Resuming the thread about Basic Training

After a few weeks off trying to (1) mentally reconstruct the chronological sequence of events that happened forty years ago and (2) trying to figure out why the Bush administration is trying so hard to create an omnipotent Presidency when it's unlikely the Republicans can keep the White House next time (as long as they actually do permit an honest election to happen), I decided to go back to my reprise of basic training, and my defense of compulsory universal military service.

One of my clearest memories of basic was the very end of it.

We had been at Fort Gordon, GA, for around 11 weeks. We had gotten two weeks to go home for Christmas -- something we all really relished, by the way. Those of us who had been heavy and out of shape when we arrived were not heavy OR out of shape any more. Those of us who had been skinny and out of shape when we arrived likewise were neither. Our uniforms, which fit us reasonably well when they were issued in Reception Station, no longer fit very well.

The fact was that all of us -- including those of us who had played college sports -- were at that point in the best physical shape we had ever been and would ever be.

I'd also suggest that we were generally in pretty good mental shape at that point as well. Those of us who had been sheltered back home had spend a couple of months establishing ourselves as independent individuals. Those of us who had been bullies, macho men, whatever, back on the block had been taken down several pegs, as had the few among us who had come from situations of privilege (the truly privileged, or course, had beaten the draft entirely or had gotten into special units in the National Guard that somehow kept their privileged members out of such inconvenient duty as Basic Training) .

We knew about "special treatment" for the privileged back then, and we all mightily resented it.

Earlier in Basic, there had been some contempt for the RAs (the guys who had enlisted in the Regular Army for a term of three or four years) as losers, and for the NGs and ERs (National Guard and Enlisted Reserve guys, who were doing their six months of active duty and who would then return to their home towns for several years of monthly drills) as pansies. Those of us whose service numbers started with "US" (the designation of a draftee) were generally perceived as neither idiots (the RAs) nor sissies (the NGs and the ERs). But by the end of Basic, these distinctions had for the most part faded.

One memorable morning during the last days of Basic Training, formed up in the Company Area, however, the distinctions were suddenly back. This was the point where the First Sergeant called out the name of each member of F-3-1 (F Company, 3rd Batallion, 1st Training Regiment, if I haven't used that designation before) and told us where we would be going from there.

Sergeant Buza told us how this would work. He would call out a name, or a series of names. When he paused, the soldiers whose names had been called would double time to the barracks steps from which he was reading, pick up copies of our orders, and return to our places. There was to be no groaning, no cheering, no celebrating, and no reading of the orders until we were released from our formation.

First off, as I recall, was a longish list of NGs and ERs who were going to Advanced Infantry Training for eight weeks before going back home to their local units. Then came a list, mostly RAs, who would be going to Airborne School. (Although we had been offered the opportunity to "go Airborne" while we were in Basic, few of the US group had opted for this. Among the RA group, the fact that Airborne soldiers got jump pay had been an important inducement. I don't recall their being any NGs or ERs who came from Airborne outfits; thus none of them were in this group.)

Then things began to get more interesting. Most of the RAs who were going to be infantry soldiers were sent to other posts for their Advanced Infantry Training (AIT). However, the RAs who had enlisted for special schools -- and that was many of them -- were then called, along with the school they would be attending. There were three or four who were sent to the US Army Language School in Monterey, CA, for example. (Parenthetically, that was a formidable institution. A fraternity brother of mine in college had flunked out, with French as one of his multiple Fs. He had enlisted for language school, been taught French there, went on to finish his four year hitch, to return to college, major in French, take a doctorate in it, and eventually to return to the old college to become a full professor of French. That is what the Army Language School was capable of.)

We draftees were among the last to be called. I hope that I have not lost your attention at this point, because this is really the most important part of this article.

In the popular view, draftees are simply cannon fodder. If the popular view were correct, all of us should have been headed directly for Advanced Infantry Training, and then for line outfits where we would have been trigger-pullers. This is the point where the Army, in popular belief, is thought to take PhDs in nuclear physics and make infantry soldiers out of them.

The popular belief is simply untrue. If more than five of the 40 or so draftees in F-3-1 were sent to AIT, it would really surprise me. Let me provide a few individual cases I remember that illustrate the extent to which the Army made good use of the resources it got.

Jack J, a graduate of Rhode Island School of Design, was sent to a Military Police battalion in Germany. No, he was not sent as an artist, but he was assigned as a sign painter. Not bad.

