Posted on 08/23/2011 5:05:54 PM PDT by nickcarraway
A Marine in my family told of pulling guard duty with Iraqis. One fell asleep twice in one night, and the Marine slugged him. The Iraqi pulled a knife, and THAT earned him a huge butt-kicking. After that, the Iraqi didn’t fall asleep...and neither did the Marine, since he figured the Iraqi would cheerfully kill him if he did.
As an officer in the USAF, I have been known to turn a blind eye to fellow enlisted men dishing out punishment. I can also say in every case I knew about, the guy punished grew up and became a solid airman.
Of course, if I did the same thing now, I’d probably end up in prison. Guess it is good I’m retired.
Inducing deep depression in someone in that state is exceedingly dangerous ~ those guys are lucky all he did was kill just himself.
Wrong. Sleeping on guard duty in a combat situation has been a captial offense in the US military. Even today Article 113 of the UCMJMisbehavior of sentinel or lookout -allows for execution.
By sleeping on guard duty in Afganistan the “victim” could have gotten everyone in his unit killed.
RE: your tagline - my son is applying for the PLC
Advances have been made in medical understanding and my understanding is that our military, if not yours, keeps up with those discoveries.
Wow! Can you interpret that for us civilians, lol?!
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Well, for starters, a lot of ‘minor’ offenses are handled on the deck plate level.
Not saying sleeping on watch/duty is minor but an NCO doesn’t want to be known as being report happy.
When a thief is caught the first time he is usually administered to by his bunk mates (same as ‘do funnies)and many types ‘fall up a ladder’ while heading to the shower, where he had a lot of help.
Usually by the time a guy got to Captains Mast or Courts-Martial he had been attended to by his peers.
Of course, I am talking many years before PC ran rampant.
“What I don’t understand in this one is that someone thought using the techniques one might use to break a slave would improve self-discipline. Today it’s recognized this sort of thing induces some pretty serious depression. I really doubt the guys doing this were taught in the military how this can be done.”
It isn’t hard. Your buddies impress on you the idea that you cannot afford to let them down. In every case I knew of, it resulted in a better person who grew up and became a part of the team.
It just was
Simple logic would tell you that the entire platoon was not sleeping or they would not have repeatedly caught him sleeping on duty.
“This is usually not a disciplinary issue ~ it’s a neurological problem, or a result of disease or injury ~ or dope.”
BS! It normally is someone who is bone tired and just doesn’t try hard enough.
Semper Fi...oh, I’m sorry, I ment get bent. The only thing that saddens me is that his “peers” didn’t frag his sorry arse.
By my post? Well I’m not the MSM am I? That’s what I meant.
In modern warfare you can and will encounter incredible things never before encountered. It's just a matter of time until sleeping agents show up.
I'm surprised Lew wasn't brought up for sleeping on guard duty.
I’ve fallen asleep a number of times while on duty at the office!
People unable to take advantage of such moments probably did get tired, but that's no excuse.
Because peer pressure frequently works. because kicking someone out of the military isn’t all that easy. Because the others are about the same age as this guy, or just a few years older.
We are wasting a lot of lives over there. Either we fight to win or get out.
Blood sugar irregularities as well as blood pressure problems can do that ~ we are talking about younger men in this situation so it’s likely any problem like that simply wasn’t caught by the medics.
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