“Ready, Stop!” instead of “Detail Halt!” The file of six Marines 92
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stopped, but failed to pivot right to face the officers. The line came to rest about thirty yards past Capt. Cruz. Someone in formation called out, “Well, how about calling ‘Right, face,’ there, you!” The entire company erupted into laughter, and laughing at the position of attention is a virtual sin in the Marines.
Captain Cruz was determined to salvage the dignity of the ceremony. His voice boomed, “At ease, Marines!” His command was echoed by the platoon sergeants until order was once again restored.
The Marines in the detail individually pivoted to the right to face the officers awarding their promotions. Captain Cruz, in a most impressive display of bearing, quietly marched the detail of officers to the file of Marines. When he finally faced Cpl. Moss to pin his sergeant chevrons, every Marine strained to hear the exchange.
“Sgt. Moss, I take it your close-order-drill commands are a bit rusty.”
Sgt. Moss cleared his throat loudly. “Hmmm. Hmmm. Yes, sir.”
“Moss, if you want to keep your sergeant stripes, I strongly advise that you brush up!” The captain raised his voice for emphasis.
“Not just on drill, but on everything that is expected of a sergeant in the United States Marine Corps!”
Then Capt. Cruz ordered the newly promoted lance corporal in front of Sgt. Moss to march the detail to the rear of the formation.
Sgt. Krause congratulated all of the Marines except for Sgt.
Moss. Instead he quipped, “If I was the CO, you would be a private right now.”
“I thought you were the CO!” Sgt. Moss replied, in classic face-saving fashion.
The Marines of Second Platoon smiled collectively at Sgt. Moss’s clever response. They were already loyal to their leader—some despite his unorthodox style . . . some because of it. I didn’t know whether to pity him or admire him. I would figure it out in the drills to come.
The January drill marked the beginning of a slow downward spiral in my motivation to be a weekend warrior. It began with a long and S P A R E P A R T S
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miserable Friday formation that left us standing, frozen, in the blowing snow. It was my first cold-weather drill, and we were scheduled to be in the field all weekend. I wasn’t sure how I was going to survive outside for two days and nights, because after only thirty minutes in formation it felt like my fingers and toes were frostbitten. I was relieved when Capt. Cruz took his post to address the company, until he delivered the sobering news.
“Marines, I have sad news to report.”
The snow was blowing hard, and collecting on the right side of the CO’s face and cover.
“Last month we tragically lost a member of our Marine family.”
I observed a funeral-guard form in front of the formation. The Marines in dress blue uniforms were unfazed by the brutal weather.
They mechanically stacked three rifles, leaning the barrels vertically inboard until they met, forming a tripod.
“We ask that you remain at the position of attention for a moment of silence, as we remember one of our own.”
And then it dawned on me. I leaned forward to scan the squad.
We were short one—Pvt. Hurst was missing.
During our briefing in the squad bay, Sgt. Krause confirmed what I already knew to be true—Pvt. Hurst was dead. What I didn’t know was that he had taken his own life on the Sunday following last drill.
Lance Cpl. Draper, with his usual bad taste and timing, added his own morbid commentary. “Shotgun in the mouth!” Draper looked at Nagel to validate his sick humor as he mimed the grotesque act of holding a shotgun to his open mouth. “Can you imagine?”
My eyes locked with Nagel’s and I silently dared him to join in.
While neither of us believed Hurst had committed suicide over a bad haircut, we both recognized our roles in making his last days on earth worse. I hated Nagel for that.
We had an hour to prepare for our gear inspection, but I needed some time to collect myself. I walked outside to make a head call and passed Sgt. Moss. He understood the gravity of the situation.
Sgt. Moss pulled me inside Second Platoon’s barracks to offer his 94
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condolences. Unlike Sgt. Krause he expressed sympathy, and I appreciated it.
I tried to hide my emotion by refocusing my attention on something other than Hurst. So I decided to compare platoons. Things were a lot different in Second Platoon than in First. The first thing I recognized was that all of the Marines lived and worked together.
There was no separation between NCOs and nonrates, scouts and crewmen, or squad leaders and troops. The most noticeable difference was that three lance corporals, instead of the platoon sergeant, were teaching a class. Sgt. Krause taught all of our classes.
Sgt. Moss explained that three of his scouts were experts in cold-weather training. So he asked them to teach the others how to use their gear to survive. It looked like the kind of class our platoon needed.
As I stepped back into the snow I joked, “You know, if I had all that Gore-Tex, I wouldn’t need any survival training.”
He laughed. “You bet your ass!”
Back in our squad bay Sgt. Krause was getting ready to teach us classes to prepare us for the night’s mission. There were classes on fire-team movements, patrolling with noise discipline, and setting up a defensive perimeter—but no cold-weather survival classes.
Pfc. Dougherty and I stared at each other when it was time to pack for the field. We labored over which gear to take and which to leave. Too much gear could make marching unnecessarily difficult.
Dougherty consulted with Lance Cpl. Lyle, but he offered little help. He had gone to infantry school during the summer, the way all reservists did, and this would be his first cold-weather drill too.
Lance Cpl. Lyle decided to get his packing list from Lance Cpl.
