Question:
During basic training in the Vietnam War was the Manuel of Arms and Close Order Drill taught in any branch of the armed forces?

Thanks,
Jimmy

Jimmy,

Absolutely for us. For us it started at either Parris Island, S C or San Diego CA. In 1965 it was PISC for me, and later in 1968 it was Quantico, VA.

I believe that we continued, but at a lower level of frequency, at Staging Battalion at Camp Pendleton before we shipped out for Vietnam. We were being taught and trained how to survive in combat.

Obviously, it was suspended for our 13-month tours while we were in country.

Bill

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That's what we do!

It was in 1964.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

Learned on M14 but all the units I served in were equipped with M16's so never used it after basic.

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Hue 68 noli me tangere

I went in in late '75 and we were the last rifle company in the Navy. 16 and 64 count manual at arms along with drill with an '03. They were inoperable.

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James L. "Jim" Rhiner

It was in 1965 as well we also used the M-14.

We had close order drill in the Air Force, 1971.

Manuel of Arms? Yeah, they showed us PICTURES of the M-16.

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I've still got it made.

AF basic in '71 and had no idea what a close order drill or a manual of arms was. We did get to fire a M-16 for one whole day during the 6 weeks of training. I think we got to fire 60 rounds. I have to admit it was the most fun of any of those days. *s*

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Why duck?? It's a 9mm!

We also did 16 (no 64) with "dead" Springfield's in mid 60s at Great Lakes. Spent a bit of time marching on the Grinder! One night we went out at midnight cause our CC said we were not tired enough to sleep quietly!

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14 S&W Revs none with locks!

I did in Jul, Aug 64 with M-14. Was carrying an M-14 when our platoon leader gathered us, sweaty and dusty, in a field to tell us about the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, and declared we'd be the first to go to Vietnam after we finished our training. Not true, but it got our attention.
We did some simple drill with the M-14 for our graduation ceremony, I think it was late Aug 64. Some hometown friends who followed me in later 64 and early 65 had drill in basic also.

Your CC's brother must have been in San Diego in 65. Had virtually the same experience. Name was Chief Smith as I recall.

Our marching around Lackland parade fields was close order drill. Prolly not up to the other services standards.

Add 10 rounds for sighting in. The 60 was for qualification. I had a tight infinity symbol of 60 hits, plus ten more. Yeah, 70 hits out of 60 shots. I figured the geniuses beside me shot my target some.

A jack rabbit ran across the range, and all hell broke loose.

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I've still got it made.

I was in the last basic training cycle at Fort Brag to carry the M14.

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Old Age Ain't For Sissies

I enlisted in the Army on Feb. 14, 1975. Yes, we still learned the Manual of Arms and Close-order drill in Basic training. BTW, even back then, there were still people who couldn't tell their left from their right (SOUND OFF!)

Regards,

Dave

1970 AOCS at NAS Pensacola FL. first with the M1 Garand, then same drill and range time with the M14. Younger brother at OCS Quantico, VA with M14s, in the late ‘70s. So yes, for Navy Airedales and mud Marines.

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"Your other right........."

"Close Order Drill" What? At Amarillo AFB in 1968, during basic training the only time I touched a gun was on the range, M-16 and M-1 carbine. Then we cleaned them and I never saw one again.

We did close order drill in Basic, but I can't remember If we did
Manual of Arms. We had M16s. Later in AIT we had to do it for
parade with M14s.

Did it with Springfield 03 bolt action rifle in 1960 boot camp...
Lots of fun.......

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Only difference Fool/Mule-ears

Here is what my Dad trained with in 1943 at Farragut Naval Training Center, ID.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

1964 fresh out of high school and at Great Lakes Naval Training center. We used 03A3's for drilling and for marksmanship they let us shoot 22 rf Mossbergs. Never any centerfire rifle. Interesting story believe it or not. During our Westpac cruise 66-67 I was out on the fantail reading a book. Gunnery sargent was doing weapons training with the M14. Evidently the results from the navy officers was sadly lacking. He calls me over and gives me the basics and tells me to shoot at a fire foam can sitting in the water. with the giggle switch in the off position and ten rounds in the mag I proceeded to riddle the can full of holes. I handed the now empty M14 back to the gunnery sargent when he tells them that this sailor with no experience can shoot like that and you all can't even hit the can. Got some evil eye stares from a couple officers from the air wing. And went back to my book. Think I was singled out as I was the only enlisted man there from which to choose from. I did have prior experience shooting a 1891 argentine mauser and M1 Carbine. I mean you have to be pretty bad with a M14 not to hit a 5 gallon red can floating in the water. And he had a stack of those old fire foam cans. And that was my total sum of shooting a centerfire rifle while in the navy. Frank

Wow! I could have wrote that. We also did get to handle a couple ratty 1911s, handle yes fire no!

