Stupid GI Tricks

[pmulcahy11b]

Lee,

I talked to an American-Vietnamese war veteran once who complained he got fined more for accidentally shooting a water buffalo than civilians. Hard to judge the veracity of that one...
Tony

There was the same sort of story going around in Desert Storm, except it was a camel instead of a water buffalo. Stories like that probably come out of every war.

[dragoon500ly]

You can almost see several Iraqis, sitting around drinking coffee and watching the Marines setting fire to each other's pubic hair.

"Assem! The Americans are even sicker running dogs than Sadaam said they were!"

[dragoon500ly]

From a REFORGER exercise in 1982....

Two Army warrent officers are going to be court-martialed for their choice of lunch.

It seems that the two chiefs were tired of C-Rations and decided to stop off at a MacDonald's somewhere in Germany.

The reason why they were being court-martialed Their choice of vehicle!

They decided to land their AH-1 in the parking lot...and got caught on tape!!

[dragoon500ly]

Talked to an ole buddy of mine who served with the 11th ACR during Vietnam as a M-48 gunner. He tells me of a little modification that was used...

This involves a standard M-48 tank, and six Claymore mines, and some steel plate and welding equipment.

One of the major disadvantages of any tanks is that the closer you are to the tank, the harder it is for the crew to see you and bring weapons to bear, especially if the crew has been forced to button up the hatches.

This mod involves welding two "L" shaped brackets in board of the dismounted headlights, mounting a claymore on each and running the firing wires into the driver's compartment.

Two additional "I" shaped brackets are welded to the lower hull, one set in between the number 1 and 2 roadwheels and the second in front of the sprocket and angled to point out at a 45 degree angle, the firing wires are run along the side of the hull towards the rear, through the gap inbetween the sprocket and hull, back over the rear deck and into the driver's compartment.

Gives a rather nasty surprise to any hostile infantry trying to get close with a satchel charge or two!

[mikeo80]

Dad's WWII Stories

I was visiting my Dad for his 87th (!!) brithday last week. He regailed me of some of the stories from his WWII Navy Experience.

1) Dad was a Radar/Sonar man in a PBY Catalina. He flew anti-sub patrols off of Florida. During one patrol, he reported a blip on his sonar. Radio man and navigator confirmed free fire zone. They dropped their two depth charges....


Up came a dead whale....


SOOO...Being the enterprising chaps that they were, instead of German, Italian or Japanese flags painted on their plane...THey painted a whale!!!

2) On days not flying, Dad and his group were MP's at a German/Italian Naval forces POW camp. Being typical GI's, Dad and his group would give extra clothing, blankets, rations, cigarettes, etc to the prisoners. Now it seems that there were a couple of German Officers who insisted that all of these goodies belonged to them...

Well, as Dad put it...Those German Officers fell down the steps....several times. Hard.

3) Towards the end of WWII, Dad was training to be a carrier fighter pilot for the invasion of Japan. We have a picture of Dad in his flying outfit. Red Barron beware!!!! Dad dressed in leather jacket, leather helmet, scarf, goggles, gloves, etc.

You see, training back then was done in BI-PLANES!!!!!

Also, as part of the "unofficial" training, there were many "Points" scored by Dad and his fellow learners when they would run the landing gear of their planes on TOP of the long freight trains that moved material.

Hope you enjoy these stories. Dad sure enjoys telling them.

Mike

[cavtroop]

Talked to an ole buddy of mine who served with the 11th ACR during Vietnam as a M-48 gunner. He tells me of a little modification that was used...

This involves a standard M-48 tank, and six Claymore mines, and some steel plate and welding equipment.

One of the major disadvantages of any tanks is that the closer you are to the tank, the harder it is for the crew to see you and bring weapons to bear, especially if the crew has been forced to button up the hatches.

This mod involves welding two "L" shaped brackets in board of the dismounted headlights, mounting a claymore on each and running the firing wires into the driver's compartment.

Two additional "I" shaped brackets are welded to the lower hull, one set in between the number 1 and 2 roadwheels and the second in front of the sprocket and angled to point out at a 45 degree angle, the firing wires are run along the side of the hull towards the rear, through the gap inbetween the sprocket and hull, back over the rear deck and into the driver's compartment.

