:: Live in Fear ::
There is one flaw in the way the army is run that does not seem right to me. And that is the fact that everyone lives in the fear of consequences of their actions and that fear is used to control them.
Every training exercise we conduct has a safety brief and in the safety brief phrases like "better not _______, or else you going to answer for it" and "if you _______, you'd better watch out". Pretty standard threats but the thing is that once you hear them so many times, you grow immune to them. To me, warnings about breaches in SOP should be rationalised. We should be allowed to know the reason why something is not done in this manner instead of another way.
For example, weapons training. We live in constant fear of our rifles. Words like "chamber explosion", "weapon jam" etc are used to remind us about the killing power we have in our hands. No doubt I agree that a certain amount of healthy respect has to be given to the fact that the inanimate metal object in our hands has the power to take the life of someone else and our own if we are not careful. But the one thing that I don't quite agree on is the inbred FEAR of the weapon. Technical handling lessons on the weapon should not just consist of the immediate actions to be taken when the weapon jams but more onto the mechanical functioning of the weapon. Once someone knows what exactly each part of the rifle does and how to maintain the rifle, I'm sure that accidents will be more infrequent. Right now, I believe that weapon maintenance by each soldier is not taken seriously.

I must apologise that of late most, in fact probably all, of my posts have been about the army. I can't help it. Unfortunately that's the only thing that I have time for in my life right now. There isn't an awful lot of time that is spent outside of camp so I don't really do much. It's seriously painful how much the army has taken away from my normal life and how I miss civilian lifestyle. hah... Now I'm even calling it CIVILIAN. A few months ago, it wouldn't be called civilian. It would be called normal.

080208. That is a date to be remembered. ORD. and back to normal life... whew.
countdown: 565 days to ORD.