The Making of a Soldier

I found out the hard way that the Army knows what it's doing. When I joined the US Army Reserves at age 18, it was mainly to avoid being drafted and sent to Viet Nam. I was a reluctant warrior looking to avoid having people shoot at me, so I enlisted in a reserve unit that had little chance of being called up to active duty. When I began my eight-week boot camp at Fort Dix, NJ, my attitude was just keep your head down, never volunteer for anything, and get through this somehow. I was the least "Gung-Ho" soldier who ever put on a uniform. I was fit and could take whatever they were dishing out physically, but I thought they will never own my mind or my heart. They will never make a soldier out of me. I was wrong on both counts.


The Army's modus operandi is a simple one, a lot like the team-building exercises to which businesses send management people. They throw you in with a bunch of disparate guys from all over the country and begin to brainwash you into believing that if you fail in your assigned task, you are not only letting your fellow soldiers down, but in a combat situation, could actually get them killed. They saddle you with impossible tasks and get the best out of you because you don't want to be the one that lets the team down. They instill "Esprit de Corps" in a way that makes you push yourself to do for others what you would not do for yourself. I remember 20 mile forced marches in the rain with full backpacks. The guys were miserable, and then someone in the rear ranks would strike up a marching song:  


They say that in the Army the coffee's mighty fine
It looks like muddy water and tastes like turpentine
Chorus:
Oh I don't want no more of Army life,
Oh Lord, I wanna go
But they won't let me go
Oh Lord, I wanna go home


The weary troops would pick up the song and, like automatons, march through the pouring rain, the driving cadence of the song's rhythm forcing them to somehow lift one foot and put in front of the other again and again as the miles passed. Sometimes the drill sergeants would stop the column of march and make every weary soldier disassemble and reassemble their rifles in the dark. You were so tired you wanted to cry, but as each man looked at the other and saw them doing what was asked, you found the strength to do it too. The sergeants were not monsters but were following the Army's age-old procedure for building a fighting force that would never question a superior's orders but obey them instantly. That tactic works most of the time, but can backfire as we found out at the massacre of Mi Lai in Viet Nam under Lieutenant William Calley.


Oh the donuts in the Army, they say they're mighty fine,
One fell off the table, and killed a friend of mine.
Chorus:
Oh I don't want no more of Army life,
Oh Lord, I wanna go
But they won't let me go
Oh Lord, I wanna go home

Though a number of US soldiers were charged in the aftermath of Mi Lai, all with the exception of Lieutenant William Calley, were acquitted. Calley was sentenced to life in prison with hard labor. He served three years before he was released. However, Calley had his supporters and many believed that he was simply following orders. All of America was horrified at the killing of women and children at Mi Lai; it was an act that seemed to belie everything we wanted to believe about our country. Nazis committed atrocities in war time, not American boys. The country was in turmoil; the media were in a frenzy; judgments flew fast and furious, and in the middle of the storm stood a group of young soldiers about to take the heat for the Generals.


They say that in the Army the pay is mighty fine
Your pay's a hundred dollars, but they take back ninety-nine
Chorus:
Oh I don't want no more of Army life,
Oh Lord, I wanna go
But they won't let me go
Oh Lord, I wanna go home 

Why did the soldiers in My Lai react as they did? After three years in Vietnam, the US Army knew that anyone could be an enemy fighter or sympathizer regardless of age or gender. Invariably everyone in the villages of South Vietnam wore the same style clothing, so no one could be sure who was who in terms of the enemy. All US soldiers knew that any patrol they were sent on could be their last or that they might suffer horrendous injuries as a result of the National Liberation Front booby traps that littered South Vietnam. The stress of simply doing what they had to do may well have become too much for the troops who were in Mi Lai on March 16^th 1968. 


I remember in boot camp blindly slogging through that mud just because the sergeant demanded we do it and because everyone else was doing it. I tried to imagine me in that jungle village, every nerve on edge and wondering if I would ever see my next birthday. I like to think that I would not have followed Lieutenant Calley's order to fire on those villagers, but I can't be sure. I feel sorry for those who were killed, but I also feel for the soldiers who were treated like criminals for doing what they were ruthlessly trained to do. War sucks. 

CLICK ON DATES AT TOP RIGHT TO SEE OTHER 

“SPALDEEN DREAMS” POSTS.

LOOKING FOR A WORTHY CHARITY? TRY THESE FOLKS: 

Children's Craniofacial Association