mine and other tools of our chosen trade.
We learned about the AN-PRC 25 FM radio, wire communications, and how to use them to call for and adjust mortar and artillery fire and close air support. We spent more time on the bayonet and hand-to-hand combat training fields and we were all swim qualified.
We learned to plant mines, to clear mine fields, and to spot all sorts of booby traps. Little did we know…
We also held week-long leadership billets on which we were graded, stood countless inspections of our newly purchased uniforms (about $1,200 per officer, out of our own pockets) and our swords (another $400). We attended leadership panel and small group discussions, and met frequently with our staff platoon commander for critique and counseling.
It was on our first payday that a burning question was answered.
All through PLC, we had been told that we were lucky, because we had longevity. When we got paid the first time, I realized that I was getting $90.00 a month more than a classmate who had just graduated from The Great Severn River Small Boat and Barge Institute, also known as the United States Naval Academy. Nope, no longevity for them. Longevity is $90.00 per month.
We ran and ran and ran. We completed the timed and graded Physical Fitness Test (pushups, pull-ups, situps, squat thrusts, and a 600 yard shuttle run—in PT gear), the Physical Readiness Test (knotted rope climb, 18-inch step-ups, 25 meter casualty evacuation, 175 meter low crawl and advance by fire and maneuver, and three mile run, all in combat uniform, steel helmet, light marching pack, cartridge belt with two canteens, first aid kit, two magazines, bayonet, and M-14 rifle), timed hikes and timed runnings of the obstacle course and the confidence course. We rappelled from 60 foot towers, 90 foot cliffs, and from helicopters at 120 feet.
We quickly learned that we were in a new world.
In the regular training environment, such as that at Quantico, there was always a concern for safety. There were a series of flags that denoted the current “heat condition,” i.e., the heat/humidity index. A yellow flag required that unacclimatized troops knock off all strenuous work . A red flag required that all unacclimatized troops move in doors and commence training that was not physical in nature and that other troops knock off heavy exercise. A black flag required that all troops be moved indoors.
On the morning of our Physical Readiness Test, we were on the exercise field at 0500 and started the test as soon as we could see. At 0605, as we formed up and moved up to the road for the three mile run, some wag noticed that the black flag was already flying. (It was already 92 degrees with 96% humidity.)
Major Flynn heard him. “Gentlemen, they don’t fly those flags in country. It’s a mile and a half out and a mile and a half back. Good luck.”
I was running with Pat Oates, Larry North, Blackie Mohr, Tom Mahlum and a couple of others. It was well and truly miserable. At about two-miles, one of the other guys (I know who it was, but it is nobody else’s business—could have happened to any of us) started to suffer from heat stress. Still on the run, North and Oates began to remove his gear and pass it to the rest of us, while keeping our brother vertical. At two and a half miles, he fell for the first time. At two and three-quarters miles, he had stopped sweating and was brick red.
A Corpsman tried to pull him off the course, to no avail, so Doc ran with us and (contrary to regulations) carried some of our shipmate’s gear. That’s what makes our Docs the best in the world. (If I was on a major city street today and someone was seriously injured, I would start yelling “Corpsman up! Corpsman! Corpsman!” even as I moved to help. I will guaran-damn-tee it that if there is a former Corpsman in earshot, he’ll come dashing up, yelling, “Whatta we got, sir?)
We were all hurting—sopping wet,gasping, hardly able to talk to our shipmate to let him know the end was in sight. By now, all of our canteens were empty, having been poured on the heat casualty.
As we neared the finish line, our Staff Platoon Commander was running with us, shouting “Well done! Well done! But remember he and his rifle have to step over the finish line on his own!”
“Step” is a pretty broad term. We got him to the line, Oates holding one arm and North the other. I was steadying his rifle as it was slung over his shoulder. Tom Mahlum was holding his helmet. We all then let go, as he fell across the line into the waiting arms of two more Corpsmen.
As we policed up his weapon and gear, the Corpsmen immersed him in a kids’ swimming pool full to the brim with ice water.
We all finished the run in just under 24 minutes. He was back in the saddle by that afternoon, although he was on light duty until the next morning.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
THE WAR COMES HOME
The next day, we graduated. Friday afternoon was spent turning in gear, field-daying the squad bay and packing for home. Taps was at 2200, as usual. Staff Sergeant Johnston tucked us in, with his usually hearty “Good night, A—ho—s” as he hit the light switch. But we were a salty bunch by then and we broke the sound barrier with an equally hearty “Good Night m------------!”
The lights came back on and we had “game night” until 0157, when, after each of us shook Staff Sergeant Johnston’s hand, and amidst much laughter, we were allowed to hit the rack. (Regarding "game night," it is possible to cram two small candidates into one wall locker if you are really creative and don’t mind a broken finger or two!)
"Reveille" came three minutes later at 0200 so that we could eat breakfast, head for the airport, and return home to complete our final year of college. True to form, Neal was banished to the corner, without breakfast, because of those silly shoes!
My Mom picked me up at Lambert Field, St. Louis, on a warm July Saturday. I was tired, but exhilarated. Mom was subdued, unusually so.
As we crossed the I-270 bridge to Granite City, she asked, “So, did you still like it?”
“Oh, yeah, it was great.”
“Well, what do you want to do in the Marine Corps?”
“I want to be an infantry officer, of course,” I replied.
She gasped and nearly hit the side wall of the bridge. “Oh, Michael,” she asked. “Why the infantry?”
“Because that’s where the action is!”
“That’s what Butch Leutenegger said, and he’s dead!”
Thus did I learn that my next door neighbor, PFC Joseph C. “Butch” Leutenegger, USMC, had become one of 27 men from my home town of 40,000 to die in Vietnam. (His name appears on Panel 22 E, line 107 on The Wall.) He was killed in action on July 2, 1967 at the age of 20 while serving with 1st Battalion, 9th Marines (The Walking Dead).
Two other Marines from the St. Louis area were from Butch's company and were KIA in the same action. At the request of their families, they are buried side-by-side-by-side in Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery. It’s less lonely that way. Semper Fidelis.
Later that summer, Mom proposed that we (Mom, my brother, sister, grandmother and I) go on “one last family vacation” up through Canada. It was years later before the import of that the word “last” finally hit me.
During that trip, we attended the changing of the guard on the lawns of the House of Commons at Ottawa. The honored guest for that particular parade was a U.S. Marine who was Canadian. He had been wounded in action and was still on crutches.
A group of American war protesters tried to unfurl a banner of some sort, but the lads of the Royal Highland Regiment of Canada (The Black Watch of Canada) were having none of that!
To the skirl of the pipes, the protestors learned an important lesson—if you want to claim your rights as an American citizen, you actually have to be in the United States to do it. If you elect to run away from your country and refuse to pay the price for those rights—a price that can be pretty hefty—well, no one in your new place of residence is liable to care.
That was my introduction to a another curious phenomenon. Even as US draft dodgers headed into Canada, a number of Canadian warriors came south to enlist and serve in Vietnam. When I commanded Fox Company, Ninth Marines, my Company Gunnery Sergeant was a Canadian who had enlisted after his brother was wounded in action and medically discharged. In my opinion, we got the better part of that deal—we traded deadbeats and cowards for warriors—a shortage in every country’s bloodline.
In September, I returned to ISU for my final year. In the second half of the first semester, I lived in Decatur, Illinois and student taught at Stephen Decatur High School, in the same building from which my maternal grandfather graduated in 1895.
At Christmas, I traveled by train to Chicago for my pre-commissioning physical. When the Chief Hospital Corpsman at RS, Chicago saw the results of my eye test, he said, “Damn! I doubt that they’ll commission you with those eyes.”
It was a long train ride home. When I got home late that night, Mom saw that I was upset. She did her best to buck me up, but I was pretty distraught.
I finished my student teaching just as the Tet Offensive of 1968 commenced. One of the young teachers at Decatur High was pretty upset with me. It seems that her husband who was “really smart, way too smart to be wasted in the Army,” had nonetheless been drafted and was serving with the 2d Infantry Division in Korea.
She never lost an opportunity to remind me that while I was going to get killed in Vietnam, at least her husband was safe in Korea. I pretty much ignored her until the morning in the teachers’ lounge that someone told her that the North Koreans had seized USS Pueblo. When someone turned on the TV for the news and it showed the 2d ID moving into position to repel a possible attack on South Korea, she lost it.
Surprisingly, she turned to me, asking if her husband was going to be OK? Even more surprisingly, I told her he would be just fine. What really stunned me was that none of the other teachers, especially the women, had offered her any comfort.
When I returned to campus for my final semester, I received a letter from Headquarters, Marine Corps, offering me a regular commission. I accepted by return mail!
A couple of days later, I returned from class to find a note on my door from my roommate. “Call your Mom. Everything is OK.”
Now, as anyone who attended college in those days may recall, we did not regularly call home during the week. In fact, most waited until after 9:00 pm on Sunday when the long-distance tolls went way down. This was an extraordinary event. I called.
