W Griffin - The Corps I - Semper Fi

And Pleasant was a man of some imagination: He might suggest that the young gentlemen were slow to fall out because they were unduly burdened by their accoutrements. Instead of falling out in helmets, full marching pack and rifles, they could try it again wearing only undershorts, skivvy shirts, leggings, and steel helmets. Plus of course, their rifles.

This required that they remove their leggings and their utilities. The utilities were then folded in the proper manner and placed in the proper place in their footlockers, and the leggings laced back on over bare calves.

If this increased their speed, Corporal Pleasant then experimented. They would next fall out in only raincoats, utility trousers, skivvy shirts, and cartridge belts. This required unlacing the leggings, storing them as prescribed, then detaching the canteen, first aid packet, and web harness from the web cartridge belt, and storing these items in their appointed places.

Next, perhaps, Corporal Pleasant would order that they again try falling out with the proper speed and enthusiasm in full marching gear. This meant of course reattaching the canteen, the first aid packet, and the harness to the cartridge belt; folding the raincoat and placing it in its prescribed location in the footlocker; and then relacing the leggings.

The possible variations were almost limitless, and Corporal Pleasant experimented with as many as he could think of".

Then there was punishment for sin:

The greatest sin of all was dropping the U.S. Rifle, Caliber.30, Ml. Anyone who did this could expect to double-time around the parade ground with the rifle held at arm's length above his head, while shouting in a loud voice, "My rifle is my best friend, and I am a miserable sonofabitch because I abused it. God have mercy on my miserable soul."

Another sin was laughter, or giggling, or even a detected snicker. These sinners would double-time around the parade ground with their rifles at arm's length above their heads, while shouting at the top of their lungs, "I am a hyena. A hyena is an animal who laughs when there is nothing funny to laugh at. This is the sound a hyena makes. Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha."

Another means of instilling discipline was calisthenics and close-order drill. This also served to cause the young gentlemen to shed civilian fat and tone their musculature. There were thirty minutes of calisthenics (later forty-five minutes and then an hour) before breakfast. And there was at least an hour of close-order drill every day.

Individual young gentlemen who came to Corporal Pleas-ant's attention during the duty day (which ran from 0345 until whenever Pleasant decided the day was over) were often required to perform additional calisthenics. Normally, this was in the form of pushups, but sometimes, when one of the young gentlemen displayed what Pleasant thought was ungainly, awkward movement (such as being out of step) it took the form of the "duck walk."

When one did the duck walk, one first squatted, then one placed the U.S. Rifle, Caliber.30, Ml in a horizontal position against the small of the neck, and then one waddled, while shouting, "This is the way a duck walks. Quack! Quack! Quack! I will try very hard to try to walk like a Marine in the future!"

McCoy had been through all this before in boot camp at Parris Island, but that didn't make things any easier. He had been genuinely surprised to learn (his feet became raw and blistered and his muscles ached) how badly out of shape he had become. In fact, the only real advantages he (and the other two Marine noncoms) had over the college boys was that responding to commands had already been drilled into them and was a reflex action. Similarly, they had experience in giving close-order drill, had already learned how to bark out commands from the pits of their stomachs, and, more importantly, had learned the cadence so that it too was automatic.

All three of the Marines in the platoon learned something else: Taking close-order drill from someone who doesn't know what he is doing, someone who doesn't understand the cadence and the timing, could turn the Marine Corps Drum and Bugle Corps at the Marine Barracks in Washington into a mob of blind men stumbling over their own feet.

In addition to the inspections Pleasant called whenever the whim struck him (and sometimes, if he woke early, the whim struck before the official rising hour of 0345), there was a regularly scheduled inspection each Saturday morning. The official inspection was conducted by the gunnery sergeant of the company and the company commander.

In order that he not be embarrassed by slovenly young gentlemen or equipment, Corporal Pleasant conducted both a preinspection and a pre-preinspection of the platoon. The latter was held on Friday evening after the barracks had been scrubbed and polished. It was necessary that the platoon pass the pre-preinspection before they were permitted to retire for the evening. Sometimes the pre-preinspection did not meet Corporal Pleasant's high standards until very late at night.

The preinspection was conducted the next morning, half an hour before first call. It was to determine if the assholes had fucked anything up in the three or four hours while they'd been in the sack after the pre-preinspection. If they had, it could be corrected in the time officially set aside for breakfast.

Scuttlebutt had it that today's inspection was going to be a real bitch. The company commander, who was rough enough, was not on the base. Thus the inspection would be conducted for him by another officer, the battalion mess officer; and the scuttlebutt on him was that he had a corn cob up his ass and was a really a chickenshit sonofabitch.

McCoy was not particularly concerned. He knew that once you had prepared your gear and arranged it, the situation was out of your hands. If an inspecting officer decided to jump your ass, he would. He would find something wrong, even if he had to step on the toes of the boots under your bunk so that he could get you for unshined shoes. If you couldn't control the situation, there was no point in worrying about it.

When Pleasant barked, "Ten-hut on the deck!" McCoy came to attention, his toes at a forty-five-degree angle, the fingers of his left hand against the seam of his trousers, his right hand holding the Garand just below the bayonet lug.

He stared straight ahead and heard the clatter of the rifles as one by one the young gentlemen came from attention to inspection arms. While this was going on, he had speculated-a little unkindly-that with just a little bit of luck, one of the young gentlemen would catch his thumb in the Ml action during the inspection. That produced a condition known as M1 thumb.

If he howled in pain, that just might bring the inspection to a quick end.

But there was no such fortuitous happenstance. The sound of clattering rifles moved closer to him. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the inspection party approaching.

He shifted the Garand to a diagonal position in front of him, slammed the action open, bobbed his head over the action to insure that it was unloaded, and then looked ahead, waiting for it to be snatched from his hand.

He found himself looking into the face of First Lieutenant John R. Macklin, USMC.

There was no smile on Macklin's face, not even a flicker of recognition.

"This man is unshaven," Lieutenant Macklin said.

The gunny trailing him dutifully wrote this down on his clipboard.

Macklin snatched the Garand from McCoy's hand, looked into the open action, and then raised the butt high in the air, so that he could look into the barrel.

"And this weapon is filthy," Lieutenant Macklin said, before he threw the Garand back at McCoy so hard that it stung his hands and he almost dropped it.

The gunny dutifully wrote "filthy weapon" on his clipboard.