Postcards from Deployment: Don’t Do Stupid Things

Today’s postcard from Southern is a look at another side of life at sea and one that’s not always pleasant – the enforcement of good order and discipline. The further up the leadership chain one finds onself, the greater the expectations are for standards of conduct and professionalism – and the greater the penalties for falling short thereof… The last bit, about false heroes, is especially worth the read – not because of the vermin who netted an article in Navy Times and who traded on the blood and sacrifice of others, but Southern’s relating of the stories of his two uncles who were Corpsmen in WWII and Korea/Vietnam respectively. Those are the stories worth recalling and preserving and we encourage all who have relatives who served in those conflicts and have stories to pass along to participate in the Veteran’s History Project, sponsored by the Library of Congress. – SJS

SJS,

To start with I received word from my detailer that I have been selected for one of the open job requisitions that I had requested. I am not sure if I had explained in an earlier postcard but basically I need to leave my current command because of staffing issues and my time is up here. The staffing issue is that currently there are five first class aviation electronics technicians out here. Four of us are in the shop and another is a Quality Assurance Representative. Looking at the manpower distribution report that all commands it states that we are over manned in that position by two. So even if I wanted to I can’t extend beyond October which is when my projected rotation date is. So on top of this they have a new detailing system that I am not use to nor completely happy with. It is referred to as Career Management System. Basically it gives the user a chance to look at all the various openings navy wide and then the user is supposed to put in for their selections. The down side is that new jobs are only posted for about two weeks in the middle of the month and then it takes about three weeks from the time that one puts in for a job before a user finds out if they are picked up for the job. Oh and there is a small window of about 4 months before the Navy decides what is “best” for you, just to add that extra stress in this. The hard part is that the Rock only has a few shore duty billets and right now no one seems to be hiring. So it was an arguing back and forth with myself and the significant other about various places to move. I tried to head to Pax River to test squadron duty, there were a couple school house billets over in VA Beach, heck I was willing to go to North Island and try for a helo training squadron there. The Significant other nixed nearly all of them, she started to warm up to North Island when I came up with the wild idea of heading back out to sea. There were a couple of billets opened up for some Prowler squadrons already deployed. So I brought that up with her and she came gave a whole hearted yes to that idea. I even told her that it would amount to me heading back out to sea for another cruise while I am there. That gave her pause for a day or so and she agreed to it. So I applied for the Prowler outfit and to just hedge my bets I applied for the Helo Rag. I talked to my command career counselor and had him make the application. So three weeks later I received the automated reply from the CMS system and am told I am going back out to sea for a third sea tour. Everyone here is congratulating me, but looking at me like I am crazy. Maybe I am crazy, maybe not; I should be eligible to look at the CPO exam for the first time near the end of that tour. Who knows I might make CPO or even LDO.

Thinking about CPO’s this next bit of news is rough for me to talk about. I have been wrestling with how to talk about this. Basically about four days ago the ship had an open Captains Mast which was shown on the ship’s TV service. Captain’s Mast also referred to as Non-Judicial Punishment (NJP) is a form of discipline that a commanding officer is able to give out for certain types of offenses as per the Uniform Code of Military Justice. If any of your readers are curious about the UCMJ, there are 134 articles in total and all of them are part of the US Code (Federal Law). I am sure if you head off to any law research website or heck maybe even Wikipedia you can look up the UCMJ and read the article about NJP. (ed. saving the readers the trip, here’s the link for the UCMJ and the Manual for Courts Martial. – SJS) Having an open Captain’s Mast is a rare event and is usually reserved for serious infractions. I personally have only seen an open Captain’s Mast about twice before and that was for drug usage both times. However, this time it was for sexual misconduct. There were 6 people in front of the Ship’s Commanding officer and unfortunately one of them was a Chief Petty Officer. He was up first and the Skipper threw the book at him. Basically he had been sexually harassing a pair of junior enlisted women that worked for him. Making highly suggestive comments or as one of the specifications read out making offers to approve qualifications in exchange for favors. After reading the riot act backwards, forwards, up one side and down the other.The punishment was meted out, lost of half a month’s pay for two months; recommendation of reduction in rank from E-7 to E-6; immediate out-processing paperwork to be started; and shipment home to a Transit Personnel Unit in Norfolk until an Other Than Honorable discharge was completed. The other 5 were people convicted of having sex either in port or onboard from the last time we were in Dubai. One was a woman who is going to be discharged because she was convicted of having sex onboard in a store room. What is sad is that she was convicted of doing the same thing only three weeks before. The next person up was the guy this woman was convict of having sex with twice. He was discharged as well. However, before either of them could have their discharged paperwork completed they will have to give up half a pay’s month for two months and reduced in rank from the E-2’s they were at down to E-1’s. Both of them showed a pattern of misconduct. The other three were also from people having sex, two men and woman. What made this worst was that the man and woman were both married to separate people when they were caught out in town by Shore patrol. The final guy was guilty of knowing the other two were getting their groove on in the hotel room and not doing anything to prevent it. The two married folks had to endure calling home to their respected spouses and explain why their pay checks will be lighter by a half a month’s pay and that after that they were going to lose the pay advance because they were losing rank. These last three were third class petty officers. Now they are down to being E-3’s again.