“I want to read a letter I got in the mail today,” Mom said. “Dear Mrs. McCarty, President Johnson has asked me to respond to your recent letter regarding your son, Michael……”
“Oh, jeez, Mom. What did you do?”
Well, at the height of the Tet Offensive, my Mother wrote to the President of the United States and said, essentially, “Hey, my kid wants to serve while other kids are running to Canada. Watcha gonna do about that?”
Actually, it is a very moving letter. It started, “I feel like the most unnatural of Mothers.” Friends, that is mother-love at its finest.
The rest of the school year rushed along. I met the girl who would become my first wife. LBJ unilaterally caved in and stopped bombing the north at a time when the North Vietnamese government was assessing its massive casualties in the Tet Offensive and coming to the realization that the bombing campaign had reduced them to a point that they would have to withdraw troops and ask for a cease fire within three weeks.
I finished my seminar paper for “Germany Between The World Wars” on the quality of proof at Nuremberg Trials. (The quality of proof was pretty low, but the bastards were clearly guilty, so we ought not feel bad that they hanged for specific offenses that were never proven. Churchill had actually argued against having trials and in favor of drum head courts-martial, followed by a quick visit to the gallows for the civilians and a display of Allied marksmanship for the High Command.)
Dr. King was assassinated and cities burned.
Bobby was assassinated and America shuddered..
And then, on Saturday June 8, 1968, I accepted a commission as a Second Lieutenant of Marines tendered by the President of the United States (with the advice and consent of the Senate).
My joy was tempered by the demand of the university that I wear a cap and gown over my uniform lest I should offend anyone in attendance at graduation. But my Mom deserved a graduation ceremony, so I swallowed my pride and walked across the stage.
Next stop, The Basic School.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
The lights came back on and we had “game night” until 0157, when, after each of us shook Staff Sergeant Johnston’s hand, and amidst much laughter, we were allowed to hit the rack. (Regarding "game night," it is possible to cram two small candidates into one wall locker if you are really creative and don’t mind a broken finger or two!)
"Reveille" came three minutes later at 0200 so that we could eat breakfast, head for the airport, and return home to complete our final year of college. True to form, Neal was banished to the corner, without breakfast, because of those silly shoes!
My Mom picked me up at Lambert Field, St. Louis, on a warm July Saturday. I was tired, but exhilarated. Mom was subdued, unusually so.
As we crossed the I-270 bridge to Granite City, she asked, “So, did you still like it?”
“Oh, yeah, it was great.”
“Well, what do you want to do in the Marine Corps?”
“I want to be an infantry officer, of course,” I replied.
She gasped and nearly hit the side wall of the bridge. “Oh, Michael,” she asked. “Why the infantry?”
“Because that’s where the action is!”
“That’s what Butch Leutenegger said, and he’s dead!”
Thus did I learn that my next door neighbor, PFC Joseph C. “Butch” Leutenegger, USMC, had become one of 27 men from my home town of 40,000 to die in Vietnam. (His name appears on Panel 22 E, line 107 on The Wall.) He was killed in action on July 2, 1967 at the age of 20 while serving with 1st Battalion, 9th Marines (The Walking Dead).
Two other Marines from the St. Louis area were from Butch's company and were KIA in the same action. At the request of their families, they are buried side-by-side-by-side in Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery. It’s less lonely that way. Semper Fidelis.
Later that summer, Mom proposed that we (Mom, my brother, sister, grandmother and I) go on “one last family vacation” up through Canada. It was years later before the import of that the word “last” finally hit me.
During that trip, we attended the changing of the guard on the lawns of the House of Commons at Ottawa. The honored guest for that particular parade was a U.S. Marine who was Canadian. He had been wounded in action and was still on crutches.
A group of American war protesters tried to unfurl a banner of some sort, but the lads of the Royal Highland Regiment of Canada (The Black Watch of Canada) were having none of that!
To the skirl of the pipes, the protestors learned an important lesson—if you want to claim your rights as an American citizen, you actually have to be in the United States to do it. If you elect to run away from your country and refuse to pay the price for those rights—a price that can be pretty hefty—well, no one in your new place of residence is liable to care.
That was my introduction to a another curious phenomenon. Even as US draft dodgers headed into Canada, a number of Canadian warriors came south to enlist and serve in Vietnam. When I commanded Fox Company, Ninth Marines, my Company Gunnery Sergeant was a Canadian who had enlisted after his brother was wounded in action and medically discharged. In my opinion, we got the better part of that deal—we traded deadbeats and cowards for warriors—a shortage in every country’s bloodline.
In September, I returned to ISU for my final year. In the second half of the first semester, I lived in Decatur, Illinois and student taught at Stephen Decatur High School, in the same building from which my maternal grandfather graduated in 1895.
At Christmas, I traveled by train to Chicago for my pre-commissioning physical. When the Chief Hospital Corpsman at RS, Chicago saw the results of my eye test, he said, “Damn! I doubt that they’ll commission you with those eyes.”
It was a long train ride home. When I got home late that night, Mom saw that I was upset. She did her best to buck me up, but I was pretty distraught.
I finished my student teaching just as the Tet Offensive of 1968 commenced. One of the young teachers at Decatur High was pretty upset with me. It seems that her husband who was “really smart, way too smart to be wasted in the Army,” had nonetheless been drafted and was serving with the 2d Infantry Division in Korea.
She never lost an opportunity to remind me that while I was going to get killed in Vietnam, at least her husband was safe in Korea. I pretty much ignored her until the morning in the teachers’ lounge that someone told her that the North Koreans had seized USS Pueblo. When someone turned on the TV for the news and it showed the 2d ID moving into position to repel a possible attack on South Korea, she lost it.
Surprisingly, she turned to me, asking if her husband was going to be OK? Even more surprisingly, I told her he would be just fine. What really stunned me was that none of the other teachers, especially the women, had offered her any comfort.
When I returned to campus for my final semester, I received a letter from Headquarters, Marine Corps, offering me a regular commission. I accepted by return mail!
A couple of days later, I returned from class to find a note on my door from my roommate. “Call your Mom. Everything is OK.”
Now, as anyone who attended college in those days may recall, we did not regularly call home during the week. In fact, most waited until after 9:00 pm on Sunday when the long-distance tolls went way down. This was an extraordinary event. I called.
“I want to read a letter I got in the mail today,” Mom said. “Dear Mrs. McCarty, President Johnson has asked me to respond to your recent letter regarding your son, Michael……”
“Oh, jeez, Mom. What did you do?”
Well, at the height of the Tet Offensive, my Mother wrote to the President of the United States and said, essentially, “Hey, my kid wants to serve while other kids are running to Canada. Watcha gonna do about that?”
Actually, it is a very moving letter. It started, “I feel like the most unnatural of Mothers.” Friends, that is mother-love at its finest.
The rest of the school year rushed along. I met the girl who would become my first wife. LBJ unilaterally caved in and stopped bombing the north at a time when the North Vietnamese government was assessing its massive casualties in the Tet Offensive and coming to the realization that the bombing campaign had reduced them to a point that they would have to withdraw troops and ask for a cease fire within three weeks.
I finished my seminar paper for “Germany Between The World Wars” on the quality of proof at Nuremberg Trials. (The quality of proof was pretty low, but the bastards were clearly guilty, so we ought not feel bad that they hanged for specific offenses that were never proven. Churchill had actually argued against having trials and in favor of drum head courts-martial, followed by a quick visit to the gallows for the civilians and a display of Allied marksmanship for the High Command.)
Dr. King was assassinated and cities burned.
Bobby was assassinated and America shuddered..
And then, on Saturday June 8, 1968, I accepted a commission as a Second Lieutenant of Marines tendered by the President of the United States (with the advice and consent of the Senate).
My joy was tempered by the demand of the university that I wear a cap and gown over my uniform lest I should offend anyone in attendance at graduation. But my Mom deserved a graduation ceremony, so I swallowed my pride and walked across the stage.
Next stop, The Basic School.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
12 December 2008
A SUMMER ALONG THE CHOPAWAMSIC
I returned to ISU for my Junior year, eager to get back to Quantico and the PLC Senior Course.
My PLC, Sr. summer (1967) began in June. It demonstrated how much change had occurred.
In 1966, our platoon sergeant, platoon commander, and company commander had all just returned from Vietnam. By 1967, we were seeing the quick movement of seasoned NCOs and junior officers to WesPac. While our company commander, platoon sergeant and sergeant-instructor were all combat vets of Vietnam, our platoon commander was a second lieutenant who had just graduated from The Basic School and was awaiting the start of his class at Communications Officers School.
This summer, we were mainside at OCS. Our barracks was at the Chopawamsic Annex, near Marine Corps Air Station, Quantico. (OCS is located at the former “Brown Field,” the original MCAS, Quantico.)
The classes on tactics were geared to Vietnam, and it was understood that if the war was still being fought when we were commissioned, we could expect to serve there.
