My distan for firing blanks has followed me for years. At the end of my first nco course we had to do a spendex of all the blanks. I had managed to never fire a single shot the entire time. There was a small female soldier there who had to carry the m249. Well she apparently has never had to clean weapons. She thought it was a blast shooting all those drums of blank ammo. So I asked her if she knew that the 249 could shoot from mags as well? She got all excited and said no way! I asked her if she wanted to try. She excitedly said yes. So I handed her all my mags and let her go to town. I probably should have felt bad watching her clean it.. but.. naw.
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Military BS Stories or the last liar wins.
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My last story about hating to shoot blanks. I promise. Now a more seasoned e7 I have grown tired of screw around games during field exercises. Especially when I see bn level officers and e-9 types refuse to participate but demand everyone else do it. Well I am slightly disgruntled having been removed from my beloved platoon sergeant position and put into a ops position in the battalion level. Well during this exercise I just decided to kick my rifle in a secure lock box in the TOC. So I just walked around like those higher up than me without a weapon. Well during our time in the training scenario we came under heavy attack. Everyone was fighting for their imaginary life as the miles gear was beeping left and right. It was brief earlier that Chem lights would be simulated grenades. So I went ro supply and grab a few boxes. And proceeded to make it rain chem lights . I killed fifty men.. maybe idk. But I was killing so many that the observers finally told me to quit. Won the battle without ever firing a shot or getting my rifle out..
Yeah, USMC SGT Don drew duty one Saturday morning in the barracks. We were TDY to be the enemy at Ft Lewis in their "Assault Town". The army drove a truck up and unloaded a load of blanks, grenade simulators and arty simulators and drove off. Now you never do this to a bunch of Marines who don't have a lot of supervision. There will be and was trouble.
As we evacuated the town after being engaged some one threw an arty simulator into the building. No one hurt, lots of complaints and ...a small....fire....
Back to duty on that Saturday morning. It is very quiet, we had some down time from being up all night. Well I heard a door slam and then some laughter. Followed by a loud boom. Seems some miscreant threw a grenade sim under a sleeping buddies rack. Blew up the mattress and another small fire.
We quickly put it all out, and took the mattress to a supply closet that had stacks of mattresses, hid it in the middle of a stack and took another.
Don
Small fires always seem to appear weird.Yeah, USMC SGT Don drew duty one Saturday morning in the barracks. We were TDY to be the enemy at Ft Lewis in their "Assault Town". The army drove a truck up and unloaded a load of blanks, grenade simulators and arty simulators and drove off. Now you never do this to a bunch of Marines who don't have a lot of supervision. There will be and was trouble.
As we evacuated the town after being engaged some one threw an arty simulator into the building. No one hurt, lots of complaints and ...a small....fire....
Back to duty on that Saturday morning. It is very quiet, we had some down time from being up all night. Well I heard a door slam and then some laughter. Followed by a loud boom. Seems some miscreant threw a grenade sim under a sleeping buddies rack. Blew up the mattress and another small fire.
We quickly put it all out, and took the mattress to a supply closet that had stacks of mattresses, hid it in the middle of a stack and took another.
Don
One evening myself and a bunch of unsupervised platoon brothers were all hanging out. My buddy twinkle was showing us a 25mm tracer round he had manage to get off the range. He had successfully pulled the round from the casing. He was attempting to light the tracer end of it with a cigarette. We said twinkle thats stupid. Ya have to scrape the phosphorus first! So he did this and successfully lit the round.. it was a beautiful show of fire and twinkies screams. We successfully managed to get him to let it go and douse is burn hand in many numerous libations. And successfully hid that injury form our ncos.
No one is allowed to bring ammo, flares, cs, smoke or anything in from the field!
One night there was a raid on our barracks by CID and the MPs.
All heck broke loose as smokes, CS, flares, booby traps, parachute flares were popped and thrown out the windows at the MPs.
Nothing was found in the barracks and they left.
One night there was a raid on our barracks by CID and the MPs.
All heck broke loose as smokes, CS, flares, booby traps, parachute flares were popped and thrown out the windows at the MPs.
Nothing was found in the barracks and they left.
Back when I was stationed with the 38th ARS at Osan AB Korea we would have a little fun with other units on base. One Saturday night a few of us snuck over to the Red Horse squadron and painted their big red horse in front Air Rescue Green. The same night we painted to extremely large green feet on one end of the runway. The General on base paid us a visit Monday morning asking us to refrain from such things while laughing about our antics.
Which reminds me…
Went to squadron officer school at Maxwell AFB many many moons ago. About 800 company grade officers in a class, vast majority are captains.
At the start of class, our section commander is briefing of us on various things we should know, among which is a recently performed prank. Someone in the previous class took all the guidons from the headquarters building out to the golf course and switched them for the little flags that mark the holes. The little flags ended up back in the headquarters building in place of the guidons.
He laughed and said this was the best one yet. Then he very sternly told us that the commander had forbidden anybody to replicate it.
