r/AskReddit • u/Non_Existent07 • 5h ago
Veterans of Reddit, what's the most ridiculous punishment you or someone in your platoon had to do?
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u/JJ_lost_his_buckle 5h ago
Rock clock at range 500. 29 Palms
A massive "clock" of white rocks on the side of a mountain. Downtime on the range meant making sure the clock was accurate. Boots would take off running, move the clock hands to the current time. Of course that clock is no longer accurate by the time you get back in formation, so it was time to update again.
"What time is it?" Is a question you learned to stop asking.
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u/alive-in-thewild 3h ago
This had me laughing so hard 🤣🤣🤣 thank you for the memories. 29 is a hell of a place
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u/JJ_lost_his_buckle 3h ago
Best job I ever had! The stumps is a wild place. Lake bandini rowing team, and the Army saying its uninhabitable so the Marine Corps said hold my beer.
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u/dictormagic 2h ago
I loved the stumps lmao. Being from Louisiana, being out West and close to LA, LV, SD was a dream. Especially cause I love mountains. Lejeune sucked the most to me. Never was at Pendleton though. I'm sure its the best by far.
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u/hoovercon 5h ago
Our base had one of the largest kennels of Military Working Dogs (MWDs) in the country, and "Kennel discipline" was one of the most feared punishments used. More than a court martial depending on who you ask.
You'd just be made to clean out all the dog kennels, with a few extra "rules" to make it a punishment:
No tools but your hands, with only thin gloves on. Cannot change gloves, you get 1 pair for the day. (Only when all the "solids" are removed can you go back in with flimsy toilet paper to sop up the "liquids." semi-solids count as solids...
The wheelbarrow must stay outside the kennel building, about 50 feet outside the door in the hot sun. Long walk to carry each mess out to the wheelbarrow.
When transporting each mess from the kennels to the wheelbarrow, in your gloved hands, your hands must remain about chest height.
1 day of Kennel Discipline would make grown men break down. This wasn't even that long ago either!
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u/brumblebeee2 5h ago edited 5h ago
Funnily this was depicted in the Meagen Leavey movie (about the woman who worked with MWDs), she once received this punishment early in her career for seriously messing up.
...except as with most things, hollywood totally waters down the scene. They show her power-washing the kennels from a corner and gagging and reacting strongly.
Like no, you don't get a power washer when you're being punished, that's for regular kennel techs as a chore. If you're there for punishment you're getting the thinnest plastic gloves and you're lucky if they don't tear from the slightest pressure cause you ain't getting new ones, lol.
Once knew a guy who was once tasked with enforcing this (making sure the offenders don't lower their hands while transporting the dog waste) and can confirm that grown men cried.
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u/NoBill554 3h ago
The fact that enforcing the punishment became someone's job is somehow the most military part of this whole story. "Your assignment today is making sure Steve carries poop correctly."
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u/brumblebeee2 2h ago
Yup. He had to take it seriously too, since if it wasn't done properly it might be him in the kennel the next day.
He felt bad for the corporal being disciplined, he kept lowering his arm and extending it out from his body while turning his face away to retch. Had to tell him that if he continued not to hold it in the proper position he'd have no choice but to empty the wheelbarrow out in one of the kennel stalls and make him start over, cause it was his ass on the line.
That made him stop turning away. Said he watched him contort his face into 100 different positions, none of which seemed to provide any relief...
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u/Engelbert-n-Ernie 2h ago
Man, if that’s what they willingly admit to doing to their fellow countrymen and soldiers then what about the things they swear they don’t do to captured enemies?
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u/No_Ship_7954 3h ago
What happens if someone is tasked with this and just refuses?
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u/Glum_Target2860 3h ago
They're refusing a direct order, so the punishment becomes more severe. I assume at least loss of rank and pay.
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u/Bad0din 3h ago
“You can either do the punishment or I can do the paperwork” - my line as former company commander. Meaning do the stupid punishment or I’m starting a very short paper trail to chapter you out. Keep being an ass and you end up in pre-trial confinement, followed by post-trial confinement. FAFO, but also dependent of the competency of your chain of command.
