Semper Fi! I saw "The D.I." in 1957. Two-and-a-half -years later I joined the Corps.
Web and company got it as right as they could in '57. Boot, in '59, was more like, in fact, exactly like, the Boot Camp shown in "Full Metal Jacket" - Yes. A black recruit, in my training platoon, was called "Snowball." I was called "Stick," because I was skinny as a rail. Every recruit had a nickname, some rather vile, that stuck with him through his service in the Corps. Getting smacked, or knocked on your ass, when you screwed-up was SOP. "Drop, and give me fifty," got to be ho-hum. Then, it turned into,"Drop, and give me two-hundred!"
The D.I.'s were a bunch of sadistic bastards, but it was a controlled sadism, and with a primary purpose of keeping us stupid MoFos alive when we hit combat. 200 years of experience was ingrained in that "sadism," and everything the D.I. did, or said, had a purpose geared to his mission.
A bad D.I. gets grunts killed. A good D.I., though seemingly the world's biggest asshole, keeps 'em alive. You can't kill the enemy if you're dead.
In case you didn't know, the Marine Corps has one primary mission: Kill the enemy. PFD.
Everything else is pure bravo sierra.
MstGySgt WHT, USMC (ret)
Web and company got it as right as they could in '57. Boot, in '59, was more like, in fact, exactly like, the Boot Camp shown in "Full Metal Jacket" - Yes. A black recruit, in my training platoon, was called "Snowball." I was called "Stick," because I was skinny as a rail. Every recruit had a nickname, some rather vile, that stuck with him through his service in the Corps. Getting smacked, or knocked on your ass, when you screwed-up was SOP. "Drop, and give me fifty," got to be ho-hum. Then, it turned into,"Drop, and give me two-hundred!"
The D.I.'s were a bunch of sadistic bastards, but it was a controlled sadism, and with a primary purpose of keeping us stupid MoFos alive when we hit combat. 200 years of experience was ingrained in that "sadism," and everything the D.I. did, or said, had a purpose geared to his mission.
A bad D.I. gets grunts killed. A good D.I., though seemingly the world's biggest asshole, keeps 'em alive. You can't kill the enemy if you're dead.
In case you didn't know, the Marine Corps has one primary mission: Kill the enemy. PFD.
Everything else is pure bravo sierra.
MstGySgt WHT, USMC (ret)