I don't want to get blown up: Any problems with that?

[bbereziuk]

Once upon a time, I was an idealistic young undergrad Commerce student with an idea:  The military appeals to me, but I don't want to get blown up.

So.. I decided to join the reserves.  A great concept!  This way I would be able to test the waters (if you will) of the murky military life style without actually getting myself into something that I can't handle.  I lived in Hamilton at the time, so I marched down the the Main Street recruiting center and got the deal started.  A gigantic Army sergeant opened my file and told me I needed to get in touch with a reserve unit directly (as I wanted to go officer).

When I told my friends and family what I was doing.  Their response was simple: "What?  Are you retarded?  If you join the military, you'll get blow up!"  I laughed at the time.  I figured that no one in the reserves ever gets blown up, so off I went.

There were no Army positions open in any of the Hamilton reserve units at the time.. so I joined HMCS STAR.  For some reason, about 12 other guys also wanted to join that year, so they had to jockey around the billets a bit.  During my unit interview, my future CO asked if I wouldn't mind taking a trade called NCS.  He ensured me that there was little chance of getting blown up in that trade... so I said 'giddy-up' and away my file went.

Four successful summers went by, I didn't get blown up, and I liked it all so much that I even went to RMC for an MA in War Studies.  The War Studies degree has had a bit of a common theme to it:  These days, lots of dudes get blown up... and it sucks.  We can think about it in class rooms.  We can try to work against it while on deployment.  We can even come up with new ways to protect ourselves.. but these days.. getting blown up is a very real risk in the military.  No other job in the country is quite like it.  From my perspective, the CF is quite possibly one of the most important organizations in our country... but man... this stuff is getting scary.. isn't it?

So.. this year... I'm looking for a job.  I want to join the reg. force.  Based upon advice from officers at RMC, and colleagues of mine.. I have been advised to stay away from MARS... but the Armour Corps rocks.  So.. I told the recruiting office that I'd like to be considered for the Armour corps.  Interestingly, my experience in the Naval reserves really hasn't given me any insight into what army life is like.. so despite some military experience, I feel like I'm entering something as a brand-spank'n new member. (so the great 'testing the waters' theory achieved nothing!)

I've recently told my friends and family about my potential to end up in the Army as early as this summer:  Again.. my parents, brother, and sister regularly reinforce the fact that guys in the army get blown up.  I've been told by family and friends that I'll get blown up so many times, that I'm starting to believe that if I walk to the store to get milk, there is a real chance that I might step on a bouncing betty along the way.

So I ask:  Was anyone else worried about this before they joined the army?  Am I nuts?

 

[Armymedic]

You are not nuts, I am in the military, and I don't want to get blown up either.

Have you heard of the saying:

"I'd die for my country, but I'd rather help others die for their's"

Nobody wants to die, and while the risk of injury and death is something you have to deal with as a soldier, it must also be known that you are a too valuable of a resource to just throw away without due caution and risk assessment.

To be perfectly honest, I am more worried about dying on the hwy between CFB Petawawa and Ottawa, then I have been at any time during my military career.

 

[Bruce Monkhouse]

I can guarantee that Highway 17 has taken more soldiers than training and deployments since the seventies....

 

[bbereziuk]

Thank you.. that perspective helps.

Any advice on how to deal with family and friends when they express concerns?  So far, I haven't been very good at easing their worries.

 

[Armymedic]

There is no good way to deal with your family. Once your in, they will get used to the fact that the most dangerous thing you will do the great majority of your time in the military will be bending over to tie your boots in the morning.

As for friends, if they are not your friends after you join...then they were not your friends before. Besides, you'll make more in the military anyway.

 

[axeman]

I dont want to get blown up either ...I dont want to sound negative but as long as you do your job right and can look to the left and right and see they are you shouldnt have that problem .. we train like we do to to minimize the risks involved with a dangerous thing we do ,,,
we generally have a lot of looking out done on behind us  to also ensure we do it in a safe way.. do it right and walk away . its not the thing you geerally doing right that will kill you its the one guy that isnt that will.. when you here some one thats a junior say watch this  ...
its time to run  play it safe and do it safe .. i  have spent 18 yrs in the infanty.. its when somebody does something wrong that injuries happen .. the ability to combat that is training and the knowledge of whats supposed to happen ...

 

[the 48th regulator]

its time to run  play it safe and do it safe .. i  have spent 18 yrs in the infanty.. its when somebody does something wrong that injuries happen .. the ability to combat that is training and the knowledge of whats supposed to happen ...

