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A Creed
I’m working from home today–with concurrence from the chain of command–to finish a product. Too many distractions at work, and the time I won’t spend commuting, answering irrelevant emails, phone calls, and questions from them that’d gotten their guidance from my office months ago. Unfortunately, there are no air quotes around “work from home” this time ’round.
So what better time to take a break and post on Ricochet? My timing, as always, is impeccable. Yesterday I was bound and determined to leave work by noon, to knock out this project. Yeah, that went well. I left work just in time to get home to feed my ADHD German Shepherd, Princess Leia, at her usual time. 1700 hours. Awesome.
However, when I went to work yesterday, I’d spent about three hours at my work station when the new Navy Chief that works with me came in. He was soaked with sweat, hung his uniform blouse over the back of the chair, then sat down and fanned his sodden T-shirt.
Me: Chief, what is it that has you sweating so?
Apparently Chief is working on getting his Navy Expeditionary certification. (Badge? Tab? Note in his record? I have no idea.) He had been outside undergoing instruction on patrolling. The instruction for this certification was conducted by our NSW guys on a volunteer basis (NSW = Naval Special Warfare = SEAL). Chief is a surface warfare guy, so he don’t even know how to spell SOF. I quizzed him on patrolling, and found him wanting. Hey, it was his first day, so slack meet cut.
Me: So, Chief, what’re the four principles of patrolling?
Chief: We didn’t cover that. We covered movement formations.
Me: Okay, what’re the movement formations you can use in a patrol?
Chief, confidently: The wedge and the file, based on enemy situation.
Me, after a double face-palm: Chief, whether you go wedge or go file is based on terrain, and if you think you might make contact, you go wedge no matter what. And then you what?
Chief: What?
Me: Okay. You’re in a squad patrol. Two fire teams, each in a wedge. You go from “enemy contact unlikely” to “enemy contact possible.” What movement technique are you using?
Chief: What?
Me, internally: Got to do some triage, here.
Me, externally: Chief, we got to get you a copy of the Ranger Handbook. Study that, you’ll be good to go. You can probably find it online, but I’d recommend getting a hardcopy and keeping it in your cargo pocket.
Chief: Uh, I don’t want to get crosswise from the NSW guys teaching the course.
Me, yelling across the bullpen: Hey, Lieutenant Commander NSW guy! Sir, can a young, motivated surface warfare guy go wrong on patrolling by studying the Ranger Handbook? Sir? (I’m a humble contractor now, I throw in a lot of “sirs” and “ma’ams.”)
Lieutenant Commander NSW guy: No, sir! He can not, sir! (This guy knew me from before.)
Another retired contract curmudgeon, walks up to Chief’s cubby, and throws a Ranger Handbook on the desk. It’s in a beat up, first-generation Ziplock bag that has dirt and dust imprinted on the plastic from God knows where; the front and back flap covers have been wrapped in green 100-mph tape to protect it: That’s mine, Chief. You can use it ’til you get your own. Don’t [CoC] it up. I’m partial to it.
Me, getting devious: Chief, you know if you’ve got that in your pocket, you’ve got to be able to recite the Ranger Creed.
Chief: The wha–?
Me: Recognizing that I volunteered as a Ranger…
As I spoke, the other Rangers in the office, without missing a beat, joined in. Some old, broken, and retired, like me. Some young, new, and still gunslinging. Some broke, but not too broke, so TPTB had given them a tour at an HQ so they could heal up, do their PT, and get back out on the line. Everyone that’d been there had done that. Pretty cool.
Recognizing that I volunteered as a Ranger, fully knowing the hazards of my chosen profession, I will always endeavor to uphold the prestige, honor, and high esprit de corps of the Rangers.
Acknowledging the fact that a Ranger is a more elite Soldier who arrives at the cutting edge of battle by land, sea, or air, I accept the fact that as a Ranger my country expects me to move further, faster and fight harder than any other Soldier.
Never shall I fail my comrades. I will always keep myself mentally alert, physically strong and morally straight and I will shoulder more than my share of the task whatever it may be, one-hundred-percent and then some.
Gallantly will I show the world that I am a specially selected and well-trained Soldier. My courtesy to superior officers, neatness of dress and care of equipment shall set the example for others to follow.
Energetically will I meet the enemies of my country. I shall defeat them on the field of battle for I am better trained and will fight with all my might. Surrender is not a Ranger word. I will never leave a fallen comrade to fall into the hands of the enemy and under no circumstances will I ever embarrass my country.
Readily will I display the intestinal fortitude required to fight on to the Ranger objective and complete the mission though I be the lone survivor.
[And then, of course, a load and thunderous]
Rangers lead the way!
Chief put a foot up on his desk, and, as he snapped into a Slim Jim: I still think you Army guys are ate up, but that was pretty awesome.
He’ll do a’ight.
Published in General
Love it, Colonel. You paint quite a picture there.