Leadership and physical fitness were the main thrusts of the summer, with the Reaction Course, a timed exercise in which accomplishment of the mission was not as important as the candidate leader’s exhibition of basic leadership skills. This was especially difficult because the “troops” being led were other candidates. It was sort of like watching a litter of Border Collie pups, each trying to herd the rest of the litter.
We also learned to love the Hill Trail, a hiking course over seven steep hills in the woodlands adjacent to OCS. (Two years later, in Vietnam, we were moving into the foothills of the On Tau slope, just west of the Arizona Territory. My 1967 OCS bunkie, Neil Meier, had the point. When the Skipper, Frank Satterfield, asked for the condition of the terrain, Neil replied, “It makes the Hill Trail look like a table.” Every officer in the company who heard that description groaned.)
Towards the end of the course, in mid-July, the Platoon Commander sent word for me to report to his office. When I reported, he told me that there were a few regular commissions available to candidates who requested them. I immediately requested a regular commission.
(Most officers are commissioned into the reserve component of their branch of service. Then during their initial period of active duty (3 to 10 years), they have an opportunity to “augment” into the regular branch of the service, but there is no guarantee that they will be offered a regular commission.)
Of course, we were on the drill field almost daily. Like Staff Sergeant Winston, our Platoon Sergeant, Staff Sergeant Johnston, was, a former Drill Instructor. Drill was important to them and to us. Close order drill instills instantaneous obedience to orders and is still the most effective way to move a body of troops from one place to another.
It was during this summer that I saw something that I had never seen before. Because of a typographic error in the training schedule, we were rushed out of the squad bay one day and the company moved in route step over several of the steepest hills of the Hill Trail at almost double time. It was one of those muggy days so common to northern Virginia and DC.
We arrived at the instruction site on time and were ordered to ground our gear and sit. The class was a visual demonstration of the many combat formations of the fire team and squad. The squad leader wore a red helmet, the fire team leaders, black, the automatic riflemen, silver, and riflemen, orange.
As we looked for the first formation to come out of a tree line 300 meters away, I realized that our uniforms were actually black with perspiration. Moreover, we were steaming. Clouds of steam rose from our bodies. Corpsmen were rushing among us, issuing salt tablets, and watching for heat exhaustion and heat stroke. By then, however, we were in pretty good shape and no one dropped out.
I will leave for another day the Saturday that Staff Sergeant Johnston had finally had enough of our short-timer attitude and marched us into the Chopawamsic and then had us crawl back for close order drill with our wooden footlockers. (Did you know that if you really concentrate, you can stand at “right shoulder, footlocker” for nearly thirty minutes before the numbness causes you to drop it?)
Or the day that Neal Meier was denied liberty because he was wearing black and white loafers. “Damn, Candidate. My four year old daughter wears shoes just like that.”
And, of course, the night before graduation when Sergeant Hunt sent the “God-damned Candidate Sergeant of the Guard, out of the God-damned duty hut to tell those God-damned civilians to get their God-damned civilian automobile out of his God-damned Marine Corps street,” only to find that the car belonged to an Episcopal Bishop who was bringing his son back from liberty. All turned out well, however. The Bishop was a WWII Marine rifleman who was delighted to find linguistic standards had been maintained. (I was on a working party, field-daying the duty hut and saw it all.)
When we were ordered to secure and return to the squad bay, Mrs. “Bishop” and her reeeeeeeealy good looking daughter were still sitting in the car while Dad and Sergeant Hunt shared sea stories in the Duty Hut. I never knew that Bishops could talk like that. I suppose you can take the Bishop out of the Corps, but never really take the Corps out of the Bishop.
He actually accompanied Sergeant Hunt to our squad bay for lights out. After saying a pretty nice prayer for us and our leaders, he led us in The Hymn, followed by “God bless The Platoon Sergeant. God bless my new shipmate, Sergeant Hunt. God bless the Marine Corps. And God bless Chesty Puller.”
He was pretty good—it only took us three times to reach a sound volume that made it possible for God—and the Bishop—to hear us.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
My PLC, Sr. summer (1967) began in June. It demonstrated how much change had occurred.
In 1966, our platoon sergeant, platoon commander, and company commander had all just returned from Vietnam. By 1967, we were seeing the quick movement of seasoned NCOs and junior officers to WesPac. While our company commander, platoon sergeant and sergeant-instructor were all combat vets of Vietnam, our platoon commander was a second lieutenant who had just graduated from The Basic School and was awaiting the start of his class at Communications Officers School.
This summer, we were mainside at OCS. Our barracks was at the Chopawamsic Annex, near Marine Corps Air Station, Quantico. (OCS is located at the former “Brown Field,” the original MCAS, Quantico.)
The classes on tactics were geared to Vietnam, and it was understood that if the war was still being fought when we were commissioned, we could expect to serve there.
Leadership and physical fitness were the main thrusts of the summer, with the Reaction Course, a timed exercise in which accomplishment of the mission was not as important as the candidate leader’s exhibition of basic leadership skills. This was especially difficult because the “troops” being led were other candidates. It was sort of like watching a litter of Border Collie pups, each trying to herd the rest of the litter.
We also learned to love the Hill Trail, a hiking course over seven steep hills in the woodlands adjacent to OCS. (Two years later, in Vietnam, we were moving into the foothills of the On Tau slope, just west of the Arizona Territory. My 1967 OCS bunkie, Neil Meier, had the point. When the Skipper, Frank Satterfield, asked for the condition of the terrain, Neil replied, “It makes the Hill Trail look like a table.” Every officer in the company who heard that description groaned.)
Towards the end of the course, in mid-July, the Platoon Commander sent word for me to report to his office. When I reported, he told me that there were a few regular commissions available to candidates who requested them. I immediately requested a regular commission.
(Most officers are commissioned into the reserve component of their branch of service. Then during their initial period of active duty (3 to 10 years), they have an opportunity to “augment” into the regular branch of the service, but there is no guarantee that they will be offered a regular commission.)
Of course, we were on the drill field almost daily. Like Staff Sergeant Winston, our Platoon Sergeant, Staff Sergeant Johnston, was, a former Drill Instructor. Drill was important to them and to us. Close order drill instills instantaneous obedience to orders and is still the most effective way to move a body of troops from one place to another.
It was during this summer that I saw something that I had never seen before. Because of a typographic error in the training schedule, we were rushed out of the squad bay one day and the company moved in route step over several of the steepest hills of the Hill Trail at almost double time. It was one of those muggy days so common to northern Virginia and DC.
We arrived at the instruction site on time and were ordered to ground our gear and sit. The class was a visual demonstration of the many combat formations of the fire team and squad. The squad leader wore a red helmet, the fire team leaders, black, the automatic riflemen, silver, and riflemen, orange.
As we looked for the first formation to come out of a tree line 300 meters away, I realized that our uniforms were actually black with perspiration. Moreover, we were steaming. Clouds of steam rose from our bodies. Corpsmen were rushing among us, issuing salt tablets, and watching for heat exhaustion and heat stroke. By then, however, we were in pretty good shape and no one dropped out.
I will leave for another day the Saturday that Staff Sergeant Johnston had finally had enough of our short-timer attitude and marched us into the Chopawamsic and then had us crawl back for close order drill with our wooden footlockers. (Did you know that if you really concentrate, you can stand at “right shoulder, footlocker” for nearly thirty minutes before the numbness causes you to drop it?)
Or the day that Neal Meier was denied liberty because he was wearing black and white loafers. “Damn, Candidate. My four year old daughter wears shoes just like that.”
And, of course, the night before graduation when Sergeant Hunt sent the “God-damned Candidate Sergeant of the Guard, out of the God-damned duty hut to tell those God-damned civilians to get their God-damned civilian automobile out of his God-damned Marine Corps street,” only to find that the car belonged to an Episcopal Bishop who was bringing his son back from liberty. All turned out well, however. The Bishop was a WWII Marine rifleman who was delighted to find linguistic standards had been maintained. (I was on a working party, field-daying the duty hut and saw it all.)
When we were ordered to secure and return to the squad bay, Mrs. “Bishop” and her reeeeeeeealy good looking daughter were still sitting in the car while Dad and Sergeant Hunt shared sea stories in the Duty Hut. I never knew that Bishops could talk like that. I suppose you can take the Bishop out of the Corps, but never really take the Corps out of the Bishop.
He actually accompanied Sergeant Hunt to our squad bay for lights out. After saying a pretty nice prayer for us and our leaders, he led us in The Hymn, followed by “God bless The Platoon Sergeant. God bless my new shipmate, Sergeant Hunt. God bless the Marine Corps. And God bless Chesty Puller.”
He was pretty good—it only took us three times to reach a sound volume that made it possible for God—and the Bishop—to hear us.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
11 December 2008
AN UPSHUR SUMMER
That PLC, Jr. summer (1966) occurred at one of those branches in history that each generation faces. The first veterans of combat in Vietnam were rotating home, but the Corps was still gearing up for the long haul. Unbeknownst to most Americans, the Secretary of Defense, the aptly-named Robert Strange McNamara, had privately concluded that the war was unwinnable. He did not reveal that little tidbit of information until he wrote a book about his experience as SecDef in the 1990's.
