Posted on 09/02/2016 6:44:52 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Every generation is perceived as weaker than the one that bore them.
There is some truth to that, but there are acceptable reasons for the decline in physical strength. First off I do not and most likely never will work as hard as my father did and I know I never came close to how hard my grandfather worked.
The truth is I never wanted to physically work as hard as my Grandpa Edgar did. He was a dirt poor share cropper in north Missouri who lost his entire crop in 1934 and 1936.
There were no tractors to do the heavy farm work with. He expended hours each day dealing with the horses before and after a hard day of work in the fields. There was no electricity so what labor saving devices that might have been on the market in 1935 were something Edgar could not use anyway. He could not have afforded to buy any of these devices. It was not Grapes of Wrath bad, but it was darn close for the grandparents.
When my grandparents moved to Iowa before WWII Edgar stopped farming, but my dad hired himself out as a day laborer all through his teenage years on local farms. $2 a day for a ten hour work day was good money for my dad. I know I never wanted to work that hard.
In 1949 my father Basil, the now retired US Navy Master Chief, road the train to Chicago from Iowa to attend basic training at Great lakes Naval base forty miles north of Chicago. This was twelve weeks of easy work for the future Master Chief. He got to sleep late and only had to get out of bed at 6:00 a.m. They had electricity and running water in his barracks and indoor plumbing. He had never had that until the US Navy came into his life. For him the physical work of Navy training was a lot easier than farming.
He still laughs about the big city boys in his training battalion who complained all through basic training about how hard it was. So were the big city boys of 1949 their generation’s weak men? I will bet you they did not think so.
The Master Chief did his last assignment in the Navy back at Great Lakes Naval base and for the first time in my life I lived close to Iowa and my extended family. There were lots of male cousins who for the most part thought I was odd. I had lived the first 16 years of my life traveling around the nation and living outside the US. Going across the Mississippi river to Illinois was a big deal in their life. I was well traveled but I did not have the strength of my farm kid cousins and they let me know about it.
One cousin talked me into baling hay with him. I had helped on his farm before but those were sixty pound hay bales. He did not bother to tell me we would be slinging one hundred pound bales all day. I brought no gloves, no hat and no water and I did not know any better. When I could not hack the job and my cousin had to pick up my slack he was mad and he never let me forget my weakness.
Now I went on to go to college, became an Air Force officer, got a masters degree and taught high school and worked in indoor heated and air conditioned offices most of my life. My cousin sort of finished high school and to this day still depends on his physical strength (his is over 60 now) to make a living. We do not talk much except at family funerals and I do not envy his life. Of course he never joined the military either.
When I joined the Air Force all we did at Officer Training School for physical training was running. We did no other physical training. I spent six months at the Army, Infantry Officer Basic Course and I more than made up for the less physically active Air Force training.
Infantry school was hard (real hard), but if you wanted to graduate you worked harder than you did in your last civilian or military job. You adapted, you improvised your overcame. Weaker people can rise to the occasion if they want or need to or they get run over.
My cousins and the guys I went to high school with were sweating bullets about getting drafted and sent to Vietnam. When the draft ended in 1973 and there was no longer a threat of mandatory conscription they simply put thoughts of the Army out of their heads for three generations. So my generation did not volunteer to join the military and neither did their sons or grandsons. Oh, a few went into the service, but the draw of the G.I. Bill to go to college on, or just having a job was more of a factor than getting in great physical shape to serve and defend the nation.
Always remember, we still have a draft and it can be activated anytime the nation is in dire peril. Your 18 year old relative even if he is a weak, fifty pounds over-weight, and an out of shape video gamer, can be drafted.
Do not worry we had motivational training platoons back during Vietnam to deal with the weak ones. The weak ones would show up to basic training and two months later they still had not started their first class of actual instruction. However they would be up everyday a 5:00 am doing physical training for 12 hours a day.
The weak were not let off, to slink home to mamma because they could not meet minimum standards. In today’s volunteer military recruiting world only approximately one out of four young Americans can meet the minimums. Remember those standards that excluded three out of four will fall by the wayside when bombs start exploding inside US soil. We always drop our standards and basic requirements in time of war. The weak and less capable of our society who plan to stay out of the game due to their inferior qualifications, the Department of Defense will get you anyway. You would be surprised how low the standards can drop in time of all out war.
