Pre-OCS Phase 0 (Weekend 2 of 3)

This weekend was definitely different than the last drill. I hesitate to say it was easier or harder than last month, it was just different. As a class we were more prepared and the leadership seemed more put together. Also all of our TAC Sergeants were out, so we just had the regular cadre sergeants who don't feel the need to yell and scream as much. Out of the original 83 candidates we had 58 return for another round. About six of those were new- they didn't attend the first Phase 0, which is technically allowed but highly frowned upon. My squad leader from last drill didn't come back, so since I was Alpha team leader I got bumped to the squad leader position. Friday night was spent continuing to take care of paperwork deficiencies. Getting all the documents together for Phase I is a small miracle thanks to the efficiency of government employees. We got smoked once or twice Friday night but it wasn't bad. We were in bed by 2230.

Saturday we had a 5 mile ruck march with our kevlar helmet, LCE, and a 35-40 lb. ruck, plus water. All in all I probably had about 60 lbs. of gear. The standard to pass is 1 hour 45 minutes. It was still cool when we stepped off at 0600 in the dark. I settled into a 16 minute mile pace, which is the pace I had done a few training marches at- reasoning that coming in 25 minutes before the standard time is a pretty good time. The instructors, however, wanted to see times closer to 1:10:00, so I was a little too slow for their liking, but now that I know the times they're really looking for I'll adjust fire. We were told we couldn't bring commercial combat boots to Phase I in Kansas [later that was taken back, commercial boots may be worn as long as they meet the regs], so I used my standard issue boots, and they tore my feet up. Thank you lowest bidder for your excellent work. Looks like I'll need to be wearing them more often to keep from blistering up in Kansas.

The rest of Saturday was spent in the classroom doing a land nav test that they let us take with a battle buddy and reviewing the basics of how to apply the classroom portion to the practical course. Around 2000 we were in a mass formation and the cadre passed the word on to the student 1st sergeant to release us to our barracks for the night- most of us were in shock, the sun wasn't even totally down yet. So naturally we were excited to get a little free time. Right as they were giving us the orders the cadre stopped us and said we needed to stretch out first. No problem. I needed some good stretching time after the march that morning anyway. Well from there it took a nose dive- after the first two stretches, two of the officer cadre just started smoking us for the fun of it. Talking to a sergeant about this later, NCO's go through training on when to tell how much is too much. No doubt smoke sessions are meant to toughen up soldiers, but contrary to popular belief they aren't designed to injure or break people. Officers go through no such training. So for an hour and a half we got smoked. Some of the females were crying and one candidate stood up and quit the program. A minute after he did that we stopped and continued stretching. I about puked from how hard they worked us, but thankfully I didn't- that's not the kind of attention you want.

Sunday was the land nav course. The course is designed to be extremely difficult so that candidates excel on the actual course in Kansas for Phase I, which our cadre told us is a joke compared to our course. Driving up to the course I could tell the woods were so dense you could barely see the sun coming up through the trees. Dense underbrush would be an understatement. We needed to find 3 out of the 5 markers that we had grid coordinates for- which the cadre promised would not be an easy task. There were no beaten paths and this course regularly fails seasoned infantry sergeants. We had three hours to complete the course and somehow my team of three hobbled around on our hamburgered feet and got all 5. We were one of the only (if not the only) groups to do so.

Candidates interested in going to the accelerated OCS course had to write a letter explaining why they needed to go. As of leaving Sunday evening, I didn't hear of anyone getting approval to go. Most people were told no, and a few hadn't received an answer yet.

Sunday afternoon we spent cleaning the barracks and standing on the concrete in the hot sun until we had been there long enough to satisfy the training requirement. We got released at 1600 which is about an hour earlier than when the scheduled time was- no one complained. Another month down and only one month left in 0 Phase.