Nagel. What he failed to realize was that Lance Cpl. Nagel was a crewman. None of us in Second Squad understood that crewmen had a much different field experience from the scouts. Lance Cpl.
Nagel knew, but he didn’t tell. So we packed exactly what the crewmen packed. I didn’t like the idea of trusting Nagel, but unfortunately I didn’t have a choice. To make matters worse I learned that I was assigned as a scout on Lance Cpl. Nagel’s vehicle. Nagel was the vehicle commander, and Draper was the driver. It was a match S P A R E P A R T S
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made in hell. The only thing that made it bearable was that Pfc.
Dougherty and Lance Cpl. Lyle were assigned with me.
Although our company census had increased, there still weren’t enough Marines to fill all the vehicle positions. Our vehicle was missing the third crewman to assume the role of gunner, but the truth was that our training seldom involved the role of the gunner.
Unless we were scheduled to conduct a live-fire exercise on a range, the function of the crewmen was limited to troop transport. As far as I could tell, for the purposes of our platoon the LAV was a fourteen-ton taxicab.
Initially I felt grateful that I was not a crewman. While operating the LAV, both the VC and driver were exposed to the weather from their waist to their heads. While en route to our drop-off point the heater offered little relief to Nagel or Draper’s upper bodies, which were exposed to the bitter air and icy snow. While the crewmen were freezing up above, Lyle, Dougherty, and I slept comfortably in the hull. Once we reached our drop-off point, however, things changed.
The luxury of the vehicle heater afforded crewmen less need to pack for sustained cold-weather training. They only needed to endure the elements while driving, and we were only on the road for thirty minutes. What we did not know was that crewmen remained with the vehicles while in the field. Their missions required an occasional brief drive from one point to another. In between movements, however, they had heat and sleep. The next time we scouts would know ei
ther would be Sunday morning, after thirty-six hours of exposure to subfreezing temperatures. As we disembarked and gathered at the rear of the vehicle, I could see Nagel and Draper pulling cans of soda and bags of snacks from their packs.
As he climbed into the back of the vehicle, Lance Cpl. Nagel whined, “Close the fucking hatch. . . . It’s cold out there.”
Inside, they laughed like schoolgirls.
Lance Cpl. Lyle wasted no time assembling the scouts and briefing us on our mission. We were dropped at the south end of Training Area 14 and assigned to patrol the roads leading two miles north to Landing Zone Foxtrot. Second Platoon’s scouts were dropped off at the north end of TA-14 to patrol southward. We were advised 96
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that we could encounter enemy armored vehicles, which were actually our company’s LAVs, driving along our patrol routes.
If we located moving vehicles we were supposed to call in the location and direction of the vehicle’s movement to headquarters. If we located stationary vehicles, we were supposed to call in their locations and “destroy” them. During the briefing Lance Cpl. Lyle explained that the CO would consider any vehicle destroyed if scouts approached close enough to hit it with a canteen. The canteen represented a variety of weapons that scouts carried that were capable of immobilizing armored vehicles—like hand grenades. The key was getting close enough without being detected, because the LAV crewmen had night-vision equipment that could see us long before we could get within throwing distance. Once we rendezvoused at LZ
Foxtrot we were supposed to form a defensive perimeter, assign Marines to fire-watch duty, and get some sleep.
I was thrilled to be embarking on a real-life infantry scout mission, just like those portrayed in the posters I had studied before boot camp. The excitement made up for the cold conditions. We remained in our assigned vehicle groups, which were called fire teams once we were on foot. Equipped with a radio, map, compass, and red-lens flashlight, the three of us headed out to LZ Foxtrot. It was an arduous two-mile creep in knee-deep snow. Even though the route paralleled an asphalt road, we walked within the wood line for concealment. We were determined to avoid being detected by the crewmen. None of us wanted to deal with Nagel’s inflated ego if he was credited with killing us.
After nearly two miles of trudging through the snow in the woods, we had neither seen nor heard a single vehicle. The novelty of the exercise was gone and I became frustrated. My cynicism grew with each passing minute. I imagined the crewmen nestled next to the heater, sleeping in the back of the LAV. Our bodies were dangerously cold. The stinging had stopped in our fingers and toes, leaving only numbness. I was worried about frostbite. Lance Cpl.
Lyle was concerned, too, so he called Sgt. Krause on the radio. Lyle lowered the volume and pressed the handset close to his ear.
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Lance Cpl. Lyle grimaced when he heard the bad news. “Roger, out.” He unkeyed the mike and slammed it into its cradle.
“Sgt. Krause wants us to remain on patrol until we see action.”
Roger, out? I thought. . . . How about “Fuck you, out!”
I should have expected it, though. Sgt. Krause’s ego was always in control. He wanted all of his fire teams to be credited with at least one vehicle sighting before checking into the LZ.
Lance Cpl. Lyle studied the map by the glow of the red-lens flashlight. After a few minutes he shared his plan. The three of us were going to split up and occupy three different posts on three different roads.
The plan made sense, as it would increase our chances of seeing a vehicle, but splitting up made me anxious. We were trained to always have a buddy in the field. I trusted Lance Cpl. Lyle, though. I went along with the plan as he promised to remain stationary, so we could find him in an emergency. His radio was our lifeline to the company.