Don’t Forget the Girls
They will not reactivate the draft without including our young women and that is only fair. So if you are fat and out of shape, and you want to talk about your feelings as to why this should keep you out of the Army, get over yourself young lady. Uncle Sam will want you also and you too can attend a motivational platoon to bring you in line with your fellow male future combatants. If we are going to make your fat brother march to the front line in the next war, there is no reason why we cannot make his fat sister pull her weight out onto the battlefield also. The quickest solution is to get in shape.
I am not trying to sound mean, but if we get nuked and millions of Americans die no one will care if you are a plus-size soldier. We had troops in uniform and on ships to France in WWI and when they arrived with less than six total weeks in the Army they went right to the front. If the Army cannot get you in shape they will simply issue you larger battle dress uniforms, and point you to the sounds of gunfire. Those who volunteered will have no time and little respect for the weak ones who waited to be drafted in hopes of being sent home for physical deficiencies and thereby avoiding the horrors of combat.
Yes we have weak people in our society, we always have. The latest crop of weak young Americans will in fact figure it out if they want to come home from war to mom and their video games.
Weakness can be overcome. Death because of weakness is something you can do something about. You choose and choose wisely.
A President TRUMP will inspire young men to achieve.
When I was at Great Lakes for Boot Camp, most of our company was from new York, Pennsylvania, etc...Up north...
Me, being from East Tennessee, got a lot of kidding about being a hillbilly and my accent...
Once I was asked how I liked wearing shoes....
I said, “Shoes??? What’s that???”
He looked at me funny and said that’s what’s on your feet...
I said, “So THAT’S what them thangs are!!! They put ‘em on me when I got here and I ain’t figgered out how to get rid of ‘em yet!!!”
I think he believed me for a fast second...
LOL
I am not sure we are weaker but previous generations were incredibly durable. They worked hard all day and thought nothing of it. I mean hard backbreaking work.
I was substitute teaching around 1995 and a Sons of Confederate Veterans branch set up a typical camp on the playground. Classes took turns visiting it and asking questions etc.
The soldiers were dressed in wool uniforms. They wore them in the Summer too. I could not imagine marching 20 miles in a day as Stonewall Jackson’s army routinely did.
WWII soldiers were largely depression era workers. They were tough, really tough. The Germans and Japanese were just as tough.
Too many single moms raising boys by themselves.
My company at Ft. Leonard Wood was entirely Indiana and Kentucky National Guardsman except for about 3 of us who were Regular Army. We got to do their KP while they learned riot control.
That sucked....
“The soldiers were dressed in wool uniforms.”
—
If it was untreated wool it would be as comfortable as cotton.
.
Another point:
When I was growing up, we had no idea what air conditioning was...We all played outdoors all summer in the heat...
Today, kids are so used to climate control air conditioning that they won’t go outside and stay inside with their video games...
Remember 9 / 11 happened because Osama thought that we were weak and would not respond.
He may have been premature but we have had 8 years of Obama since then.
I despise Obama even more than Osama and wish the prior an even less dignified departure than the latter
After Viet Nam the Military cleaned out the Dead Wood, after Obama it can clean out the Pink Wood. I have far more faith in MY Military than I do in Politicians.
Exactly
The boys of today have a single mom as their father figure.
*** “If it was untreated wool it would be as comfortable as cotton” ***
I live in South Texas and I do not have AC (long story and a Divorce so I don’t need the Snarks)
I wear Wool Socks (Italian Army Surplus) every day and find them much more comfortable than Cotton ... Soft and Cool in the Summer, Soft and Warm in the Winter and they are VERY durable (only complaint is that if there is a Sand Spur within 500 ft... in the wash it will find one of my socks)
Why is it fair to draft girls Major Haar?
I’ll be darned-——I’ve never worn wool in the hot weather but I remember my mother raving about it.
It must be BRUTAL in South Texas and interesting to find out that wool works.
(And I can identify with “long story and a divorce”——been there.)
Equal rights, equal responsibility.
Women have been demanding to be allowed to serve in the combat arms and to be treated exactly as men are? Then women can be subject to the draft, too.
I’d point out that the Israelis have figured out that everyone, man or woman, needs to be able to defend their country. Women there are drafted just as the men are. And the Israelis would know something about what needs to be done when your country is facing several existential threats.
Uhhh yes he looks weak alright.
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