In this thread military members and Vets post their memorable accounts of Old School leadership practiced in their units...Officers and NCOs that acted with Old School values in the face of political correctness.





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I was at the rifle range in Wildflecken in the winter (brrrrr.....) and there was a company on the line.  Each firing position was a concrete sewer pipe set waist-high into the ground.  I was up in the range tower when we saw one guy reach out for his rifle (without command), seat a magazine, chamber a round, flip the muzzle around and shoot himself.  He slid down into the pipe, and everyone was yelling "Cease fire!" and for a medic.



Medic came and declared the wound to be not immediately life threatening.  They loaded him on a stretcher and were carrying him towards the Meat Wagon when the Battalion Commander asked where they thought they were going.  The medic replied that they were loading him in the Ambulance and taking him to the post clinic.  The Bn. Cdr. replied : "My ambulance is for legitimate injuries.  What do we do if someone is injured through no fault of his own while you are gone taking care of this idiot? Take him to the hospital in the 5 ton dump truck." as he pointed at a nearby 5 ton dump with 6 inches of snow in the bed.



The medic argued but the Old Man wasn't having it.  So they loaded the stretcher into the dump's snow-filled bed and slowly drove off.



Balls.

That's not balls, that's fucking retarded.  You can judge the individual's actions at a later time.  When he's bleeding from a GSW, you provide the care needed to save a life.  The BC interfered with that.  

Fucking retards like that battalion commander are the reason we have so much bullshit training to deal with today.  Soldiers are people - treat them like it.  Treating people like shit doesn't make you a tough guy; and just because you were treated like shit doesn't mean it was right.  

No thanks.

Greatest leader that I ever had was my battalion commander, Lt Col Valentin. Little NY Puerto Rican. Did a lot of good things, but this was the greatest.

To keep a long story short, and I'm typing on my phone, I'll just leave it at the fact that he stole a Mexican ambulance, rescued one of our injured Marines from a Tijajuna hospital, and raced back across the border with him. The Navy Liason guy had his hands full with that one.  

 
Have to agree with you; particularly after re telling the story of my Bn. Cmdr above. That was a leader.

So wrong, but so right at the same time.



I know I have a story or two.  I'll remember them after a bit.
       

Indeed.  Treating stupid people like shit on the other hand, and letting them know they are being treated like shit because they were in fact stupid... well, still doesn't make one a tough guy, one can only hope the stupid person would change their ways I guess.





 

Desert Storm , Regiment Commander (Colonel) , a little speech. I am paraphrasing but it went like this:

Marines, tomorrow we go into battle. We are attacking. Overwhelm the enemy.  Drive toward the ocean, if your vehicle is disabled get out and go to the ocean. Kill the enemy, try not to die. That is all

I love that guy. (no homo)

Jim

Belittling a person doesn't fix stupid.  Punishment, corrective training, and plain ole' giving a fuck about another human quite often does the trick.  

Any leader can knock a junior Soldier on their ass over misbehavior (metaphorically speaking / punishment wise).  A good leader knocks them on their ass, picks them back up, dusts them off, and sets them on the path to not repeat the mistake.  That path may be in the military, maybe at a reduced rank; or out of the military all together.  

The exception to this rule is people who maliciously harm innocent people, such as murderers, rapists, and child abusers.  Fuck them.  Let them burn.  Once that line is crossed, that human being loses all right to a second chance.  

We were on a small OP of the Afghan/Pak border and our SNAP (the thing that gave us network/non-radio comms, IE secret internet) overheated and went down. We were taking contact every day so this was a big deal. There was like 14 of us on the OP and nobody knew how to fix it, all we had was TACSAT so they couldn't clog up the net to talk us through how to fix it. So they Blackhawk'ed in the supremely fat Air Force E3 to fix it. He had no idea what he was getting into and sucked so bad at his job he literally broke the dish even worse. So they had to chopper civilians to fix it. He told us in no uncertain terms "keep that Air Force idiot away from this thing" and trained one of our tech savvy guys on how to work the thing. Nobody wanted to come pick up this kid, as we figured they sent him to us to get him out of their hair, so he was stuck on the OP. So the Platoon Sergeant put him to work on details and guard (supervised, of course).
One night we were unloading slings that had been dropped to us, trying to get everything squared away of the LZ into the OP before morning when we'd get shot at. There was a big ass pile of sandbags that we weren't going to be able to get to.

SGT TL "Hey Sergeant, what are we going to do about this pallet of sandbags?"
SFC PSG "Get that Air Force kid, shit. What's his name? You know, the fat one that cries every time we get in contact and makes me want to slap the life out of him. Make him carry that shit, I am sick and tired of him drinking all of our ripits, eating all the good MREs, and not contributing anything. If he doesn't want to get sold to the Afghans for butthole pleasure he needs to pay some rent and start pulling his weight"
SGT TL "The fat worthless Air Force guy? Nimrossa. He's standing right behind you."
Nimrossa (sniffling) "And I heard everything you said!"
SFC PSG "Well then good, I don't have to repeat myself."

That's not balls just stupidty.  The BC would still have to answer for his decision and if the patient died from further injuries from the snow-filled bed he would be responsible.  

 

Don't confuse old school with stupid.