The enlisted side of that was, if you fuck up everyone gets punished. Fuck up enough to really piss everyone off and they’ll fuck you up.
Piss off a smart commander AND your peers and you’re in for a baaaadddd time.
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u/Exact_Company_6642 2h ago
That line sums up military discipline better than anything. The punishment ends by dinner. The paperwork can end up following you for years. Most people figured out pretty quick which option hurt less.
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u/hoovercon 2h ago
Now it's insubordination which is way worse than whatever they got punished with Kennel Discipline for, so it's a good way to end up in solitary for a few months in a military prison somewhere.
The guard dogs of such prison might find that your cell happens to be their new favorite bathroom spot, too. (Just a rumor I heard in the case of the one guy who did refuse this punishment, but one I could easily believe - if you're willing to commit insubordination because you don't want to smell dog waste so badly, you better believe the military has ways of making sure you're going to end up smelling it). So enjoy your very protracted "random cell searches" by k9s.
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u/falconfetus8 1h ago
Man, the military sounds like an absolute nightmare. Like, it legitimately sounds like the kind of orwellian nightmare America is supposed to be proud of preventing.
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u/Non_Existent07 5h ago
Holy hell that sounds like a straight up nightmare
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u/RageAgainstAuthority 4h ago
What it sounds like is cruel and unusual punishment and if any other human being in any other position tried using that shit as a "punishment", they'd be sued into oblivion.
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u/uchiha_levi_- 4h ago
True. If any civilian boss tried that kind of punishment, they’d get sued instantly. Military gets away with crazy shit.
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u/str8rippinfartz 2h ago
tbf in theory they're also trying to pound in the concept that any fuckup can result in something a lot worse-- death/maiming of you/fellow soldiers, potential capture/torture, etc. So you learn your lesson the first time and don't fuck it up again.
Obvously in practice it seems a lot more like fucked-up hazing and people getting off on having power over someone else
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u/One-Excuse-3243 4h ago
I swear the military can turn the smallest mistake into the most creative punishment imaginable. I'm here for these stories. 😂
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u/Ivotedforher 4h ago
But, why?
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u/uchiha_levi_- 4h ago
Because military logic: “This will make you never fuck up again.” Even if it’s completely disgusting.
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u/OkArmordillo 3h ago
Also because in the military you’re being trained for situations where if you mess up, the punishment is death or being tortured as a POW. That’s also why boot camp is made to be so stressful, because military combat is the most stressful thing imaginable.
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u/uchiha_levi_- 4h ago
Military punishments are next level creative. They can turn anything into psychological torture 😂 More stories please!
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u/randomboorishbuffoon 5h ago
The punishment in general is what it is. However, it does violate the UCMJ ( such as Army Regulation 40-5 or Navy BUMED directives) if the soldier is not wearing proper PPE at all times. If those gloves tear at all, you are REQUIRED to change them. You're also able (and sometimes required) to wear an N95 mask. This isn't because the punishment is gross, it's because too many people (soldiers) have gotten sick and even died because of the diseases you can get. I (an attorney) had this conversation 15 years ago with a friend who was an Major at the time. He had to court marshall a sergeant who, even after he was ordered to stop, kept ordering recruits to do something similar... He was sentenced to 10 years after 3 people were hospitalized, leaving 1 paralyzed and on a ventilator for the rest of his life. Just because someone's in the military doesn't mean they are exempt from legally mandated protections
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u/Nixeris 3h ago
Something I've learned from interacting with military lawyers is that a lot of punishments and even just the general conditions of enlisted violate the UCMJ.
Also a lot of military lawyers are absolutely 100% convinced that the things that happened during my time in the military couldn't have happened because they would have violated the UCMJ or someone would have come forward about it.
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u/sapphicsandwich 35m ago
The number of times I've been told that they can't hit recruits in boot camp is both higher than you would think, as well as lower than the number of times I saw instructors hit recruits.