Gives a rather nasty surprise to any hostile infantry trying to get close with a satchel charge or two!

The Air Force did this in Iraq:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/USAF_M113_APC_at_Camp_Bucca,_Iraq.jpg

Near as I can tell, it's an APC used to quell prison riots or something not sure though, little info out there.

[dragoon500ly]

It's always scary when people mention Air Force and using armored vehicles. In the armor battalions, one of the three tanks in Headquarters Company is the -66 vehicle and it belongs to the Air Force forward observer. You know, that "lost" looking major in Air Force uniform, wandering around...

They normally stay in their jeep during field exercises. But a decision was made to run them through the Tank Commander's Certification Course and turn them into instant TCs. While it seemed a good idea to some REMF buried deep in the bowels of the Pentagon, taking an airdale and putting them in a tank was a recipe for trouble. Especially when they had to go to gunnery.

The M-60A1 tank is equipped with a gyro-stabilizer that maintains traverse and elevation while the tank is moving. To stabilize, there is a control box with two dials, the gunner simply rotates the dials to hold the gun/turret steady. Simple, right

Shooting with a three man crew means that the tank commander also has to act as gunner, which is why the TC position has the ability to move the turret and fire a weapon, many TCs are adapt at reaching into the gunner's position to flip switches, index ammo, arm the co-axial, etc.

Our airdale saw this being done and thought he could go one better, while holding the turret override control, he stretched his leg and tried to kick the switch for the co-ax...except he missed and engaged the stabilizer...and knocked both knobs out of adjustment.

Since he had the override engaged, the gun moved to max elevation, causing him to slip, and since he didn't let go of the override, the turret proceed to slew left at max speed. On the firing range we watched in awe as the turret spun about a dozen times before he released the override. We also got to listen to his terrified screaming and cursing over the radio circuit!

And Range Control couldn't help themselves: "Ahhhh, Hotel-66, please observe correct radio procedure!"

[helbent4]

It's always scary when people mention Air Force and using armored vehicles.

Lee,

My dad was employed as a civilian contractor with Burroughs Business Machines, installing the SAGE network into NORAD stations across Canada (Pine-Tree and Mid-Canada radar lines). Mostly up north like northern Quebec, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, BC. Not the "Far North", more like what we call the "deep bush". (Like the Australians, we have our "outback" except we have so much there are increasingly severe degrees of outbackedness.)

Speaking of "brass-catchers", he met my mom in the officer's club of one of these bases (Mt. Brother near Kamloops). A friend of hers dragged her there to troll for Air Force officers (she says) but she ended up dating the tech guy so go figure. This would have been in the early 60's, and his memories of Operation Skyshield II and III, not to mention real alerts, were particularly harrowing. It's understandable why the results of these full-dress exercises were kept secret until recently (hint: we would have gotten creamed in a nuclear war unless we struck first).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Skyshield

At any rate, he said that Air Force guys running around the station with guns was always considered a bad sign! One day up in the Interior (mid-northern BC) he was having coffee in the cafeteria when an AF guy packing a carbine came in and started closing the windows and shuttering them. It was a fallout exercise and they were locking down the base, although they were probably the only worthwhile target within 500km. Curious, dad asked if he'd closed the rest of the base, including the ventilation and air conditioning for the computer annex (where the SAGE main-frames were located) even though the intakes were filtered and the building kept at positive pressure. As you may have guessed from the time period, this was when computers had to be kept well-cooled (I think he said the SAGE mainframes used water or liquid cooling).

When the answer was he started at that end of the base first and indeed had shut everything down, including the SAGE annex, dad bolted for the door. He arrived at the far side of the base just before the coolant boiled over and destroyed the mainframe.

This is an unrelated, but hilarious infantry briefing (submitted to the webcomic "Terminal Lance" and is Not Safe For Work):

http://www.youtube.com/watchv=6sxXep-aUIc&feature=player_embedded

Tony

[pmulcahy11b]

My great-great-uncle John Harris (one of the few people on my stepmonster's side of the family worth anything) was a Marine in World War 1. (He unfortunately died about 15 years ago at the age of 99.) Seems the Germans one day sent an officer under a flag of truce to the the Marines' lines. The German commander was highly pissed at the Marines' "ungentlemanly" behavior -- the Marines would start an engagement by consistently picking off Germans at 600-800 yards. Not just a sniper or two, but the whole Marine unit!