About ten years ago, one of my Basic School classmates circulated a letter to the surviving members of our class, begging our forgiveness because “Last week, I was on the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard. I looked down the rail and there was Robert Strange McNamara, not ten feet away. And I did not throw that son-of-a-bitch overboard! Mea culpa. Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa.”
For those of us who lost Marines and classmates in 1968 and 1969, Marines who might not have died if RSMc had done the honorable thing, our fervent hope is that LBJ is saving McNamara a seat very close to the fire.
But I digress. At Camp Upshur in that summer of 1966, we were introduced to the Marine Corps in the same manner as had our fathers and brothers since at least 1917.
The summer was heavily laced with drill, physical training, and classes on basic military subjects. The leadership package was a real eye-opener to many of us, although those of us who had been patrol leaders and senior patrol leaders in Boy Scouts had some basic understanding of authority and responsibility. We were graded on everything from first aid, to Marine Corps history, to our ability to command a platoon on the drill field.
Our platoon commander was 1stLt John Rowe, who had just returned from Vietnam. One moment in the summer stands out for me. We were formed up outside the Company Headquarters. The Company Executive Officer (XO—second-in-command), another 1st Lieutenant, stuck his head out of the hatch and said “Hey, John. The Skipper needs to see you. He’s up at the Battalion CP (command post, i.e., headquarters) with the Old Man.”
Standing in the second rank, I remember thinking, “Oh, if only some day I am senior enough to call The Platoon Commander by his first name, to refer to The Company Commander as ‘Skipper,’ and that holy of holies, The Battalion Commander, as ‘The Old man,’ I will have arrived!”
There was one unique aspect of Marine Corps Officer Candidates School: the ability to DOR or “drop on request.” At any time, day or night, a candidate could speak to his platoon sergeant or the Duty NCO and, essentially, resign. The theory, a valid one in my estimation, is that if a man cannot handle the minimal stress of OCS and takes the step to formally “quit,” it is in the best interests of the Corps and those fine young Marines who could later be in his charge to get rid of the quitter right away. Such a request was acted upon nearly instantaneously and the request could not be withdrawn.
One afternoon, our last class of the day was bayonet drill. We were on the physical training field, rifles with fixed bayonets in place. Spread far enough apart that we could not accidently hurt the candidates around us, we were practicing the five basic offensive bayonet moves: slash, smash, vertical butt stroke, horizontal butt stroke, and jab.
The candidate next to me, a kid from New York City, was just going through the motions. It was late in a long day and I figured that he was tired.
The Platoon Sergeant spotted him and moved to position himself to the side of this character.
“Damn, candidate,” he growled. “This isn’t a dance in the high school gym. Thrust that bayonet like you mean it.”
“Oh, c’mon, Platoon sergeant,” my erstwhile classmate replied. “I could never stick that blade into another human being.”
My blood turned cold, and all of the other candidates adjacent to this clown froze, hoping that when the Platoon Sergeant exploded, he wouldn’t take us out, too.
Instead, he gently asked, “Do you really mean that, Son?”
“Yes, Platoon Sergeant, I guess I do.”
“All right, Candidate. You come with me.”
They walked off towards the barracks together.
We finished the drill about 20 minutes later and marched back to the squad bay to secure our rifles and get ready for evening chow. When we got there, our former companion’s locker was empty, his rack was stripped and the mattress rolled, and there was no evidence that he had ever existed.
I cannot think of a better demonstration for a group of potential officers that there is no room for a quitter on the battlefield, to see a serious lapse in character treated with compassion, but to also see that such a cancer must be quickly excised from the body.
The DOR’s name was never again spoken.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
About ten years ago, one of my Basic School classmates circulated a letter to the surviving members of our class, begging our forgiveness because “Last week, I was on the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard. I looked down the rail and there was Robert Strange McNamara, not ten feet away. And I did not throw that son-of-a-bitch overboard! Mea culpa. Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa.”
For those of us who lost Marines and classmates in 1968 and 1969, Marines who might not have died if RSMc had done the honorable thing, our fervent hope is that LBJ is saving McNamara a seat very close to the fire.
But I digress. At Camp Upshur in that summer of 1966, we were introduced to the Marine Corps in the same manner as had our fathers and brothers since at least 1917.
The summer was heavily laced with drill, physical training, and classes on basic military subjects. The leadership package was a real eye-opener to many of us, although those of us who had been patrol leaders and senior patrol leaders in Boy Scouts had some basic understanding of authority and responsibility. We were graded on everything from first aid, to Marine Corps history, to our ability to command a platoon on the drill field.
Our platoon commander was 1stLt John Rowe, who had just returned from Vietnam. One moment in the summer stands out for me. We were formed up outside the Company Headquarters. The Company Executive Officer (XO—second-in-command), another 1st Lieutenant, stuck his head out of the hatch and said “Hey, John. The Skipper needs to see you. He’s up at the Battalion CP (command post, i.e., headquarters) with the Old Man.”
Standing in the second rank, I remember thinking, “Oh, if only some day I am senior enough to call The Platoon Commander by his first name, to refer to The Company Commander as ‘Skipper,’ and that holy of holies, The Battalion Commander, as ‘The Old man,’ I will have arrived!”
There was one unique aspect of Marine Corps Officer Candidates School: the ability to DOR or “drop on request.” At any time, day or night, a candidate could speak to his platoon sergeant or the Duty NCO and, essentially, resign. The theory, a valid one in my estimation, is that if a man cannot handle the minimal stress of OCS and takes the step to formally “quit,” it is in the best interests of the Corps and those fine young Marines who could later be in his charge to get rid of the quitter right away. Such a request was acted upon nearly instantaneously and the request could not be withdrawn.
One afternoon, our last class of the day was bayonet drill. We were on the physical training field, rifles with fixed bayonets in place. Spread far enough apart that we could not accidently hurt the candidates around us, we were practicing the five basic offensive bayonet moves: slash, smash, vertical butt stroke, horizontal butt stroke, and jab.
The candidate next to me, a kid from New York City, was just going through the motions. It was late in a long day and I figured that he was tired.
The Platoon Sergeant spotted him and moved to position himself to the side of this character.
“Damn, candidate,” he growled. “This isn’t a dance in the high school gym. Thrust that bayonet like you mean it.”
“Oh, c’mon, Platoon sergeant,” my erstwhile classmate replied. “I could never stick that blade into another human being.”
My blood turned cold, and all of the other candidates adjacent to this clown froze, hoping that when the Platoon Sergeant exploded, he wouldn’t take us out, too.
Instead, he gently asked, “Do you really mean that, Son?”
“Yes, Platoon Sergeant, I guess I do.”
“All right, Candidate. You come with me.”
They walked off towards the barracks together.
We finished the drill about 20 minutes later and marched back to the squad bay to secure our rifles and get ready for evening chow. When we got there, our former companion’s locker was empty, his rack was stripped and the mattress rolled, and there was no evidence that he had ever existed.
I cannot think of a better demonstration for a group of potential officers that there is no room for a quitter on the battlefield, to see a serious lapse in character treated with compassion, but to also see that such a cancer must be quickly excised from the body.
The DOR’s name was never again spoken.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
10 December 2008
STAFF SERGEANT WINSTON
In any man’s life there are other men who stand out as role models and, often, heroes. My Dad is one of my heroes, even 45 years after his death. So is my Grand-dad. Not a unique situation for men of my generation.
A third is Staff Sergeant Samuel Winston, USMC. Of course, we never used either his first or last names—he was “The Platoon Sergeant” and that was enough.
At 0530, we were rousted out of our racks, given 30 seconds to perform the three S’s (use the sanitary facility, shower and shave), dress our miserable bodies in our scummy civilian clothes and fall out into the “battalion street” to be marched to breakfast.
By 0620, we had learned that before every meal we were to give thanks (“Every day’s a holiday, every meal’s a banquet! Marine Corps!”), eaten (my first experience with stewed tomatoes, a little fat back, and okra as a breakfast dish—-I still love it when I can get it, especially with grits on the side), and marched (“gaggled”) back to the squad bay to collect our linen and turn it back in, field day (sweep and swab) the squad bay and head, and fall in for a bus ride to our new home away from home, Camp Upshur.
For anyone who has ever contemplated “the end of the earth,” cf, Acts 1:8, I can tell you that Camp Upshur is about two miles further down the road, next to the gates of Hell. It was a WWII-era camp located near the western boundary of MCB, Quantico, composed of tin Quonset hut barracks and steel “Butler” buildings used for offices, classrooms, supply warehouses, the armory, and the mess hall. There was an asphalt "parade deck," aka, "grinder", an obstacle course and a sand pit for some real fun.
Each platoon of 50 candidates was housed in its own Quonset hut squad bay. The four platoons in a company shared a "head" (bathroom) in a fifth, central Quonset Hut--15 commodes (no stalls or privacy barriers), a long, trough urinal, 15 sinks, and a large shower room with 11 shower heads ringing the bulkhead. Perfect for "Navy" showers!