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14 S&W Revs none with locks!

AF boy scout camp: March '72.

Manual of Arms? Close-order drill? Never heard of 'em.

Shot the M-16 one day. I guess it was 10 + 60, like the others have said. Disassemble, clean and put it back together. Every guy in my 50-man flight was from Nebr., Colo., Mont., and Wyo. We'd all grown up with guns -- just another day in the country.

Qualified expert prior to each overseas tour ('78, '82, '86 and '94). Ho hum.

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Wrangler of stray Chiefs
Bob

At Lackland, almost a year to the day later, they sent a handful of us to the range and we shot M-16’s converted to .22LR. Some kind of trial program. As I recall, the whole ordeal lasted about two hours, and that was it for basic training. Across the base at tech school we qualified with “real” M-16’s and S&W Model 15’s, and familiarized with M-60’s and M-79’s. Even got to toss a couple pineapple grenades. The war was winding down by then so fortunately I never had to test my pitching arm in real life.
Doug

P.S. Incredibly, I knew a couple of people who actually washed out of AF basic training. Go figure.

Me too, 1966 Fort Gordon Georgia.

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Doesn't hasta call me Johnson

BCT, C-4-2, Fort Dix, Summer of 1967. Close order drill, Manual of Arms and BRMC-Basic Rifle Marksmanship Course.

Ha!

The 50 of us who started together finished together. We had one fat kid who washed back into our flight for failure to meet the physical standards. He was a daddy's boy rich kid. He saw himself washing out of the AF, too. His future bosses and co-workers may have hated us for it, but, collectively, we rode him like a tired horse and he graduated with us.

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Wrangler of stray Chiefs
Bob

We didn't clean 'em. Handed them over to some Chicanos. I still remember passing it over, with two hands, muzzle vertical. Almost a ritual.

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I've still got it made.

Gamecock, I think the first 10 were for sighting in and the next 50 were for qualification. If you hit the B-27 figure with all 50 rounds you qualified for expert. I hit all 50 at 100 yds but the guy next to me had no hits at all. They wouldn't qualify me because they said they didn't know if some of his shots hit my target. Arguing with the TI's would have gotten me sent back to day#1 in training. That was the only time I ever got a chance to qualify.

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Why duck?? It's a 9mm!

Perhaps I'm mistaken on the number.

I got expert. I had such a tight group, the errant hits were obvious strays.

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I've still got it made.

USN still had close order drill and MOA in fall of 67 at San Diego NTS.

Our graduation had about 7 company's that passed in parade for the station command and families of recruits.

A good time was had by all. Nothing better than a military parade.

Next stop, the real navy. 14 hour days and no liberty for weeks on end. Vietnam called. No MOA or COD.

I spent 2 years of my life living on a runway in Alabama. I ate cold food and slept under a truck.

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That's just somebody talkin.

Sorry, double post.

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That's just somebody talkin.

its been 55 years since basic.......i cant remember.....

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There's nowt so queer as folk

Hmmm. Forty-six years for me. Wasn't that just yesterday?

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Wrangler of stray Chiefs
Bob

52 years back in '66 when this happened. Used to go out on the fantail to watch the 5"54's shoot at the towed targets, now that was fun. You hear the bang and out comes the projectile making a whosh whosh noise similar to an old steam engine. You could visually track the shell in flight and inpact on the target. Frank

I trained on the Manuel of Arms in 1965 @ Great Lakes Naval Training Center. We used nutered Springfield rifles and spent hours marching up and down the Grinder.

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Old Cop
LEO (Ret.)

USN 68-72 Had close order drills in Great Lakes Naval Training Center

47 years ago we had some close order drill, no manual of arms and a few hours of pugil sticks.