I reluctantly turned my back on my buddies and headed off to my post. I found my road, just as Lyle had said, about a hundred meters east of our start point. I waited just inside the wood line, and shivered. By 0300 I had been in a stationary position for thirty minutes. There were no vehicles. There was only cold. My hands and feet felt like blocks of ice. I could barely move my fingers, and when I did they moved in slow motion. I tried to recall the warning signs of frostbite, but it was difficult to think clearly. It was another predicament, and another big decision. Option one was to put my personal safety first, abandon my post, and report to Lance Cpl.
Lyle. Option two was to put the mission first, remain observant, and hopefully see or hear something to report.
Having to make that decision pissed me off. I could not believe the futility of this mission. I shuffled from one foot to another, trying desperately to regain feeling in my legs.
The first time I heard it I thought I was hallucinating. I was cold enough to be delusional. I strained to hear more . . . twigs crack-ing . . . branches snapping . . . footsteps landing. People were moving in my direction. I hid behind a tree and waited. When the boots passed my position, I peeked around to see. It was just one body.
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My shaky shivering voice cut through the falling snow as I strained to point my rifle. “You’re d-dead!” I was grateful this was just a war game. My fingers were so cold, I couldn’t have made them pull the trigger if my life depended on it.
The stranger’s voice answered, “Wee-ams . . . is that you?”
It was Sgt. Moss. I recognized him by the way he bastardized my last name. I was relieved to see him.
“What are you doing in my area?” he whispered. “First Platoon scouts are supposed to be on the west side.”
I was too cold to go into details. “We split up to get a v-vehicle sighting. Sgt. Krause wants every fire team to call in a r-report before going to the LZ.”
“You’re only five minutes away.” Sgt. Moss snickered. “I just came from the LZ to call in my last fire team.”
I didn’t respond. He knew something was wrong. It took all of my energy just to talk.
“I don’t think I can walk to the LZ, Sgt. Moss. My can’t feel my f-feet.”
He wasted no time examining the uselessness of my pack and then tossing it aside.
“Where’s all your gear?” he asked.
Clenching my jaw in anger I snapped, “I packed what I was t-told to pack!”
As he pulled gear from his own pack, he gave me some of the best advice I ever received in the Marines. “You’ve got to pay more attention to who’s doing the telling.”
He helped me sit on a log while he removed my boots and socks.
I was as helpless as a baby. He helped me pull two pairs of socks over my purple feet, and after my boots were on, the feeling slowly returned. I welcomed the sensation of pins and needles in my toes, which signaled the return of blood flow. He also gave me the cold-weather gear that he had been issued at supply—gloves, thermal underwear, a field-jacket liner, and a wool watch cap. Most of what he wore he owned personally. The night would have turned out very differently if he had not rescued me.
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drill would be like in Second Platoon. By final formation on Sunday I would begin wondering what life would be like without drill . . .
without the Marines, period.
The drudgery of drill weekends continued through February and March. It was normal for my motivation to wane as drill Friday approached, but following the March drill my dedication to the Corps was at an all-time low. There were many more instances of incompetence and poor leadership while I served with First Platoon, like the debacle at LZ Foxtrot.
Sgt. Krause continued his inane quest to demonstrate his superiority over us, the inferior reservists. While in garrison he saturated our training schedule with fruitless classes, and filled our minds with military textbook trivia. In the field he carried on like MacArthur, micromanaging every ex
ercise with manic intensity. My feelings about his leadership ran hot or cold, depending on the circumstances. The most disappointing thing was his indifference toward the activities of Lance Cpl. Nagel, who continued to alienate the scouts with his adolescent antics and, worse yet, endangered us with flagrant incompetence, questionable morality, and thoughtless decision-making.
After only seven months I learned to loathe drill weekends. My friends and family knew only that I was growing tired of the way drill weekends interfered with my social life. It seemed that drill always fell on the least favorable weekend. Without fail, whenever something important was happening I missed it because of drill. But that was not the real problem. The real problem was much deeper.
Life was happening, and I felt I was missing it because of drill.
I have since come to understand that for me, and many others like me, the resentment I felt about drill was a psychological defense mechanism. As long as I resisted the drill weekend, I could continue with the reintegration process . . . fading away from Marine mode back into civilian mode. But just when being a civilian started feeling natural and comfortable, the drill weekend reared its ugly head.
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The calendar dragged us unwillingly, under the threat of a court-martial, back to a place that was physically, mentally, and emotionally painful.
Drill weekends are born from the individual missions assigned to them, and bred by the philosophies of their leaders. The experiences of reservists vary greatly from unit to unit in the intensity, duration, and nature of training. Reserve units and their drill weekends fall on a continuum of challenge and rigor. The drill weekends of some units facilitate the process of reintegration, as their demands are little more than an extension of the civilian nine-to-five workday.
On the other end of the continuum, however, there is the Marine combat reserve unit. These units, and the nature of their drill weekends, inhibit the process of reintegration, as their demands are the antithesis of civility. Their missions focus on death and destruction.
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