There was also a wash rack located on the exterior of one end of the hut, and four coin-operated washers and dryers in a small room at the other end of the the hut.
We arrived at Camp Upshur at about 0700. We were herded into a large classroom for in-processing which entailed filling out numerous forms so that we could be paid, issued ID cards, issued individual copies of the “Candidate Regs”, a small pocket sized volume that we were to study at any time that we were doing nothing else, marched to sickbay for shots and a rudimentary physical, and marched back to the admin classroom where we were broken down into platoons. I was assigned to “4th Platoon, Golf Company, Upshur Training Battalion.”
At about 1000, we were then ordered to fall out into the street. And we met him.
If I were to see Staff Sergeant Winston walking down the street today, 42 years later, I believe I would recognize him from six blocks away. He had bearing with a capital “B.” He stood about 6’ 4” tall , and probably weighed about 175. He marched in that distinctive way of the Marine Drill Instructor wherever he went. His eyes penetrated.
And he was a black Marine.
This was 1966. America was just entering the throes of the civil rights movement on a national scale. The March on Washington had occurred less than two years before. Many of us, myself included, had never met a “negro.” And here he was. I will never forget his self-introduction.
“You people are late.” (Due to the national airline strike, which, we now came to realize, was solely our fault.) “You are wasting your time, which is bad. You are wasting the Marine Corps’ time, which is worse. And you are wasting my time, which is unforgiveable! You have put me 24 hours behind schedule. We are going to catch up!”
He turned us over to our Sergeant-Instructor, Sergeant Hicks, a skinny little red head. And now things got hectic!
We double-timed to supply to draw uniforms, equipment, and our "bucket issue.". We double-timed back to our squad bay to stow all that gear and finally change into our new uniforms in the allotted “two minutes.” We actually got nearly 20, but it did seem like only two.
We drew linen and blankets and made up our racks—three or four times until we got it somewhere within a mile or two of right. Then it was double-time to the barber shop for a haircut, high and tight. Then to the armory to draw our rifles and equipment, and back to the squad bay to lock our rifles in our lockers.
And to hear for the first time, a Winston-ism: “And woe be unto the candidate what leaves his weapon unsecured!”
Then it was time for Noon chow. The thermometer was at about 95, we were operating on two hours sleep in the past 30 hours, starting to feel the effects of our shots, and it was only Noon!
The rest of the day is a blur, but by 2130, we had caught up. We were lined up, in the squad bay, and learning the lingo, as the tin crackled and popped from the heat.
Doors were hatches, windows were portholes. The ceiling was the overhead and the floor the deck. Walls were bulkheads, stairs were ladders, and field equipment was collectively “782 gear.” Fifty-five gallon garbage cans were “GI cans,” mops were swabs, and sailors (other than our beloved Corpsmen, who are always and forever “Doc”) were swabbies, squids, or ducks. The purpose of the pockets on our utility shirts and trousers (the green field uniform) must have been top secret, because we sure as sunrise were never to put anything in them. Every button must always be buttoned because, "Some poor old Lady worked hard to sew that on and here you are, sand for brains, ignoring her! Now [rip] sew it back on and keep it buttoned." "Irish pennants" (loose strings, from the British naval slang in the days of wooden ships and iron men for loose or dangling ropes or lines) could drive The Platoon Sergeant and The Sergeant-Instructor into fits of apoplexy!
We were introduced to "BRASSO" and told that were were to shine our brass at least daily, until it "Gleams like a diamond in a goat's ass." An enchanting word picture, eh?
And our rifles. We memorized "The Creed of the Marine Rifleman," written by MajGen William Rupertus during WWII:
Each rifle had a name; after 42 years, I still recall that mine was named “U.S. Rifle,caliber 7.62 mm, M-14, serial number 2399451.”
That night, a candidate dropped his rifle. The rifle must have been very sad, because it got a special privilege—-it slept in the candidate’s bunk while he slept on the deck. By morning, they were once again best friends.
And it was always "my rifle" or "my weapon" or "my piece," never a "gun." To help the miscreant who called a rifle a "gun," there was a little ditty. The entire presentation resembled a skit from summer camp. The poor soul held his 10 pound rifle in his right hand at the balance of the piece, arm fully extended straight above his head. In his left, he held an appropriate, centrally located piece of his anatomy. He then recited at the top of his lungs, "This my rifle. [Pumping rifle.] This is my gun. [Waving anatomy.] This is for killing. [Pump rifle.] This is for fun. [Back to anatomy.]"
The Marine Corps Manual must prescribe twenty repetitions of the ditty, because just one never seemed to satisfy The Platoon Sergeant and he had the Marine Corps Manual and the Landing Party Manual memorized cold!
The Platoon Sergeant, the Sergeant Instructor, and any other officer or enlisted Marines were always addressed in the third person. (If one slipped and addressed The Platoon Sergeant as “you,” the response was invariably, “You? Ewe? A ewe is a female sheep, sand for brains. Do you see any wool growing around my [a particular orifice common to the human body]?” The lesson was then reinforced in some manner well-calculated to foster memory. Remember how you learned that stoves are hot and not to be touched—evolutionary instinct is based on pain!)
Finally, at 2200, it was Taps and lights out, but not before our evening prayer. “God bless, The Platoon Sergeant, God bless The Sergeant-Instructor, God bless The Platoon Commander, and God bless the Marine Corps. And God bless Chesty Puller.”
We then sang, for the first time in my Marine Corps career, The Hymn.
After lights out, I heard the candidate in the rack below me and the one in the next top bunk talking. They were fraternity brothers, two of 25 members of the platoon from Auburn University in Alabama.
“I don’t care,” said one. “Ain’t no [unversal adjective] n----- gonna tell me what to do!”
I remember thinking, Oh, my. Yes he will and you will obey, ‘cause if you don’t, they are never gonna find your grave out here in the piney woods.
That conversation was a relic of times that were, gladly, changing.
And here is why Samuel Winston, Staff Sergeant (and later Gunnery Sergeant) of Marines, is one of my heroes. Six weeks later, when we graduated and were declared to be the battalion honor platoon, those southern gentlemen from Auburn were the first ones in line to shake his hand and, in their soft southern drawls, thank him.
An American hero, indeed.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
A third is Staff Sergeant Samuel Winston, USMC. Of course, we never used either his first or last names—he was “The Platoon Sergeant” and that was enough.
At 0530, we were rousted out of our racks, given 30 seconds to perform the three S’s (use the sanitary facility, shower and shave), dress our miserable bodies in our scummy civilian clothes and fall out into the “battalion street” to be marched to breakfast.
By 0620, we had learned that before every meal we were to give thanks (“Every day’s a holiday, every meal’s a banquet! Marine Corps!”), eaten (my first experience with stewed tomatoes, a little fat back, and okra as a breakfast dish—-I still love it when I can get it, especially with grits on the side), and marched (“gaggled”) back to the squad bay to collect our linen and turn it back in, field day (sweep and swab) the squad bay and head, and fall in for a bus ride to our new home away from home, Camp Upshur.
For anyone who has ever contemplated “the end of the earth,” cf, Acts 1:8, I can tell you that Camp Upshur is about two miles further down the road, next to the gates of Hell. It was a WWII-era camp located near the western boundary of MCB, Quantico, composed of tin Quonset hut barracks and steel “Butler” buildings used for offices, classrooms, supply warehouses, the armory, and the mess hall. There was an asphalt "parade deck," aka, "grinder", an obstacle course and a sand pit for some real fun.
Each platoon of 50 candidates was housed in its own Quonset hut squad bay. The four platoons in a company shared a "head" (bathroom) in a fifth, central Quonset Hut--15 commodes (no stalls or privacy barriers), a long, trough urinal, 15 sinks, and a large shower room with 11 shower heads ringing the bulkhead. Perfect for "Navy" showers!
There was also a wash rack located on the exterior of one end of the hut, and four coin-operated washers and dryers in a small room at the other end of the the hut.
We arrived at Camp Upshur at about 0700. We were herded into a large classroom for in-processing which entailed filling out numerous forms so that we could be paid, issued ID cards, issued individual copies of the “Candidate Regs”, a small pocket sized volume that we were to study at any time that we were doing nothing else, marched to sickbay for shots and a rudimentary physical, and marched back to the admin classroom where we were broken down into platoons. I was assigned to “4th Platoon, Golf Company, Upshur Training Battalion.”
At about 1000, we were then ordered to fall out into the street. And we met him.
If I were to see Staff Sergeant Winston walking down the street today, 42 years later, I believe I would recognize him from six blocks away. He had bearing with a capital “B.” He stood about 6’ 4” tall , and probably weighed about 175. He marched in that distinctive way of the Marine Drill Instructor wherever he went. His eyes penetrated.
And he was a black Marine.
This was 1966. America was just entering the throes of the civil rights movement on a national scale. The March on Washington had occurred less than two years before. Many of us, myself included, had never met a “negro.” And here he was. I will never forget his self-introduction.