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p.s. Which brings up another memory. Our SOS Section commander, named Captain Rawls, also instructed us on what to do if we got crossways with the local police, which happens from time to time I guess. In the midst of this, his boss, the wing chief, stops in and tells section commander to continue with his briefing.
When Rawls gets done he asks us “so you know what to do if you get detained by the local police?”
We had already started to jell as a group and as one voice we shouted back to him “My name is RAWLS! R - A - W - L - S! RAWLS!”
His eyes and mouth popped open in perfect “O’s” and then he buried his face in his hands shaking his head. The Wing Chief rolled his eyes, started laughing and as he walked out the door he said “Rawls, I’m gonna go start your dishonorable discharge paperwork right now. You’re not gonna survive this class.”
When Rawls gets done he asks us “so you know what to do if you get detained by the local police?”
We had already started to jell as a group and as one voice we shouted back to him “My name is RAWLS! R - A - W - L - S! RAWLS!”
His eyes and mouth popped open in perfect “O’s” and then he buried his face in his hands shaking his head. The Wing Chief rolled his eyes, started laughing and as he walked out the door he said “Rawls, I’m gonna go start your dishonorable discharge paperwork right now. You’re not gonna survive this class.”
On this day (actually 30 Dec), in 1970, the F-14 flew for the first time. The plane crashed on its second test flight on December 30 when it suffered a hydraulic failure. The crew ejected safely less than 100 feet above the ground. The Tomcat would go on to operate aboard U.S. carriers from 1974 to 2006.
I bet those Red Horse guys were really mad when they sobered up enough to realize what happened.
RED HORSE (Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operations Squadron Engineer... yes they say engineer twice) are a different kind of cat. There are very few RED HORSE Squadrons, IIRC they have around 600 troops assigned. These are Civil Engineers who fix battle damaged runways, do heavy construction projects, build schools in the third world, etc.
To say their reputation proceeds them is a bit of an understatement. That would be an alcohol-fueled reputation.
What always amazed me about RED HORSE, these are USAF Civil Engineers assigned to a Red Horse Squadron. There is a Special Experience Indicator for having been in a Red Horse unit (which follows you for life) but these are the same career fields as found in a Civil Engineer Squadron.
Which brings me to this: Folks in Civil Engineer Squadrons really hate RED HORSE. They are all in the same career fields, a lot of CES guys were in RED HORSE at one time. "RED HORSE SUCKS!!" Weren't you in RED HORSE last year? "Yeah, but they still suck."
To say their reputation proceeds them is a bit of an understatement. That would be an alcohol-fueled reputation.
What always amazed me about RED HORSE, these are USAF Civil Engineers assigned to a Red Horse Squadron. There is a Special Experience Indicator for having been in a Red Horse unit (which follows you for life) but these are the same career fields as found in a Civil Engineer Squadron.
Which brings me to this: Folks in Civil Engineer Squadrons really hate RED HORSE. They are all in the same career fields, a lot of CES guys were in RED HORSE at one time. "RED HORSE SUCKS!!" Weren't you in RED HORSE last year? "Yeah, but they still suck."
If I recall correctly, caused by failure of hydraulic hard line. They were made of titanium, for weight savings, but where they made 90° bends near bulkhead they would quickly work harden from internal pressure, and become very brittle.
Ping!
Sploosh!
Uncontrolled vertical deployment into the terrain.
Fortunately, they learned.
It's also why, when new systems fail, everyone should take a break before they start screaming about a contractor and faulty equipment, and stealing from the taxpayer.
New complex systems usually need to be worked out.
The F-14 was THE fighter for it's time (for carrier defense).
To have stopped at the first failure, would have been MORE of a waste.
On my deployment to the 380th Air Expeditionary Wing at al Dhafra Air Base, Abu Dhabi, UAE in Jun-Aug 2002, we had two RED HORSE squadrons on base. They spent the summer pouring concrete, greatly expanding the parking area for aircraft. According to all the medals paperwork I had to review as wing exec, they poured more concrete for ramp space than had been done overseas since the Vietnam war. This was part of the wind up for Iraq, although we were operating under OEF at the time.
The other thing RED HORSE was noted for was that one of their NCOs was missing his wife A LOT and wrote a very explicit email about what he intended to catch up on with her when he got back from his deployment. For unknown reasons, he not only sent the email to her, but included the “ALL COMMAND STAFF“ email distribution list in the “TO:“ line. This included the Wing Commander, the Wing Commander‘s staff of a dozen or so(including me), the Group Commanders and staff, all the Wing squadron commanders and their execs and admin troops, the RED HORSE squadron commanders and staff … so probably not more than about 40-50 people.
What was funny is that we were in a secure area that was also for the U-2 squadron. Red Horse could not go into our area without being escorted.
First time I heard a U-2 was at Osan. LOUD!!
Has been there for a very long time. My oldest son was with the U-2 Squadron there. He was in Egress.
I was there in 92-93. They were programmed to retire in the 08 POM but got new life due to Global Hawk's lack of SIGINT capability at the time. The fleet is retired now I think.
Egress on the U-2? It works, just ask Gary Powers.
