Once I was smart and then I got dumb...

I was looking for some of my OLD Army pictures to add to the entries I am about to write and came across these that were taken back in October of 1980, when I was appointed as a 2nd Lieutenant in the U.S. Army (Reserve).

It seems the Commanding General of the 83d Army Reserve Command (ARCOM) (the old 83d Infantry Division) was facing some heat about that time concerning strength in some of his units. Belonging to the Army Reserve (or any military unit for that matter) was not very popular after the Viet Nam war, so units were really pretty hollow when it came to actual numbers of troops. There was a big push to get numbers up, so the General was looking for ways to increase enlistments. He really liked our unit (342d MP CO) because we were one of the few he had that still soldiered like it meant something. So, to make a long story short, he decided to start up a new detachment of the 342d MP Co. in the Dayton, Ohio area. Somehow, he knew I lived in the western part of Ohio (Troy, Ohio) and knew I had been driving back and forth from Troy to Zanesville and Athens, Ohio (Ohio University) for several years, and figured I must have been dedicated. He wanted me to head up the new detachment so he ordered the battalion headquarters put in paperwork for a Direct Commission for me.This was in 1978.

Fast forward to 1980, and the unit had just come back from Ft. McCoy where we had spent time with the Cubans refugees. We are now at the first drill back in the center. My paperwork had been in for two years now, and it was back and forth, stalled here and there, and I was getting pretty fed up with the system by now. Concurrently my packet was in for the E-7 promotion board, and I thought that would probably be how it all turned out. Oh well, it was worth a try.

Early the morning of the drill, I was getting dressed, and wasn't very pleasant with my wife, crabbing about the Army and its stupid ways. She wasn't paying much attention to me and seemed like she was just trying to get me out of the house. She wasn't very sympathetic. So when I got to the center, I wasn't in a very good mood.

Prior to the drill, the First Sergeant called me in the office and told me that the Board had rejected my paperwork for E-7 for some reason. He didn't know exactly what it was, but he'd look into it later. I went back out to the drill hall and waited with my platoon for the commander (CPT Jeff Wonder) to come out for the opening formation. Needless to say, I was even more bummed.

It seemed like an eternity before CPT Wonder and the First Sergeant came out to the drill hall. What were they waiting for -- I had training to get done today. I sure didn't have time for those two to sit in their offices, eating donuts and slurping coffee. Finally, they were coming out. But what was my wife doing with them???

All of a sudden, the light went on -- you big dummy. My commission had been approved and this was the pinning ceremony. SFC Barnett later told me I had a smile on my face from ear to ear. It seems everyone was in on it and kept the secret pretty good. CPT Wonder said he would have been out sooner, but SSG Bennett was in a bad mood and his wife couldn't get him out of the house sooner so she could get dressed to get down here. Oh well. I think I said this before -- in about 10 minutes I went from one of the smartest sergeants in the MP Corps or maybe the Army for that matter to one of the dumbest, no-time-in-grade lieutenants in the Army's inventory.

Two days after I was commissioned, I was transferred to Dayton and appointed as the Detachment Commander of the platoon that was to be started there. The experiment worked as before the year was up, I had almost three platoons of MP there with me in Dayton and the HQ in Zanesville told me to stop recruiting before we got so large the Battalion decided to move the flag over to Dayton. It wasn't too long after that that there were detachments of units popping up all over the place, in the larger population centers. Strength in the Reserves was starting to grow, even if we weren't all that popular yet.

It's funny. In the first picture, SSG Kenny Humphrey took my platoon for me when I was called out to be promoted (See "Not just another Grunt" -- February 1 entry). CPT Wonder and I have served together in various capacities for over 20 years, SFC Barnett later became my battalion Command Sergeant Major and served with me for over 20 more years in a number of units and commands.

Another interesting thing in the Army-- what goes around, comes around. It was 27 years later that I was the one swearing in a young, hard-charging MP Staff Sergeant as he got his Direct Appointment to 2LT (I had encouraged him and written a letter to the Officer Selection Board on his behalf). Only this time, I was a Colonel and we did it in the Secretary of the Army's office in the Pentagon, where the SSG and I were stationed.

For all its faults, the Army is still one of the greatest institutions known to man.

“We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.” (George Orwell)

Hooah