It is hard to explain this to someone on the outside of the military but basically these sort of things break down good order and discipline in a command. This isn’t the fault of having women out to sea on ships. That argument doesn’t work ashore in the civilian market. I have seen people fired from various jobs before I joined the Navy because they found out someone was playing in the company pool. I am a full supporter of having women in the military. I am not drinking from the kool-aid either. I have worked around women both in the military and doing civilian jobs. I have seen a lady who was covered in jet fuel, coolant, and grease get done with a work day then grab a shower and it looks like they had come from a model shoot. I have also worked with a lady who tried the bat her eyes and hurt look as the reason she couldn’t accomplish a work tasking at an after school job. I then watched as the shift supervisor shut this woman down but basically tell her that his wife was prettier this woman and if she didn’t get her butt into gear well she could stop by payroll and pick up her check to date.

One of the big things I was taught as a child by my father and by some other family members was that doing a job well and knowing that is more then enough reward. So it pains me deeply to see people put themselves up for unjust medals or other rewards. Why am I bringing this up? I am not sure if you have heard of HM3 Tazewell, but this is a corpsman who gun decked some paperwork to earn himself some extra rewards that helped him to receive a promotion on the next test cycle. A number of us out here heard about this through some copies of the Navy Times and it then popped up in the ship’s news service talking about this HM3’s court martial. A number of us senior petty officers are talking about this case another that just popped up in another edition of the Navy Times about a guy who didn’t even complete boot camp that was discharged on a medical condition. It seems he showed up back home wearing a Bronze Star, Fleet Marine Force medal, FMF Pin, Battle E, and a few other awards along with a third class crow. This other faker was busted by the local sheriff who had been in back in the 70’s and things just didn’t add up in the story. We talked about how both of these cases and a few others out there just seem to rob the honor of being a hero to those true heroes out there.

It also pains me deeply to see a faker of a corpsman as well, I had two corpsmen in my family. Both of them were my uncles. One (my uncle Henry) served during World War 2 on an LST in the European theater. He retired as an HM1 after spending 22 years in from 1939 to 1958. I never meet this uncle myself since he died before I was born, but I heard a number of stories about him from my mother, my aunts, and my grandfather (his brother). I didn’t find out till well after the fact that one of the LST’s he was on was involved in the D-Day operation and on the second week while taking injured GI’s back to England for hospitals there his ship was torpedoed by a German U-boat. Since he was the on call doc at the time he had to help treated the injured sailors and then treat GI’s as well as try to save the ship. It was saved and they made it back to a port in England. He came home after that and spent time on a couple of destroyers and a few other gator freighters in the Norfolk area. He retired out of the Philadelphia Naval Hospital. I don’t know if he received any awards beyond the WW2 campaign medal and the European Campaign medal. I have always wanted to put a request in for his service record and make up for my aunt a shadowbox with his awards, a flag, and where he served. Just haven’t had the time.

The other uncle (Jack) I have joined the Navy in 1949. It was a choice of either heading to reform school or the Navy as the story was told to me. So he joined the Navy and became a corpsman. He was then assigned to the 1st Marine Regiment after graduating from Corpsman school. My uncle didn’t even get a chance to put his bag down when he showed up at San Diego before his regiment was on load to a transport and shipped off to some place called Korea. His first taste of combat came at a place called Inchon. I met this uncle when I graduate boot camp and spent some time talking to him once on leave seeing some other family from where my dad is from. He told me that he was an 18yr old fresh from how to save people and it really took the wind out of him to be there trying his damndest to save a kid from the platoon that he had just played Acey-Ducey with only 48hrs prior. When he told me that story I saw in his eyes that it was a battle he lost. He then told me of going to Seoul and how he marched with Puller and Tenth Corps out of Inchon up to the Chosin then back out again. I tried to ask about what it was like to be there in the Chosin, but at the same time I saw a glaze go over in his eyes as he talked about it. I didn’t want to push the issue. After that he went to Lebanon in 1958 with a Marine unit when Ike put the Marines in to help stabilize that nation. My uncle’s final combat tour was in Da Nang before Tet where he was in overall charge of all the corpsmen in the I Corps area. My uncle Jack helped me a little bit try to relate to some of the hero worship that I was offered in a few places post- Sept 01. I spent a long time talking to him on the phone about how I didn’t feel like a hero. He asked if everything I did was by the book and that I put my best job forward. I told him yes. He then said I did my job and that is all I need to know. He said the heroes are those guys that do their jobs and then kick the dirt with an “aw, shucks” look on their face when they are recognized. Jack told me that the fake heroes are the guys that are looking for that recognition and to be treated as a superstar. Most of the times the fakers ended up doing something to hurt a number of people in the process of trying to get something shiny on their chests.

I know some of these are heavy thoughts but just some ideas bouncing through my head. Hope things are going good back at the beach for you and all the readers. I can’t wait to get back there myself and in my own space.
Sincerely,

Southern Air Pirate
“CWO for CNO!”