“You people are late.” (Due to the national airline strike, which, we now came to realize, was solely our fault.) “You are wasting your time, which is bad. You are wasting the Marine Corps’ time, which is worse. And you are wasting my time, which is unforgiveable! You have put me 24 hours behind schedule. We are going to catch up!”
He turned us over to our Sergeant-Instructor, Sergeant Hicks, a skinny little red head. And now things got hectic!
We double-timed to supply to draw uniforms, equipment, and our "bucket issue.". We double-timed back to our squad bay to stow all that gear and finally change into our new uniforms in the allotted “two minutes.” We actually got nearly 20, but it did seem like only two.
We drew linen and blankets and made up our racks—three or four times until we got it somewhere within a mile or two of right. Then it was double-time to the barber shop for a haircut, high and tight. Then to the armory to draw our rifles and equipment, and back to the squad bay to lock our rifles in our lockers.
And to hear for the first time, a Winston-ism: “And woe be unto the candidate what leaves his weapon unsecured!”
Then it was time for Noon chow. The thermometer was at about 95, we were operating on two hours sleep in the past 30 hours, starting to feel the effects of our shots, and it was only Noon!
The rest of the day is a blur, but by 2130, we had caught up. We were lined up, in the squad bay, and learning the lingo, as the tin crackled and popped from the heat.
Doors were hatches, windows were portholes. The ceiling was the overhead and the floor the deck. Walls were bulkheads, stairs were ladders, and field equipment was collectively “782 gear.” Fifty-five gallon garbage cans were “GI cans,” mops were swabs, and sailors (other than our beloved Corpsmen, who are always and forever “Doc”) were swabbies, squids, or ducks. The purpose of the pockets on our utility shirts and trousers (the green field uniform) must have been top secret, because we sure as sunrise were never to put anything in them. Every button must always be buttoned because, "Some poor old Lady worked hard to sew that on and here you are, sand for brains, ignoring her! Now [rip] sew it back on and keep it buttoned." "Irish pennants" (loose strings, from the British naval slang in the days of wooden ships and iron men for loose or dangling ropes or lines) could drive The Platoon Sergeant and The Sergeant-Instructor into fits of apoplexy!
We were introduced to "BRASSO" and told that were were to shine our brass at least daily, until it "Gleams like a diamond in a goat's ass." An enchanting word picture, eh?
And our rifles. We memorized "The Creed of the Marine Rifleman," written by MajGen William Rupertus during WWII:
This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is MINE. My rifle is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life. My rifle without me is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless.
I must fire my rifle true.
I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me. I will...
My rifle and myself know that what counts in war is not the rounds we fire, the noise of our bursts, nor the smoke we make. We know it is the hits that count. We will hit...
My rifle is human, even as I, because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strengths, its parts, its accessories, its sights, and its barrel.
I will ever guard it against the ravages of weather and damage. I will keep my rifle clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will...
Before God I swear this creed.
My rifle and myself are the defenders of my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.
So be it, until there is no enemy, but PEACE.
Each rifle had a name; after 42 years, I still recall that mine was named “U.S. Rifle,caliber 7.62 mm, M-14, serial number 2399451.”
That night, a candidate dropped his rifle. The rifle must have been very sad, because it got a special privilege—-it slept in the candidate’s bunk while he slept on the deck. By morning, they were once again best friends.
And it was always "my rifle" or "my weapon" or "my piece," never a "gun." To help the miscreant who called a rifle a "gun," there was a little ditty. The entire presentation resembled a skit from summer camp. The poor soul held his 10 pound rifle in his right hand at the balance of the piece, arm fully extended straight above his head. In his left, he held an appropriate, centrally located piece of his anatomy. He then recited at the top of his lungs, "This my rifle. [Pumping rifle.] This is my gun. [Waving anatomy.] This is for killing. [Pump rifle.] This is for fun. [Back to anatomy.]"
The Marine Corps Manual must prescribe twenty repetitions of the ditty, because just one never seemed to satisfy The Platoon Sergeant and he had the Marine Corps Manual and the Landing Party Manual memorized cold!
The Platoon Sergeant, the Sergeant Instructor, and any other officer or enlisted Marines were always addressed in the third person. (If one slipped and addressed The Platoon Sergeant as “you,” the response was invariably, “You? Ewe? A ewe is a female sheep, sand for brains. Do you see any wool growing around my [a particular orifice common to the human body]?” The lesson was then reinforced in some manner well-calculated to foster memory. Remember how you learned that stoves are hot and not to be touched—evolutionary instinct is based on pain!)
Finally, at 2200, it was Taps and lights out, but not before our evening prayer. “God bless, The Platoon Sergeant, God bless The Sergeant-Instructor, God bless The Platoon Commander, and God bless the Marine Corps. And God bless Chesty Puller.”
We then sang, for the first time in my Marine Corps career, The Hymn.
After lights out, I heard the candidate in the rack below me and the one in the next top bunk talking. They were fraternity brothers, two of 25 members of the platoon from Auburn University in Alabama.
“I don’t care,” said one. “Ain’t no [unversal adjective] n----- gonna tell me what to do!”
I remember thinking, Oh, my. Yes he will and you will obey, ‘cause if you don’t, they are never gonna find your grave out here in the piney woods.
That conversation was a relic of times that were, gladly, changing.
And here is why Samuel Winston, Staff Sergeant (and later Gunnery Sergeant) of Marines, is one of my heroes. Six weeks later, when we graduated and were declared to be the battalion honor platoon, those southern gentlemen from Auburn were the first ones in line to shake his hand and, in their soft southern drawls, thank him.
An American hero, indeed.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
09 December 2008
EVERY CLIME AND PLACE
When I returned to ISU for my sophomore year, I immediately checked the University Union calendar for the scheduled visit by the Marine Officer Selection Officer from Recruiting Station, Chicago.
In November 1965, a new Officer Selection Officer, Captain R. Richard Thrasher, USMC, made his first trip to the ISU campus. I was waiting in the parking lot of the Student Union when he arrived, and helped him carry recruiting materials into the building. He was freshly returned from Vietnam where he had commanded Company F, 2d Battalion, 9th Marines during its March 1965 landings at Danang. (Ten years later, in March 1975, I assumed command of Fox Company, Ninth Marines at Camp Schwab, Okinawa shortly before Danang fell to the North Vietnamese Army. In October 1975, I reported to Company F, 24th Marines in Milwaukee as the Inspector-Instructor. The Inspector-Instructor of 2/24 in Chicago was LtCol R. Richard Thrasher. It’s a small Corps!)
On 22 November 1965, the second anniversary of JFK’s assassination, I took the oath of enlistment in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve and was assigned to the Platoon Leaders’ Course. The PLC was an officer-candidate program designed, in part, for colleges and universities that had no ROTC programs. The PLC candidate had no military duties prior to commissioning except two six-week sessions at Officer Candidates School at Marine Corps Schools (now Marine Corps Base), Quantico, Virginia. One other benefit that was repeatedly touted to us was that, as enlisted reservists, we were earning “longevity.” It took years for me to figure that one out. Stay tuned.
In the summer of 1966, I was ordered to attend the PLC, JR. course. Our flight out of St. Louis was delayed by 24 hours due to a national airline strike, so we arrived at Washington National Airport at about 9 pm on a hot Tuesday in mid-July. As we waited for the bus that would pick us up and deliver us to Quantico, several “elderly” ladies (in their 50’s, I would guess) took an interest in us.
When the bus arrived, a Sergeant disembarked and pleasantly said, “OK, Candidates, pick up your gear and find a seat on the bus.”
The ladies wished us well, and I remember hearing one comment on “that nice young man who is taking such good care of the boys.”
As the bus door closed and we moved out, it began! The “nice young man” and another Sergeant turned into quintessential NCOs. Initially, they must have been told that we were deaf, because every order and instruction neared the 100 decibel level. Because they were often given with the Sergeant's mouth only millimeters from our ears, we were able to hear them despite our presumed deafness.
We were informed that we were the lowest form of life on the planet, lower than whale excrement on the floor of the Mariannas Trench. Under no circumstances were we Marines. We were not fit to be the pus in a pimple on a Marine's posterior and any thought to the contrary had better never even enter our pea brains!
We were to “sit at attention,” a contradiction in terms that I have never been able to fathom. Not a sound was to leave our miserable mouths, now known as “filthy commodes.” We would speak only if spoken to. The only acceptable responses were “Yes, Sergeant,” “No, Sergeant,” and “Aye, Aye, Sergeant.” Although all windows (“portholes”) on the bus were closed and the humidity began to rise to equal the temperature (high 90’s at 10 pm, er…”2200”), under no circumstances were we to sleep.
I soon learned a valuable skill, the ability to sleep "at attention" with my eyes wide open.
We arrived at the transient barracks at OCS at about 2300. We were hurried into an empty bunkroom, issued two sheets, a blanket and a pillow case and instructed to “make up those racks,” i.e., steel bunk beds aligned along both sides of the "squadbay." The first effort nearly reduced one of the Sergeants to tears.
