Cold Week in Heck

It was the most difficult week yet of OCS. Despite all the complaints I may have, I have to admit that the way the course is set up builds a lot of character in a person that may be extremely useful in the officer's world. After this hard and interesting week, I am left with my thoughts. There are some good thoughts, but there are also some very horrible thoughts. Here was the week.

Last Sunday after we reported back in from our weekend, we had yet another SOCR practice. The Senior Officer Candidate Review is a ceremony in which we move from Basic Officer Candidates to Senior Officer Candidates. Now we have many new privileges and we can be saluted by basic candidates. The SOCR was on Monday, and it went just fine. Unfortunately, the warmth of the moment didn't last long. We boarded the busses for the field just a few hours later on Monday.

The packing list was handed out on Sunday. When I saw it, I figured half of the list would go into a duffel for a motor move and the rest would go into the ruck. The packing list was incredibly huge, and like many other lists you get in training, contained mostly items you would never use. As for it dividing into two bags, sorry soldier, it all goes in the ruck. The average weight of the final product was 85-95 pounds. I kept my weight down by taking my 5 MRE's and taking out all the items I would never eat. The fun part was getting the entire platoon and their bags on the bus. It was something that violated every safety rule in the book. There were rucks thrown around the bus with people buried beneath them. Finally, we arrived to the field.

The main focus of this week's field exercise was simply the land navigation evaluation. On Monday, we had a practice land nav course in which most of us found virtually no points. I managed to find one point on my map. Now, I'm not "Mr. Land Nav" or anything, but in all of the land nav courses I have ever done I have been very successful. Usually I finish a course in 2-3 hours out of the 5 that you are given. It turns out that the datum for the map was different than the datum that was used for the course. The complete failure of the candidates on this day destroyed the spirits of all of the candidates hoping to pass an evaluation that historically kicks 5-10 people from the course. Well, after an extremely cold night of trying to sleep we were all up at 4 for the land nav course. The OCS requirements require us to execute land nav in 2 hours of darkness, 1 hour of twilight, and 2 hours of daylight. I think we had maybe 1.5 hours of daylight for the sun never really reached full light until about 8 or so. Despite this, I was able to find all of my points in the first 3 hours. The course was actually pretty easy for me. Many people failed Tuesday's course and had to retest on Wednesday. I was ecstatic. Unfortunately, my success came to bite a little. Those who failed were set to go out on another course for practice on Tuesday afternoon. They asked the most successful people who passed to aid these candidates. The lack of volunteers kind of disappointed me, but it made sense. The land nav course requires you to find points in a huge area. We literally speed walked over rough terrain for 5 hours. Most people were exhausted and the feet hurt. Despite my feet screaming at me, I went and helped out a friend of mine. She found all of her points on the practice course and made my life kind of easy. I didn't have to explain anything to her other than very basic terrain association (i.e. if the contour lines on the map show the point on a hill, then look for a hill. If it's on low ground, look to low ground, etc.)

Tuesday is about where the spirits went into the crapper. We learned that one of our best people failed his history re-test on Monday. He was removed from the course and will be recycled. He was a great part of our platoon and we will miss him. Another good person from our platoon was also removed from the course during land nav. He apparently was trying to show another candidate where a particular road was. Since we weren't allowed to talk on the course, he broke that rule. But the cadre also felt that he broke the honor code for cheating by showing another candidate a road. Alot of people in the platoon felt it was a piece of BS. I take the position that we don't know what really happened and shouldn't concern ourselves with other people's business. All I know is that my friend Joe will not be with us any longer and it will be harder for me to get through the course. This particular person and I were good friends.

So, another problem in the field. It was cold. Very, very cold. Our company had these little sink contraptions that allowed you to wash your hands after going to the bathroom and such. I got up wednesday morning, and they were completely frozen over. Plus, we slept in sleeping bags on the ground. Army sleeping bags were very warm and comfortable, but you had to get in and out of them. Not only that, you had to sleep in your underwear in order to not overheat. That means to get dressed you step outside in the nice cold air in your underwear. The cadre made the determination that the cold was too much, so we came back to the company on Wednesday. The spirits of the company were lifted instantly. A lot of people were miserable and the student leadership (including myself since I was a squad leader this week) were working very hard to motivate the troops. We also learned on Wednesday, that we would get the full 4-day MLK weekend off if we can get the remaining training done and complete the road march on Thursday night. So, Thursday was a full day of basic infantry tactics in order to make us a little bit proficient in leading an infantry squad or platoon and not freeze up during the remaining two weeks in the field when we do leadership evaluations. Then there was the ruck march.

We have already done two 5 mile ruck marches along with 1 7 miler just before exodus. This was just another 7 miler. But, you had to consider several things. 1) We had all just completed a land nav course and most of us had feet issues from that. Those who failed and had to re-test once or even twice were even worse off. 2) This march required us to carry our primary weapons which included heavy machine guns for some people. 3) This march required us to carry special weaponry including AT4 (basically a bazooka) and claymores. 4) We also had to carry field radios. I ended up splitting a field radio with one of my friends who got 3.5 miles with it and felt like she wouldn't make it. This was the hardest road march we had ever done. A few people didn't make it and had to be picked up by the trucks. The rest of us had to find it within ourselves to move through the pain and keep going. After the ruck march though, we were released for our four day weekend.

So, the lengthiness of this blog kind of tells you what kind of a week it was. The good thing was we were busy for most of it accelerating the time. It seemed to go by quick. Right now, I am nursing a blister that formed and burst during the ruck march. I've never had a blister burst, so I have to figure out a decent treatment. However, another week is down and graduation is coming. Next week, we go back to the field and are evaluated on squad level leadership. The last two weeks in the field tend to claim some people, but I am now determined that it won't be me.

SOC Sharp