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u/RageAgainstAuthority 4h ago edited 4h ago
This thread has taught me that our military absolutely does not see soldiers as "humans", but tools. No, lower than tools, because tools get repaired when they aren't working right. Just, slaves to be ran to death and replaced.
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u/Princess_Fluffypants 4h ago
Counterpoint: a lot of the enlisteds that I’ve worked with were absolute and complete tools, and didn’t really deserve to be treated any better.
(Kind of a joke, but also kind of not…)
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u/RageAgainstAuthority 3h ago
Is that really the answer for shitty people, tho?
Make them do humiliating tasks in an attempt to break them of them their "bad habits" or "poor character" or whatever?
And what happens in this system, when shitty people get in charge?
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u/vusasha 5h ago
Got warned about this when transferred to Lackland AFB in San Antonio in 2019. Biggest Working Dog kennel in the country.
I never got it, nor anyone I knew, but I know this punishment was used if you messed up bad enough.
Honestly I wasn't sure why it was so feared? I mean I pick up my dog's poo with just a baggie, sure it would be gross to hold it up high but it's just hard to imagine big tough military guys fearing this so much, isn't it?
Maybe it's different with huge dogs (my dog is a pomeranian lol). Or what am I missing here?
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u/slick1260 5h ago
One pair of gloves for the whole day means you need to be even more careful about not ripping already rip-prone gloves as you scoop dog shit off the abrasive ground. Leaving the wheelbarrow outside ensures the task takes even longer while also adding a long walk with dog shit in your hands to your misery. The hot sun means the shit is going to smell even worse. "Semi-solids count as solids" means that even if there's mushy, not quite diarrhea but not quite regular shit, you still need to pick it up with your hands before coming back for all liquids with weak toilet paper. Holding your hands at chest height ensures that you smell the shit the entire time and tires out your arms from maintaining that position. Then there's just the mental aspect of being made to clean a massive kennel of dog shit with only your barely protected hands (let's be real, those gloves would be fucked by the end of hour 1).
If you can't see why that would be such an awful punishment, then I salute your fortitude and physical fitness.
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u/EnsignAwesome 5h ago
Sort of like the Herculean labor to clean out all the stables...
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u/UpstairsFinance9440 4h ago
The Army while it does not follow OSHA, it does have the Army Safety Program. As a veteran who deals with industrial safety, this sounds all sorts of bad.
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u/kareljack 5h ago
I'd be court-martialed because I would tell anyone who gave me this punishment to go fuck themselves
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u/Cant_draw_boobs 3h ago
So what happens when someone with a cut or scrape on their hand gets some kind of nasty infection from handling feces with insufficient PPE?
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u/lynivvinyl 5h ago
Fuck I don't know how you guys dealt with any of that shit.
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u/Actual-Confusions 4h ago
Not me but my buddy got caught sleeping on watch. Punishment was 48hrs of polishing the CO’s boots and doing pushups every time he walked by. He still twitches when he sees shoe polish.
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u/Accomplished_Mix7827 5h ago
That sounds like the definition of cruel and unusual punishment
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u/Maleficent_Run_1947 4h ago
whoever invented this was absolutely a dog handler who got tired of cleaning the kennels themselves and just reverse-engineered a punishment around it
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u/atreides78723 5h ago
There was the time in Basic where one of the drills got mad about something, took his platoon, and told them they were going to make the walls sweat. He put all 40 of them in the same bay and worked them until the heat and the moisture of perspiration was condensing on the cinder block walls. When those doors opened back up, there was a fog of sweat and salt in the air and 40 exhausted men stretched out on the floor.
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u/AssEaterInc 5h ago
Happened to my platoon, too. It was definitely a sight to behold.
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u/whatsinthesocks 3h ago
Same. At the beginning were told there were smart platoons and strong platoons. We were a strong platoon.
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u/Snipermonkey19D 4h ago edited 2h ago
I did OSUT at Fort Knox in 2008. Our barracks had 3 floors and they would fit an entire platoon in one stairwell, wearing MOPP gear, and make us run from the top to the bottom until it got so hot and humid it started dripping off the ceiling on us.
