Basic Training Story 4675

So here we are at Infantry Basic, Spring of 1990. Of course, none of us had a clue what was about to happen. And then the shark attack. Ok, most of us live through it, but a couple dipshits just can't get anything together. But one poor guy, he literally can't tell his left from his right, and apparently up from down. Everything he was asked to do he managed to get it bass-ackwards. And then he'd break down crying when the DS's yelled at him.Now, this was before the touchy-feely days, but the whole "no swearing at recruits" thing was just beginning to be a thing, so it was still happening as the DS's were trying to remember new rules. Not that most of us gave a damn, swear, don't swear, we didn't care.Now this poor bastard, I swear the DS's kept him there just to torture him. Like one day he laid down right in the middle of the formation, just straight out. The only thing the DS had to say was "Platoon. Attention. Right face, march! Counter-column, march." For about 5 minutes. Oh and "And if one of you jackasses fall out of step or out of cadence, [Other DS] will be glad to take you to the PT field for some remedial training. Yep, we marched over him again and again.And he just lay there crying...Now at the time, we lived in 3 or 4 story-high elevated barracks, We were on the 3rd floor. I'm sure people at Benning know the ones with a marching pad under the bottom floor. The final straw was when the guy decided he'd had enough so he decided to end it all and commit suicide.He had a good plan, he thought. He took a floor buffer, tied the end of the cord around his neck, and threw the buffer off the balcony. Yep, you see the problem I'm sure. The length of the cord.The Battalion CSM and a couple drills happened to be walking through and it missed them by about 15 feet. Even they admitted they needed a change of shorts. That was enough to get the guy gone on a psych though.Read more Basic Training Stories here.