“I am a good Christian man! I am, candidates! So why has God punished me by sending me helpless, hopeless, hapless vermin like you people?”
I already liked him—he was a wordsmith. Fortunately, I never found the time to express my appreciation. I say "fortunately" because OCS backs up on Chopawamsic Creek, a tributary of the of the Potomac. It is a tidal stream and the muck and mire are three feet deep at low tide. I doubt if anyone would have ever found my remains after such a presumtuous conversation!
Finally, by 0200, we had made up our racks to some semblance of acceptability and we were allowed to actually test them. That is, we had “30 seconds to get out of them scummy civilian rags, right down to them scummy civilian skivvies, and fall in at the foot of them racks. Then, when I give the order, you will fall out and get in the sack. Fall out. Nooooooo. Out out out. What was that? WHAT was that? Now fall in and when I give the order, fall out and get in the sack. Arrrghhh! Outoutoutout! You people could screw up the Lord's Prayer. If you want to play, we have all night. Now fall out!"
Ah, sweet success. We were now to be granted the privilege of two and a half hours sleep, but not until we had said our prayers. “God bless the Marine Corps. God bless the Commandant of the Marine Corps. God bless our two sergeants and please forgive us for causing them so much distress, and feel free to strike any of us dead who might think that we were Marines, worthless whale dung that we really were. And God bless Chesty Puller.”
It occurred to me that perhaps he had been a seminarian in another life.
By the third try, we finally achieved a volume that made it possible for God and the sergeants to hear us.
The lights went out.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
In November 1965, a new Officer Selection Officer, Captain R. Richard Thrasher, USMC, made his first trip to the ISU campus. I was waiting in the parking lot of the Student Union when he arrived, and helped him carry recruiting materials into the building. He was freshly returned from Vietnam where he had commanded Company F, 2d Battalion, 9th Marines during its March 1965 landings at Danang. (Ten years later, in March 1975, I assumed command of Fox Company, Ninth Marines at Camp Schwab, Okinawa shortly before Danang fell to the North Vietnamese Army. In October 1975, I reported to Company F, 24th Marines in Milwaukee as the Inspector-Instructor. The Inspector-Instructor of 2/24 in Chicago was LtCol R. Richard Thrasher. It’s a small Corps!)
On 22 November 1965, the second anniversary of JFK’s assassination, I took the oath of enlistment in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve and was assigned to the Platoon Leaders’ Course. The PLC was an officer-candidate program designed, in part, for colleges and universities that had no ROTC programs. The PLC candidate had no military duties prior to commissioning except two six-week sessions at Officer Candidates School at Marine Corps Schools (now Marine Corps Base), Quantico, Virginia. One other benefit that was repeatedly touted to us was that, as enlisted reservists, we were earning “longevity.” It took years for me to figure that one out. Stay tuned.
In the summer of 1966, I was ordered to attend the PLC, JR. course. Our flight out of St. Louis was delayed by 24 hours due to a national airline strike, so we arrived at Washington National Airport at about 9 pm on a hot Tuesday in mid-July. As we waited for the bus that would pick us up and deliver us to Quantico, several “elderly” ladies (in their 50’s, I would guess) took an interest in us.
When the bus arrived, a Sergeant disembarked and pleasantly said, “OK, Candidates, pick up your gear and find a seat on the bus.”
The ladies wished us well, and I remember hearing one comment on “that nice young man who is taking such good care of the boys.”
As the bus door closed and we moved out, it began! The “nice young man” and another Sergeant turned into quintessential NCOs. Initially, they must have been told that we were deaf, because every order and instruction neared the 100 decibel level. Because they were often given with the Sergeant's mouth only millimeters from our ears, we were able to hear them despite our presumed deafness.
We were informed that we were the lowest form of life on the planet, lower than whale excrement on the floor of the Mariannas Trench. Under no circumstances were we Marines. We were not fit to be the pus in a pimple on a Marine's posterior and any thought to the contrary had better never even enter our pea brains!
We were to “sit at attention,” a contradiction in terms that I have never been able to fathom. Not a sound was to leave our miserable mouths, now known as “filthy commodes.” We would speak only if spoken to. The only acceptable responses were “Yes, Sergeant,” “No, Sergeant,” and “Aye, Aye, Sergeant.” Although all windows (“portholes”) on the bus were closed and the humidity began to rise to equal the temperature (high 90’s at 10 pm, er…”2200”), under no circumstances were we to sleep.
I soon learned a valuable skill, the ability to sleep "at attention" with my eyes wide open.
We arrived at the transient barracks at OCS at about 2300. We were hurried into an empty bunkroom, issued two sheets, a blanket and a pillow case and instructed to “make up those racks,” i.e., steel bunk beds aligned along both sides of the "squadbay." The first effort nearly reduced one of the Sergeants to tears.
“I am a good Christian man! I am, candidates! So why has God punished me by sending me helpless, hopeless, hapless vermin like you people?”
I already liked him—he was a wordsmith. Fortunately, I never found the time to express my appreciation. I say "fortunately" because OCS backs up on Chopawamsic Creek, a tributary of the of the Potomac. It is a tidal stream and the muck and mire are three feet deep at low tide. I doubt if anyone would have ever found my remains after such a presumtuous conversation!
Finally, by 0200, we had made up our racks to some semblance of acceptability and we were allowed to actually test them. That is, we had “30 seconds to get out of them scummy civilian rags, right down to them scummy civilian skivvies, and fall in at the foot of them racks. Then, when I give the order, you will fall out and get in the sack. Fall out. Nooooooo. Out out out. What was that? WHAT was that? Now fall in and when I give the order, fall out and get in the sack. Arrrghhh! Outoutoutout! You people could screw up the Lord's Prayer. If you want to play, we have all night. Now fall out!"
Ah, sweet success. We were now to be granted the privilege of two and a half hours sleep, but not until we had said our prayers. “God bless the Marine Corps. God bless the Commandant of the Marine Corps. God bless our two sergeants and please forgive us for causing them so much distress, and feel free to strike any of us dead who might think that we were Marines, worthless whale dung that we really were. And God bless Chesty Puller.”
It occurred to me that perhaps he had been a seminarian in another life.
By the third try, we finally achieved a volume that made it possible for God and the sergeants to hear us.
The lights went out.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
08 December 2008
THE APPROACH MARCH
Having thought only of Annapolis for seven years, I was caught short on colleges after I got the bad news about my eyesight. Fortunately, I was in the first group of Baby Boomers. Illinois State University (just renamed from its 107 year old “Illinois State Normal University) was the first and leading teachers’ college in Illinois. In 1964, it was still a small school of some 3000 undergraduates, 80 percent of whom were women. The fledgling liberal arts college was ready to grow, so when I applied in April, I was accepted by early May.
By this time, I was completely turned off by LBJ, whom I considered to be a charlatan and a fraud. After the Billie Sol Estes scandal which had caused JFK to consider dropping Johnson from the 1964 ticket, I wanted nothing to do with him. He was, in my youthful, idealistic opinion, unfit to follow in Jack Kennedy's footsteps.
Additionally, Johnson had not served in WWII. (Of all the presidents of my parents’ generation--JFK through George H.W. Bush--only Jphnson had avoided service in WWII.) He had merely “resigned” from Congress just long enough to go to Australia where he took an observation flight in a B-17 for which he was “awarded” the Silver Star Medal. He then “unresigned” and returned to Congress “at the President’s request.”
I spent the summer of 1964 working for the Goldwater campaign in a heavily Democratic county in southern Illinois. My Mom, a “yellow dog” Democrat, was appalled. “Oh, dear,” she cried. “If you work for that man, you’ll end up in Vietnam!” Turns out, she was right, but that’s a story for another day.
My first year at ISU was typical of the era. We were a conservative lot who wore sports shirts and khakis to class. Women students wore skirts and blouses. (My history professor, Dr. Helen Cavanaugh, once ordered a young woman out of her classroom with the admonition, “Ladies do not attend class in trousers!” The coed was wearing an expensive, well-tailored pants suit. A different time, indeed.)
In February of 1965, I learned that the first of my high school graduating class had died in service. Jim Nash was a crew member on a CH-46 helicopter that was taking off from Marine Corps Air Station, Santa Ana, CA to fly to an LPH for deployment to the Western Pacific (“WesPac”). His chopper collided with another and both crashed, killing all on board.
A few days later, 2d Battalion, 9th Marines, Third Marine Division became the first American ground combat unit to land in South Vietnam. 3/9 and then the rest of the Division soon followed.
Then, in April, as I was walking through the Student Union, I saw a Marine Officer Selection Officer handing out literature concerning the Platoon Leaders’ Course. He informed me that he had just come from Notre Dame and had filled his quota, but he took my name for the Fall.
My last summer as a civilian was upon me.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
By this time, I was completely turned off by LBJ, whom I considered to be a charlatan and a fraud. After the Billie Sol Estes scandal which had caused JFK to consider dropping Johnson from the 1964 ticket, I wanted nothing to do with him. He was, in my youthful, idealistic opinion, unfit to follow in Jack Kennedy's footsteps.