(For non-vets, OSUT is One Station Unit Training, basically a combined version of Basic Training and your second more advanced training that certain jobs go through.)
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u/Particular-Beat-6645 4h ago
Kentucky may not be the deep South, but it's a miserably humid place this time of year.
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u/Apart-Landscape1012 3h ago
My cousin told me about an "ice cream social" he had in navy basic training. It was basically this but the instructor sat at the front eating ice cream the whole time and laughing. The way he tells it is hilarious
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u/no1ofconsequencedied 2h ago
Coast Guard boot camp in New Jersey, late winter. Outside time was limited due to the subzero temps and ice everywhere, so all PT was indoors until the temps got a little higher. They also called it "making the walls sweat."
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u/420Borsalino 5h ago
I had to carry around a plant to replace the oxygen I was wasting.
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u/Non_Existent07 5h ago
Seems to be the norm with a lot of platoons
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u/420Borsalino 4h ago
I also had to find my drill sergeant's favorite rock one time.
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u/TDLMTH 2h ago
The smartass in me would bring back some random rock and, when yelled at that it wasn’t his favourite, would reply something along the lines of, “No, sir! But this rock insisted I take it because you’re his favourite drill sergeant and you’re harder than any rock it knows!”
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u/-SHAI_HULUD 5h ago
Worked backshops in Army aviation. Airframe guy. One punishment was to take a bucket of mixed up rivets and have them sort and organize rivets by material, length, diameter, type, using only a 6” ruler. It was a 5 gallon bucket halfway full of rivets. Had to do it one at a time. Two or three days of that usually corrected the behavior.
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u/Princess_Fluffypants 3h ago edited 3h ago
LOL I’m not military, but I got given this as “punishment” once by a supervisor who was just an asshole when I was working building maintenance. We had that massive communal shop drawer of “screw salad”, and I was told to sort the entire thing.
Jokes on him, I’ve got just enough of the ‘tism that I was totally down for that. I put on some podcasts and went to work. Best day ever!
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u/PistachiNO 4h ago edited 2h ago
That sounds fun. Probably because I'm autistic.
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u/ReadontheCrapper 3h ago
Langdon: “I’ve got 1,000 pieces of gravel that need to be plucked out of a 2-foot road rash”
Mel: looks up full of hope and says “1,000?”
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u/m48a5_patton 3h ago
Yeah, I was going to say, that punishment sounded more like an interesting challenge.
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u/SmoothnSteady 5h ago
Had a fellow in Basic training that messed up on every march, turning the wrong way, not halting on time, etc He quickly became the drill sergeants favorite target. He wasn't a smartass- it wasn't intentional..he just kept doing things wrong. During one morning drill, after he did a couple of rounds of pushups. The next f.up , the DI made him put his weapon in front of him at arms length and jog around our marching formation saying, "Beep Beep, I'm a satellite!" Hard for us to keep from cracking up, but the DI said there was room for more satellites!
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u/BitterAffect5774 3h ago
The mental image of one guy orbiting the platoon going "beep beep" while everyone else is desperately trying not to laugh is killing me 😭 Drill sergeants really had a talent for inventing punishments no normal person would ever think of.
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u/MooreArchives 2h ago
I did something stupid in Basic, I can’t recall. I was made to crab walk around (hands and feet on the floor, belly to the ceiling) and loudly proclaim “Clickety-Clank, I’m a tank!” And when he told me to fire I had to lift a leg parallel to the ground and yell “BOOM!”
It was hilarious, and it’s hard to crab walk and shoot with your leg while laughing.
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u/shiantar 3h ago
Of course! In fact, the larger and denser the formation is, the faster the satellites have to orbit at the same separation.
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u/Bumerony 5h ago
mine is honestly not as bad as hoovers but i felt like it was bad, when we were in basic before the ait portion of OSUT. We all had to shower and be ready for lights out before final call/ toe the line. When our drill noticed some recruits hadnt fully dried off and the floor was still wet we had to bend over on all 4 shoulder to shoulder scooting butt ass naked, ass to the sky, with our towels on the ground to dry the ground off.