I spent more time on "pots and pans" than I did handling an M-16.

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Music/Sports/Beer fan

Basic training in 1969 we did a shortened version of the MOA with the m16.

I will bet that if you handedany Marine from that era an M14 he could still do a fair manual of arms. It wasn't beat into them as much as mistakes PTed out of them

in 1966 the Air Force did close order drill, no manual of arms. I did learn the manual of arms after I got to my first base and while on post (air policeman) I forgot answer to a question I should know and it should have rolled off my tongue like honey off a spoon. I got to learn the manual and challenge everyone entering central security control.

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Carpriver.

Went though Army BCT in 1972 at Ft Dix and yes we learned close order drill and Manual of Arms with the M16.

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Support your Police, & NRA

Yes to both at Ft Bliss in 1966. Good amount of time with the M-14's, cleaning, operation, inspections, firing. Threw one hand grenade IIRC. Same with close order drill, plenty of that too.

Got more of the same in AIT Ft Leonard Wood aka"Litle Korea", plus some demolitions training for us engineers.

M-16's didn't come until pre-Vietnam deployment training at Ft Hood.

rayb

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"cumplo pero no obedezco"

I remember bits and pieces of Jan 72 ... Great Lakes Basic with the Seabees .. close order drilling for sure. My buddy even learned how to use the butt of his 03 on the chest of one of the Chicago bad boy gang members that had been taunting us for weeks. After the nastiest winter I ever experienced, it was 5-6 weeks of Marine style boot camp in Gulfport, Ms... That was fun, our Viet Nam vet Marine DI started us off with some physical games, I ended up winning, turns out that made me our Platoon Commander. More fun, marching around base singing all those marching songs.. you know, the ones where we sing about, " this is our rifle, this is our gun, this ones for fighting and this ones for fun." Apparently the base commanders wife didn't care for our singing so we had to make a few changes.. As for shooting.. I'm pretty sure we trained with 16's, for some reason, I believe they had the 3 shot fun switch .. forget what you call it exactly. We qualified with that, but when we had some overnight jungle training, the bad guys had some 14's. We were ambushing some bad guys in the middle of the night and all hell broke loose, when I gave my boyz the shoot em password, "feel that ------ breeze.. one of the bad boyz stuck his 14 in the bushes and unloaded on my buddy.. it was ugly... but we won.. Wow ... that was a fun trip down memory lane..

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Jack C

My dad served in the Navy during the Vietnam War. From what I remember, he described doing manual of arms and close order drill with a M1 Garand during boot camp. I don't have specific dates, though.

Well at Fort Jackson back in "65 we did close order drill, manual of arms and all the other stuff and all with the M14. We did get a day to familiarize ourselves with the M16 then back to the M14. I really liked that rifle, sure wish I had one now.

I'll bet that they at least had the bolts in them.

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"He was kinda funny lookin'"

U.S.A.F. Basic May, 1966. As others have noted very limited drill and zero manual of arms. One day at the range out of 30 days of basic training. Ten to sight in and sixty to qualify with. I did earn my Expert Ribbon that day.

I think they only gave us enough drill to get us to the mess hall and PT as a group as opposed to a mob.

LTC

We were on the same base as Marine recruits. They just had a separate area and we didn't go in there. Those Marines did love to apply *corrective training measures* tho. They had what we called the 40/20 company. Two runners and some poor recruit that couldn't apply himself. The recruit had two buckets on a shovel. He filled them at one side of the base and he ran to the other side and dumped them. Then he ran back and did it again. They made it a point to run these guys by our company from time to time.

I did my share of *extra PT* also. I was a hard case. I truly wanted to take our company adjutant apart and would have if the situation had been different. I think that was part of the training. Needless to say I was in very good shape coming out of boot camp.

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That's just somebody talkin.

I came across one of those guys. He was proudly wearing his "cover," and I asked him what he did in the Corps. I thought he said he was a pilot so I asked what he flew.

He said, "No, no, you don't understand. I piled it here, and then they told me to do it again and pile it there. See, I was a pile it."

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Wrangler of stray Chiefs
Bob

1966 Fort Knox Kentucky Basic Training marching backwards yes backwards up Misery and Agony hill.with M14. Vietnam M16.and Colt 1911.45.