Very good positive reinforcement but not true.

Poop happens, but I say the cup is always half full.  Do your job, enjoy the experience, and that is my advice. 

Training and the knowledge of whats supposed to happen will help you keep you cool in tough situations, ensuring you complete the mission.  Doing something wrong, will get someone hurt or killed, but take the last decade, and you will see the majority of injuries or deaths were not caused by "Somebody doing something Wrong"

dileas

tess

 

[GO!!!]

Very good positive reinforcement but not true.

Poop happens, but I say the cup is always half full.  Do your job, enjoy the experience, and that is my advice. 

Training and the knowledge of whats supposed to happen will help you keep you cool in tough situations, ensuring you complete the mission.  Doing something wrong, will get someone hurt or killed, but take the last decade, and you will see the majority of injuries or deaths were not caused by "Somebody doing something Wrong"

I call.

Where did you get stats on what has killed "the majority" of soldiers in the last decade, and how do you know what they were, or were not doing wrong?

In my time in the CF, I have observed what axeman said to be true - you screw up - and someone gets hurt - not always the guy who screwed up either.

Accidents/incidents are rarely unpreventable. Even our enemies are not totally unpredictable - so I'd like to see a source for this comment of yours.

 

[the 48th regulator]

I call.

Where did you get stats on what has killed "the majority" of soldiers in the last decade, and how do you know what they were, or were not doing wrong?

In my time in the CF, I have observed what axeman said to be true - you screw up - and someone gets hurt - not always the guy who screwed up either.

Accidents/incidents are rarely unpreventable. Even our enemies are not totally unpredictable - so I'd like to see a source for this comment of yours.

You are kidding me right?

What did Isfeld, Gunther, and Ternapolski do that was wrong?

What did our boys (From your regiment) do wrong that got them killed in Kandahar?  Leger, Dyer,Green and Smith?

Or the injured like the recent situation with Bailey, Franklin, and Salikin...

Or what about Myself and Badanai?  What did we do wrong???

You want to chase around on threads and do battles tonight?  Sweet, I am ready...

But you want to make nice, PAM, course oriented statements, then read in to them carefully.  You of all people I would have thought, would have jumped in and said that a broad statement like axemans's was totally out of order, considering.

dileas

tess

 

[SHF]

Go! old chap,

I would say 48th has you on this one.

 

[GO!!!]

48th,

I maintain my position. Deaths and injuries in training and ops are usually due to a mistake somewhere.

I don't have info on exactly what went wrong in the first three cases.

On the issue of the Tarnak Farms bombing, someone did screw up - THE PILOT - that is why I said;

....said to be true - you screw up - and someone gets hurt - not always the guy who screwed up either....

The book "Friendly Fire" by Michael Friscolanti can shed a little more light on this for you.

Baily, Franklin and Salikin? I'll ask - I'm sure their visitor load at the Hospital is tapering off now, and I'm sure they'll appreciate the visit!

You? I don't know - but like it was said - there is almost always a lesson to be learned. In Tarnak farms - it was the pilot who dropped the ball. The lesson? Follow your ROE.

I also said "rarely" that means it does happen, just not often.

 

[the 48th regulator]

GO!!!,

Thanks for breaking it down, oh you have summed it up.. :

You called I gave examples.

You come back with "I don't knows" and "authors have said"...

Zook's thread was "I don't want to get blown up: Any problems with that?" so what you are say to him is that He should worry about pilots and people in charge of weapons that can blow him up.

I say worry about doing your job, and garnish as much from the experience.  You worry too much about what's in the sky, you can't do the "job" you and axeman profess about.

Badanai and I were ambushed, going down the route, and doing the duty dictated to us.  Could we have prevented that attatck by our keen observance of our training?  Nope.  Our training did, however, teach us how to react and bring us home alive.

Maybe that is the angle that you two should profess in this thread.  The statements you make, blame the injured or dead parties involved.

dileas

tess

 

[GO!!!]

Maybe that is the angle that you two should profess in this thread.  The statements you make, blame the injured or dead parties involved.

You must be in great shape the way you constantly jump to conclusions like that.

How many troops have been hurt or killed in Canada and abroad in the last decade?

You don't know. You selected a few cases, and tried to turn this into a "blame the dead guy" game.

I know I'm right. My company has half a dozen guys walking around in casts, braces and stitches right now. Every one of them can tell you what happened and how to prevent it. It is not always their fault (the pilot dropped us in the trees instead of on the "A") but the point is most of them did'nt have to happen.

