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Libhater
10-08-2013, 03:27 PM
I was drafted in 1969-70 into the Army against my will. Being psychologically impaired as a result of being subjected to chronic child abuse, I had a hard time dealing with any and all military rules of engagement and authority figures.
At the age of 19 I was still trying to create or to get in touch with my own psyche and to find a managable course in which to cope with authority figures, i.e. my abusive father and the overbearing drill sergeants that were awaiting me.
I didn't have the financial resources nor the stomach to go AWOL during those trying days before and after my induction into the Army. Fleeing to Canada or enrolling in a community college as a product of having a flunkie high school education so as to receive a draft deferment just wasn't a viable option for me at that time.
So now life in the real world of abiding by strict military rules and the super egos of those recent O.C.S. (Officer Candiate School) graduate greenhorns had paved the way for my on the job psychological training in venues very distant and very strange to me.
I look back at my military life as being the introduction to manhood; my time to either stand up for myself or to let others continue to bully me the way my father had.
The test to my manhood came in the last week of my 8-week bootcamp exercises.
We trainees were paired off against one another in pogo stick matches. Pogo sticks looked like giant Q-Tips with the difference being the size difference and of the two hard rubber ends to the pogos. We used these Pogos as a weapon in hand to hand combat sessions by batering the opponent in the head with the sticks. Offensive and defnsive skills of each combatant were on full display for all to watch.
This one drill sergeant weighing about the same as me around 175 lbs had a chisled out muscular body similar to that of Atlas. His ego along with his love of self had stepped in to pogo battle some of the weaker G.I.'s by mercilessly beating them to the ground with one or two of the beaten G.I.'s actually crying. Knowing that this drill sergeant wouldn't challenge anyone as adroit as myself in hand to hand combat, I decided to challenge the jerk to a pogo match.
I was beating this sergeant so bad that when I had knocked him to the ground I became relentless in my attack to where I wailed on him until other nearby drill sergenats had to come to the guy's rescue. Perhaps it was all that pent up anger in me that made me beat this guy into submission, but whatever the reason, from that point forward no one would ever bully me again.
I believe I was inducted into the Army as an E-1, and upon my honorable discharge I was still categorized as an E-1 as stated on my DD-214 form. I didn't receive any promotions simply because I refused to take orders from smart-assed buck sergeants and egotistical lieutenants. I received my fair share of Article #15's that ensured I wouldn't ever get to sew a stripe on my dress greens uniform, and ensure that my many cuts in pay wouldn't make me a rich man any time soon.
One last story to my total defiance of military rules of engagement:
Me and two of my combat platoon buddies were in the final week of our Vietnam tour of duty. We were what one would officially call 'SHORT TIMERS'.
Its an unwritten rule that short timers were to get the easiest and the safest duties while out on combat in the bush; Afterall, we had put our lives on the line for almost a full year. Time for some respect, if you know what I mean. So my two short time buddies and myself were given the duty of pulling up rear security in the platoon. The new guys in the platoon (the cherries) were made to walk point and or carry the M-60 machine gun up front where the potential for a fire, getting hit by sniper fire, or someone stepping on a land mine were at a greater risk.
Our current lieutenant and platoon leader had just DEROS back to the states as his one-year combat duty had expired. In his place came this greenhorn lieutenant fresh out of O.C.S. wearing starched and pressed cammies while sporting a smarmy attitute. This guy wanted everyone to know who was boss by appointing me and my two short-timer buddies to lead 6 of us out at dusk to set up an all night OP or Outpost a couple hundred yards away from camp. The most dangerous thing for a grunt to do out in the jungle that is filled with night time enemy guerrillas is to subject yourself to them while being seaparated from your backup or from the support of your full platoon.
My buddies and I refused the jerk's order and the 3 of us received Article #15's as being insubordinate, but our defiance and cut in pay didn't prevent us from boarding the freedom jet back to the states one week later.

jillian
10-08-2013, 03:28 PM
why didn't you seek conscientious objector status?

Codename Section
10-08-2013, 03:38 PM
why didn't you seek conscientious objector status?

It was very difficult to get back then.

I'm guessing he's trying to tell us something important about how he was treated and the draft, too.

War is a weird thing. It's not the movies in that it is all "horror". Everything becomes surreal and normal. That's the worst part of it. You start to feel normal in combat zones. People will get something blown off and someone will be upset and cry and then other people will make fun of him for being stupid. People act like losing a foot or hand is like cutting yourself on a tin can or hitting your thumb with a hammer.

I dunno. It's just very weird is all I can say.

Codename Section
10-08-2013, 03:39 PM
Libhater

thanks for sharing. I'm not there myself but thanks for sharing. We'll listen.

Libhater
10-08-2013, 04:44 PM
why didn't you seek conscientious objector status?

I wasn't conscious of much in those daze, and despite the fact that I didn't want to get drafted into a combat role, I never conscientiously objected to the war. As you saw from the OP I objected more to the military rules of engagement than to the actual nature of war itself.

Ivan88
12-03-2013, 01:35 PM
Thanks Libhater for your story of survival in the USA Army.
Here is a great video on military guys who successfully and heroically disobeyed all the military rules. It includes 3 North Korean, 2 South Korean and a Yankee:
Welcome To Dongmakgol

4774

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yePoRoYm8gQ
You have to press the little cc button at the bottom right of the YouTube screen and start the english subtitles.