Nice.
however comma I never did like the 110% crap.
Maybe it’s just me but I ain’t got a lot left to give after 100%.
carry on!
Dude, you and your math.
RAH, Boss! (Maybe the 10% is from the supernatural reserves you and ST show us often?)
The lady has a good point, does she not? She does! Great post, Mongo.
Great post! Truly inspiring.
Squids call insignia such as the expeditionary warfare device “pins”, which upon award are affixed to one’s uniform very gently and never, ever tacked on with excessive force. Because that would be against regulations. And absent regulations we would devolve into brutes!
So, no blood pins?
Really? Or are you just being facetious?
Youth is wasted on the young.
Am reminded of what a friend once told me. He said, “Your Majesty – ‘joint’ is spelled a.r.m.y.”
Love it.
I wish you’d had that on video #thecreed (I don’t EVEN tweet, mostly because it is called tweeting, so I am just talking smack). As for giving a 110% – I always thought it was a load but see it as a forcing function to actually get to 100% – “c’mon maggots you got a little bit more……..give a 110%.”
<span class="atwho-inserted" contenteditable="false" data-atwho-at-query="@dajoho“>@dajoho, it was pretty cool. Thing is, we had some of the boys–group boys–in the office in the time. As far as I can tell, only one former batboy. Totally unscripted, I just started spouting off and the brothers jumped in. If I thought about it long enough, I’d probably get a little teary eyed. But I won’t so I won’t.
Speaking of math, at Blackwater most of the cats (read grunts, trigger-pullers) I worked with were SF, then NSW, Marine Recon, then “legs” (USMC, Rangers, 10th Mountain, etc. [if there is an etc after those three?]), and one lonely airman. Whazzsup with that Air Force!?!
Pretty sure he was a TacAir Control guy or something like that. He was a stud. We ridiculed him 24/7.
Uh, what’s with the speaking in tongues at the beginning?
@max, bug reports...or the exorcist rides again…
While I’ve got yunz all here, brothers: [080118] is the 3rd anniversary of my “pinning” as an honorary devil dog/angel pup…Will be putting up a post the weekend prior, for everyone to come to my virtual party. Fun ideas – including at least one virtual “carrier-landing” – location of the invitees choice, welcome! Looking forward to a gathering long on moto/camaraderie, short on regrets in the morning…Let the planning/operational coordination commence! :-)
So, product not finished, huh?
That’s code, man. Computer code. Yeah.
Aaaand, I have no idea how it got there. Did what I usually do and <Boom> there it was.
So, on the 4th most of the immediate clan and in-laws were over for a marathon barbecue. Li’l Skinner, who needs to be re-christened, let us know that he’d like to Skype after he finished his watch. We all gathered around the computer, and made the call. During the conversation, Ms Skinner asked what he watched for during watch. Li’l Skinner doesn’t miss a beat, and says “the 4Fs.” A little confused, his mom asks for more explanation. “Fire, flood, fighting, and,” Li’l Skinner pauses for a beat, “and…fornicating.” Thank you son.
He forgot about the mail buoys?
Hey, pal, this is a family friendly post. You just keep your proclivity for mail buoys to yourself, fella.
We used to send the ‘boots’ out with a pair of binos in the middle of the ocean (preferably in the middle of a typhoon, hurricane and/ or the worst kinds of weather imaginable) to watch for our unit’s mail which had been placed on a buoy.
We called it mail buoy watch and that he would suffer a fate worse than death if somehow our little flotilla missed ‘mail call’ because of him. I’ll plea the 5th on whether or not I was ever tricked into that sort of ‘collateral duty.’
P.S. Just watched We, the Marines (~37 minutes) on Netflix. It is pretty good. Narrated by a Marine named *Gene Hackman. Who knew?
*The link is of Hackman on the Letterman showing explaining why he enlisted (about 1 1/2 minutes).
Pretend you could be the man that these men are. Hang out with them online and bless them for tolerating you. All for, what, something like $60 a year? I’ve known street corners full of guys that would spend $60 on drinks pretending they were anywhere near this good. So how come this site doesn’t have more like 500,000 members? Lack of advertising? Or the fact that the studs don’t run the site?
Obviously, you need to sit in for <span class="atwho-inserted" contenteditable="false" data-atwho-at-query="@roblong“>@Rob Long to do the advertisements.
Standing by to honor one NPT……………
When you started into the RANGER creed, I imagined epic movie music rising to a crescendo in the background.
Something like this:
Thanks for this outstanding post, Boss.
You remind me of this:
The CYO (Catholic Youth Organization) pledge. I’ve got it down in memory still, even though I haven’t recited it publicly since my last CYO basketball game in 1984. No one else I know still remembers it…
I just have the Boy Scout one. I’m glad it includes the “…and to keep myself physically fit, mentally awake, and morally straight.” that yours has.