Additionally, Johnson had not served in WWII. (Of all the presidents of my parents’ generation--JFK through George H.W. Bush--only Jphnson had avoided service in WWII.) He had merely “resigned” from Congress just long enough to go to Australia where he took an observation flight in a B-17 for which he was “awarded” the Silver Star Medal. He then “unresigned” and returned to Congress “at the President’s request.”
I spent the summer of 1964 working for the Goldwater campaign in a heavily Democratic county in southern Illinois. My Mom, a “yellow dog” Democrat, was appalled. “Oh, dear,” she cried. “If you work for that man, you’ll end up in Vietnam!” Turns out, she was right, but that’s a story for another day.
My first year at ISU was typical of the era. We were a conservative lot who wore sports shirts and khakis to class. Women students wore skirts and blouses. (My history professor, Dr. Helen Cavanaugh, once ordered a young woman out of her classroom with the admonition, “Ladies do not attend class in trousers!” The coed was wearing an expensive, well-tailored pants suit. A different time, indeed.)
In February of 1965, I learned that the first of my high school graduating class had died in service. Jim Nash was a crew member on a CH-46 helicopter that was taking off from Marine Corps Air Station, Santa Ana, CA to fly to an LPH for deployment to the Western Pacific (“WesPac”). His chopper collided with another and both crashed, killing all on board.
A few days later, 2d Battalion, 9th Marines, Third Marine Division became the first American ground combat unit to land in South Vietnam. 3/9 and then the rest of the Division soon followed.
Then, in April, as I was walking through the Student Union, I saw a Marine Officer Selection Officer handing out literature concerning the Platoon Leaders’ Course. He informed me that he had just come from Notre Dame and had filled his quota, but he took my name for the Fall.
My last summer as a civilian was upon me.
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
07 December 2008
THE START OF A JOURNEY
It was December 7, 1957. For my folks, it was the 16th anniversary of a day that turned their world—and that of their generation—upside down: that date that would live in infamy.
Starting in third grade, I had read books about our Navy in World War II. My boyhood heroes were Mush Morton, Donc Donaho, Red Ramage,and Gene Fluckey. I knew the records of Tang and Wahoo and Trigger, and I had cried at the heroism of Howard Gilmore whose dying words on the shattered bridge of USS Growler still echo down the halls of American naval history: “Take her down!”
I was inspired by three legendary Wildcat commanders, Jimmy Thach, creator with Medal of Honor recipient Butch O’Hare, of the “Thach Weave”, the maneuver, named by Jimmy Flatley, that kept the old F4F Wildcat alive against the Japanese Zero. I had made a model of Jimmy Flatley’s F6F Hellcat. Oh, yeah, Flatley, “Reaper Leader” of Fighting Ten, the Grim Reapers, was a hero in my book.
And there was my number one hero, my Dad, former Chief Pharmacists Mate John James McCarty. I secretly suspected that he won the war all by himself, not that he talked much about it. Five opposed landings and they were bad ones—Tarawa, Kwajalien, Saipan, Tinian and Pelelieu.
Navy blue and gold were my favorite colors.
So on that gray December day, after seeing the “Pearl Harbor” episode of Victory at Sea on TV, I decided that I wanted to follow my Dad’s footsteps and become a squared away North American bluejacket. My Mom suggested that if I wanted to be in the Navy, I ought to attend the Naval Academy. To get there required a Congressional appointment.
That evening, I sat down at the kitchen table with a ballpoint pen and a piece of lined school paper and wrote the first of what would be many letters to Representative Melvin Price, our Congressman. Only a few days later, I received a letter from Mr. Price, sending me a copy of the Midshipman Handbook, asking that I keep him informed of my progress through school.
(Later, while my Mom was vice-president of her American Federation of Teachers local, she met Mr. Price. “Oh,” he said, “your son is the boy that wants to go to Annapolis.” They don’t make them like that any more.)
In early 1964, I was appointed to the Naval Academy class of 1968. When I took my physical at Scott Air Force Base, I was declared to be NPQ, “not physically qualified” due to poor eyesight. Coming on the heels of the deaths of my Dad and my Grand-dad, it could have been a crushing blow. By then, however, I had discovered another branch of the Naval Service—the United States Marine Corps. We had read parts of John Thomason's World War I classic, Fix Bayonets!, in English class and I felt as if I had served alongside Robert Leckie (Helmet For My Pillow) and that Richard Tregaskis (Guadalcanal Diary) was a close friend. And of course, I had read Robert Sherrod’s Tarawa: The Story Of A Battle until the pages fell apart.
So, today marks for me the 51st anniversary of the start of a journey that really took off 40 years ago next week. Stay tuned!
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
Starting in third grade, I had read books about our Navy in World War II. My boyhood heroes were Mush Morton, Donc Donaho, Red Ramage,and Gene Fluckey. I knew the records of Tang and Wahoo and Trigger, and I had cried at the heroism of Howard Gilmore whose dying words on the shattered bridge of USS Growler still echo down the halls of American naval history: “Take her down!”
I was inspired by three legendary Wildcat commanders, Jimmy Thach, creator with Medal of Honor recipient Butch O’Hare, of the “Thach Weave”, the maneuver, named by Jimmy Flatley, that kept the old F4F Wildcat alive against the Japanese Zero. I had made a model of Jimmy Flatley’s F6F Hellcat. Oh, yeah, Flatley, “Reaper Leader” of Fighting Ten, the Grim Reapers, was a hero in my book.
And there was my number one hero, my Dad, former Chief Pharmacists Mate John James McCarty. I secretly suspected that he won the war all by himself, not that he talked much about it. Five opposed landings and they were bad ones—Tarawa, Kwajalien, Saipan, Tinian and Pelelieu.
Navy blue and gold were my favorite colors.
So on that gray December day, after seeing the “Pearl Harbor” episode of Victory at Sea on TV, I decided that I wanted to follow my Dad’s footsteps and become a squared away North American bluejacket. My Mom suggested that if I wanted to be in the Navy, I ought to attend the Naval Academy. To get there required a Congressional appointment.
That evening, I sat down at the kitchen table with a ballpoint pen and a piece of lined school paper and wrote the first of what would be many letters to Representative Melvin Price, our Congressman. Only a few days later, I received a letter from Mr. Price, sending me a copy of the Midshipman Handbook, asking that I keep him informed of my progress through school.
(Later, while my Mom was vice-president of her American Federation of Teachers local, she met Mr. Price. “Oh,” he said, “your son is the boy that wants to go to Annapolis.” They don’t make them like that any more.)
In early 1964, I was appointed to the Naval Academy class of 1968. When I took my physical at Scott Air Force Base, I was declared to be NPQ, “not physically qualified” due to poor eyesight. Coming on the heels of the deaths of my Dad and my Grand-dad, it could have been a crushing blow. By then, however, I had discovered another branch of the Naval Service—the United States Marine Corps. We had read parts of John Thomason's World War I classic, Fix Bayonets!, in English class and I felt as if I had served alongside Robert Leckie (Helmet For My Pillow) and that Richard Tregaskis (Guadalcanal Diary) was a close friend. And of course, I had read Robert Sherrod’s Tarawa: The Story Of A Battle until the pages fell apart.
So, today marks for me the 51st anniversary of the start of a journey that really took off 40 years ago next week. Stay tuned!
© 2010 Michael R. McCarty. All rights reserved.
30 November 2008
CHANGE
It is axiomatic that change is stressful. People will endure a lot to avoid change; witness the majority French refusal to become involved in the Resistance during WWII.
Our church received the painful news this weekend that our pastor of nearly 12 years is leaving for another call. This is the man who shepherded our flock on the long, but amazingly wonderful trip out of the PC(USA) and into our gracious new denominational affiliation with the EPC. He is my dear friend as well as my pastor; my traveling companion to convocations in Denver, Edina, Tulsa, Orlando, Sacramento, and Bay Village, as well as countless trips to presbytery meetings. I have learned so much from him and will miss him as my pastor (although we will remain fast friends and colleagues in ministry).
Our congregation will now enter the process of calling the new pastor that God has already picked for us.
In the meantime, as frail humans we do not seek or desire change. When it is put before us anyway, we come to realize that it is only through God's grace and our faith in His risen Son that we can move on.
Our church received the painful news this weekend that our pastor of nearly 12 years is leaving for another call. This is the man who shepherded our flock on the long, but amazingly wonderful trip out of the PC(USA) and into our gracious new denominational affiliation with the EPC. He is my dear friend as well as my pastor; my traveling companion to convocations in Denver, Edina, Tulsa, Orlando, Sacramento, and Bay Village, as well as countless trips to presbytery meetings. I have learned so much from him and will miss him as my pastor (although we will remain fast friends and colleagues in ministry).
Our congregation will now enter the process of calling the new pastor that God has already picked for us.
In the meantime, as frail humans we do not seek or desire change. When it is put before us anyway, we come to realize that it is only through God's grace and our faith in His risen Son that we can move on.
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