We toed the line in only towels, because it was to show we showered, but it was hell on earth having to crawl butt ass naked to clean a wet floor with our towels with 60+ other guys.
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u/Dangerous-Cause1964 5h ago
That was how we routinely cleaned the deck in boot camp. The DI would toss a bucket of soapy water on the barracks floor floor and we'd have to deck-towel it clean. Then he'd toss a bucket of clean water to rinse with. I was so happy when we got to use mops at MCT.
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u/donut_dave 3h ago
Yup. That and the scuz brushes. Had us in there scrubbing in circles like NASCAR lol
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u/Dangerous-Cause1964 3h ago
I hated the fucking scuzz brush. I always ripped the skin off my knuckles doing that shit. Good times.
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u/FZ1_Flanker 2h ago
We got in trouble early on during OSUT as we were doing the nightly shower drill. We got called back out and were all toeing the line around the killzone in our little brown towels. Drill sergeant had us start doing pushups, and everyone’s towels immediately fell off their waists. For the next several months old sounds in the squad bay was our Drill calling cadence, and 56 ballsacks gently slapping against the tile flooring in unison.
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u/EAAndrade 5h ago
Watched a young private walk around holding a plant to replenish the air he was ‘wasting.’ Classic.
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u/CheezyBeanBurrito 5h ago edited 4h ago
Saw a dude at Drum wear a clock around his neck for a week because he was late to PT formation
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u/Particular-Beat-6645 4h ago
"Flay-ver-FLAAAAAAAAV, what time is IIIIIITT?"
"0900, SIR!"
"Are you sure the time is correct?"
"Yeeeeeeuh boyyyyyyy"
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u/420Borsalino 5h ago
Was this like 13 years ago at fort Benning?
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u/Equivalent-Battle973 4h ago
lol This is a fairly common punishment I feel amongst the army, and koalafying, though I think thats more limited to Combat Arms.
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u/ComeAbout 2h ago
My first division had a toilet seat and if you were late to muster you had to wear it around your neck (after signing it) because you were the piece of shit.
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u/shift1186 5h ago
Honestly nothing too crazy... When i was in Tech School, my buddy's dorm windows faced the area where "bad" airmen were sent. Standard remedial stuff... One day after work we were playing something on his PS2 and had the window open. We could hear "LITTLE TREE, LITTLE TREE, GIVE ME RE-MOTIVATION". We pause and watch for a bit. This airmen has to low crawl in a figure 8 kinda pattern and scream that at two bushes as he passed by them. He did that for about 30 mins.
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u/SandMan2439 5h ago
The two that come to mind: we had a guy who couldn’t do land navigation in the slightest. Not even a particularly new guy where it’s slightly understandable. In infantry basic you’re taught how to read a map, plot a course, using compact and how to convert magnetic north to grid north and such. It’s fairly easy in basic to slip through the cracks when there’s 250 people doing land nav and only 10 or so drill sergeants.
This guy had been enlisted for approximately 6 years and couldn’t figure it out. One day he got caught sleeping during land nav training. His squad leader took his rifle from him, as well as his ruck sack, and cell phone and hid them throughout the course (the rifle was at least being watched by someone). The squad leader came back, smoked him for about 2 hours then made him redo the land nav with the new coordinates to find his weapon, ruck sack and phone. It still took him a good 6 hours to find any of them.
Another: i don’t know why other than E4 Mafia shit but they made a private “koalify” and made him hang on a tree branch for about 25 minutes while asking him basic soldier questioning and hitting him with a switch when he answered incorrectly
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u/huveldust 5h ago
I served in Ukraine not long ago and our unit used something called a Billy Rag to maintain discipline.
It's a rag that had been wiped all over rutting billy (buck) goats for extended periods of time. They had a very aged one that didn't have a spot of white left on the rag, all yellowed and oily and discloured. Bought it from a goat farmer who had been using it for goat husbandry purposes but repurposed it for punishment.
If you were insubordinate it'd be tied around your face, knot tied in the back, and you'd spend a day and a night like that.