To sit there and try to turn this into an emotional screaming match is kind of childish. Why should'nt we investigate injuries and deaths and try to figure out how they happened and how to prevent them? Sure someone will get blamed, but if it saves a life in the future, is'nt it worth it?

 

[Gunner]

:argument:

:

 

[the 48th regulator]

You must be in great shape the way you constantly jump to conclusions like that.

Yep I am in great effing shape, wish you were there to help with the assessment for that a decade ago.  Maybe I wouldn't be the way I am now if you were there for that.  Sort yourself out.

This is what you want to come up with?  What did you do wrong that landed you in the trees?  I selected a few cases.  You called me, I gave examples of what can happen.  You are now calling that selective?

I know I'm right. My company has half a dozen guys walking around in casts, braces and stitches right now. Every one of them can tell you what happened and how to prevent it. It is not always their fault (the pilot dropped us in the trees instead of on the "A") but the point is most of them didn't have to happen.

So what is your advice for Zook, then?  To worry about the pilot?  Worry about the driver in the vehicle he is in?  No better yet, why not worry about the storesman that issued the boots that gave him blisters?

Sounds like treading water to stay afloat to justify posting in the thread if you ask me....

dileas

tess

 

[Jungle]

Guys, you are way off topic... take the arguing to PMs.

Zook, people get blown up in the Military like people get injured or killed in car accidents, work accidents, sports accidents etc... in civilian life. Nobody lives forever.
If your family and friends are worried, invite them to get to know the CF better.

 

[medicineman]

Zook, if it really worries you alot, perhaps a change of jobs would be in order.  Having said that, as has been pointed out, a minor error in judgement driving to work or out in the field could be just as dangerous as driving through a minefield or into a combat team attack.  Everything is relative.

48th, I have a fair amount of knowledge vis a vis one of the fatalities you mentioned and some about another due to either being involved or supporting units concerned.  I`m not going to slag people living or dead down in a public forum, as the living still have to live with it all (myself included).  But, let`s face it, some error in judgement ultimately resulted in these incidents.  I can even think of an error in my judgement that ended up with a vehicle hitting a mine (not long before one of the incidents concerned) - luckily it was a toe popper and just scared the crap out of myself and the driver of the other vehicle.  I was also involved in several training accidents -  all could be directly attributed to poor judgement or human error somewhere along the line.  Oddly enough, the same happens in most motor vehicle crashes, accidental shootings and malpractice suits in medicine, etc ad nauseum.  Military history is as full of errors in judgement leading to a large number of casualties as it is full of brilliant judgement leading to victory.  Long story short, it`s all about being a human - a being that is inherently prone to error.

MM 

 

[the 48th regulator]

medicineman ,

So to sum up your post, you then agree with this statement.

i  have spent 18 yrs in the infanty.. its when somebody does something wrong that injuries happen .. the ability to combat that is training and the knowledge of whats supposed to happen ...

Thank you, so your job then is to clean up the mess after we make mistakes and get hurt.  You say it has nothing to do to the fact that we work in a dangerous environment, and things happen.

I am glad you have personal knowledge of these incidents, what did we do wrong to get injured then?  Phil and I would love to learn after all of these years.

dileas

tess

 

[axeman]

i hate to stir the pot .. lets see generally if theres a death theres been a lapse . mark,ainsworth,nathan,and richard did not die because they did something wrong but they were killed because some one did do something wrong. the pilot . there was a bunch of jnr officers that died because they did not know that only a CLEAN WOODEN stick is to be used to tamp explosives in a crater  . after their deaths a lot of ppl now know that .. its the training we get that minimizes the risks we take yes poop happens as a blown hmmv is a clear example of that .. i know you carry shrapnel in your body i know a lot of other ppl that do to .. generally it was not the way you handle yourself but the person next  to you ...if yourplaying safe and johhny plays safe generally you can get away clean .. its when youstart adding up the .05% chance here and there that all of a sudden that you catch a packet... you just happend to be unlucky.. isfeld ended being uinlucky ..  i know a lot of deathes that could of been prevented if training  or proceedure were followed mores the pity i knew a lot off ppl by name, but inthe end theres always an off day  you win some you lose some everyone dies in the end ,,,,,

 

[the 48th regulator]

So in other words I mistook your statement.

What you really meant to say was Murphy always comes along for the ride....man if you had said that in the first post we would have saved tons of pages and time...

sorry to have misread you.

dileas

tess