Jim (can't remember his last name), a political science grad with graduate courses in public administration, was also a big, hulking guy, and was sent off to MP School to become a Military Policeman.

Steve C, who had been an Engineer on the Erie Lackawanna Railroad when he was drafted, was sent TDY (stands for Temporary Duty) to the Transportation Corps training center, with a permanent duty station somewhere doing guess what? Driving trains!

One guy, whose name I don't remember, had been notably religious, although he was not an ordained cleric or seminarian. Sunday mornings, for example, when we got a couple of extra hours to ourselves that most of us used to write letters, sleep in, or generally goof off, this guy had always gone to church. Well, he was sent to Army Chaplain School to become a Chaplain's Assistant.

Another guy who had been a bio-chem major, was sent to Fort Dietrick, Maryland. That was the chemical warfare headquarters back then.

When my name was called, I heard, while double-timing up to Sgt. Buza for my orders, that I would be going directly to the 25th Administration Company at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii. While Schofield immediately rang a bell as the site of "From Here to Eternity" the idea that I was going to an Admin Company, and that it would be in Hawaii, had me surfing back to my place in my platoon. It got a laugh out of the rest of the guys, and since nobody was much focused yet on the fact that Hawaii was closer to Vietnam than anywhere else anybody was headed, I actually got some scattered applause for my good luck.

The extent to which the Army was using their resources well was evident only after I found out what the MOS (Military Occupational Specialty) on my orders meant. It was 716.30. This stood for Personnel Management Specialist. In other words, the Army had decided that an MBA in Industrial Relations and Human Behavioral Systems belonged in Army personnel (that's pretty good to start with) but also that instead of going directly into personnel as a 716.10 (that's entry level), I would go into a classification two notches up the ladder (no additional money for this, but a job that presupposed both some knowledge of how to "do" personnel and the aptitude to learn the job via OJT instead of Personnel School). To say that this was a far cry from putting the Nuclear Physics PhD in a foxhole is to belabor what must be an obvious point.

Those are the ones that stick in my mind after 40 years.

They reflected an Army that was efficient, well managed, and able to make good use of resources it received.

As a postscript, all of us had originally been pegged with a "combat" MOS (really, a default MOS, probably to be used if they could not find some more specialized use for our talents), based entirely on our scores on the tests we took in Reception Station. My own combat MOS had been Heavy Artillery Crewman -- and I later learned that this assignment had been based on a reasonably high score in the quantitative tests; thus presumably qualifying me to calculate trajectories on heavy artillery (8-inch guns and larger) without significant danger of miscalculation. Significantly, even this was a far cry from the foxhole-bound 111.10, or Light Weapons Infantryman -- aka cannon fodder -- that you might have expected a draftee to carry as a default MOS.

Be careful what you wish for???

I haven't abandoned my series about the virtues of the military draft and how it was beneficial for me (and for countless others as well) -- I've just been trying to assemble in sequential order the events of basic training back in December 1964 and January 1965 so I can recount them as something other than a stream of consciousness.

I did have a thought this morning that I am sure was more shocking to me than it has been to others who are wiser and who no doubt thought of it years ago.

We hear at length today about government spying on American citizens without a warrant. The administration says it is A Good Thing. Indeed we have a Supreme Court nominee who seems to believe that almost anything the Executive branch does is A Good Thing.

Presumably, however, these folks would feel that these are only Good Things as long as the present administration is running things.

One supposes that if a Democratic administration were in place, spying on American citizens would become an Intrusion by Big Government and would thus become reprehensible. And by extension that anything that a Democratic Executive branch did would become by definition a Bad Thing.

The problem we are dealing with here is that of precedent, or, otherwise stated, "What's good for the goose is good for the gander." Another well-worn saying involves ownership of the ox that gets gored.

Now, there is no question that the Republican party has some truly brilliant strategists and tacticians, and some very verbally agile pundits as well. Is it possible that all of these smart people have not considered the possibility that someday, somehow, a Democratic administration might be elected that could use the Big Brother apparatus constructed by the present administration against the very people who constructed it?

It seems obvious that they have considered this eventuality. They are simply too smart not to have done so.

But consider the implications if they have, indeed, done so, and understand that eventually they may be the party out of power, and, realizing this, have decided to continue with domestic spying and promoting the notion of the Imperial Presidency.

Am I too cynical when I note that the only people for whom domestic spying and the Imperial Presidency are not ultimately problematical are those in power who do not intend to cede power -- ever?