I think the German commander was just pissed because his troops couldn't shoot as well.

[dragoon500ly]

This would have been in the early 60's, and his memories of Operation Skyshield II and III, not to mention real alerts, were particularly harrowing. It's understandable why the results of these full-dress exercises were kept secret until recently (hint: we would have gotten creamed in a nuclear war unless we struck first).

Tony,

There is an intresting story out of one of the Red Flag exercises held in Nevada. It seems that the RAF sent some Buccaneers over as Red Force bombers. The USAF, with its brand new F-15Cs was looking forward to nailing the RAF...so much so that a case of Dewar's Scotch was bet on the outcome.

The result...

RAF made 12 attacks on targets and never lost a single plane. They did it by doing nap of the earth, at less than 100 feet altitude and at high speed. It turns out the much-vaunted Eagles couldn't see on radar at such low altitude, and that the older Buccaneers, were faster and more maneuverable than the Eagles at low level.

Game, set and match to the Royal Air Force!!!!!

[dragoon500ly]

My great-great-uncle John Harris (one of the few people on my stepmonster's side of the family worth anything) was a Marine in World War 1. (He unfortunately died about 15 years ago at the age of 99.) Seems the Germans one day sent an officer under a flag of truce to the the Marines' lines. The German commander was highly pissed at the Marines' "ungentlemanly" behavior -- the Marines would start an engagement by consistently picking off Germans at 600-800 yards. Not just a sniper or two, but the whole Marine unit!

I think the German commander was just pissed because his troops couldn't shoot as well.

Paul,

I ran across a hardbook on WWI that talked about the Germans rifle practise taking place at indoor ranges and at ranges of no more than 100 yards. US Marines and Army, prewar, trained at up to 1,000 yards.

The Germans, while not as bayonet-happy as the French (is anybody more bayonet-happy than the French), believed that the bayonet would overpower the rifle. They also believed that the true man-killer was artillery and machine guns.

So when the Germans ran into the 2nd and 3rd Divisions of the AEF, there are so many accounts from both sides of how American rifle fire at unheard of ranges, slaughtered attacking Germans.

[dragoon500ly]

I once had a First Sergeant who was (in)famous for his safety briefings:

"Alright you horny bunch of f**king troopers! You have a f**king three day weekend and its time for our Safety f**king Briefing! Remember! If you get f**king drunk, call the CQ to have a f**king ride back to the f**king kaserne! Don't f**king Drink and f**king Drive! If you are going to f**k a local, use a f**king condom! If you plan of f**king passing out in a f**king ditch, have a f**king pair of f**king dry socks handy so you don't get f**king trench foot! No f**king fighting with the f**king MPs! And if one of you f**king idiots decide to take on the f**king Polizei, don't f**king call me to bail your f**king ass out! I plan on f**king my wife! Anybody have a f**king question Good! Dismissed!"

The Army...gotta love it!

[B.T.]

Well, Dragoon ...

His German was not bad

[dragoon500ly]

What can I say, he was a great First Sergeant, it's just that every sentence he ever uttered had f**k in it!

"Is there any the f**k else you would like to f**king add Captain"

"Lieutenant, I've seen some stupid f**king mistakes in my f**king 32 years of service. But this f**king takes the cake, Sir!"

[Adm.Lee]

Tony,

There is an intresting story out of one of the Red Flag exercises held in Nevada. It seems that the RAF sent some Buccaneers over as Red Force bombers. ...

Game, set and match to the Royal Air Force!!!!!

How about RN Admiral Woodward's story about how he 'sank' a US CVN (cited in his Falklands memoir) On a 1970s exercise in the Indian Ocean, his DD was supposed to be the target for a CVBG. At night, his ship rigged all the lights possible, and had the radio crew pretend to be an Indian cruise ship every time a plane flew over. At dawn, they were in antiship missile range of the carrier.