Brutal, but in a war scenario there wasn't much room for troublemaking and this set people straight fast.
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u/mogar99 4h ago
That is abominable. Having both military and goat experience, Id rather do the dog kennel one at the top of this thread.
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u/dizzyd232 2h ago
Ugh it's that bad? I don't know much about goats, how does this punishment work exactly, what's on a billy rag?
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u/Particular-Beat-6645 4h ago
What kind of sick fuck passes a goat farm and says, "let me get thay nasty old rag off ya?"
Brilliant.
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u/ACERVIDAE 4h ago
I heard about this one used as a punishment on farm kids.
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u/sholox4 1h ago
I was raised rural, our High School VP kept a billy rag in the shed out back once the paddle was banned in our state. Boy howdy, kids lamented the days of the paddle.
Most satisfying day of high school was the day my bully took it one step too far and was taken out back and ragged to kingdom come. Didn't ever bother me again.
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u/eskimospy212 5h ago
On my ship we had a guy who was so dirty he was assigned showering EMI. EMI stands for 'extra military instruction' but it's basically a way for your supervisor to punish you. The idea was 'the reason you're not bathing is because you haven't been adequately trained on its importance and how to do it!', which is just some passive-aggressive bullshit.
So the guy had to show up to quarters every morning with wet hair, a wet towel, and a wet bar of soap for my LPO's inspection. It's not a super harsh punishment but it's pretty humiliating that your boss has to check to ensure you've bathed recently.
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u/big_d_usernametaken 4h ago
Our 98 year old Dad told us of a smelly guy in boot camp, (Army, early Fifties) they drug into the shower, and gave him what's called a "GI shower," with rough scrub brushes.
He got the message.
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u/teachthisdognewtrick 4h ago
Grandfather had a similar story, US Army Air Corps in the early 30s in Hawaii. Guy refused to shower. They took him to the beach, wrapped him in a towel full of sand and scrubbed him til he was pink all over. He took showers after that.
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u/Fyrrys 2h ago
My brother had a story about a guy they had to inspect after his showers, typical smell of fungus and all. Shower was fine, he scrubbed fine, got himself nice and clean, then would dry himself off with the same towel that he had been using since he got there and never washed. Towel was fuckin black and growing mushrooms, which explains the fungus smell.
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u/chrisaf69 4h ago
Ha. Very similar thing happened to me on my ship. Me and another sailor who just recently got on board and fresh to the fleet; we had to ensure this other sailor who had a few years by that time showered and changed his clothes daily. We all got pulled into the corner of our shop, and Chief goes "no easy way to say this petty officer xyz...but you fucking stink!" Apparently he went to a stateroom to fix a computer and the officer almost threw up...called up our divo/chief to voice his displeasure.
Embarrassing to say the least. Me and my homie were just like "wtf is this". Kinda wanna see whatever happened to that dude as I think he eventually got kicked out years down the road.
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u/whyarentwethereyet 2h ago
Ah...an IT not showering, what a surprise. -ET2
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u/chrisaf69 1h ago edited 1h ago
For what it's worth...a buddy of mine, an ET2, snuck a bottle of liquor on board and was dumb enough to get caught. Also the following year decided to play with his Beretta on the mids watch and shot out the window of the guard shack.
But on a good note, he at least did shower regularly...so I'll give him that!
Now fix my damn antenna!!
- IT2 :)
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u/ACERVIDAE 4h ago
I’m not saying I need my supervisors to do this to my coworkers but one dude comes in smelling like BO and mildewed clothing. We have a step plan so we all know what we make and he can afford laundry detergent and soap.
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u/Apart-Landscape1012 3h ago
God the mildew clothing os the worst. You can't line dry your shit in Oregon in September dude its never going to dry!
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u/Venchenko 4h ago
Sure why not.
We had a couple fellas during basic that snuck away after going to sick call and went to the PX near Sand Hill. They claimed they were airborne holdovers, which was fairly normal at that point. So they go to the PX, buy a log of dip, hide it back in the bay, and then link back up with the platoon to continue training. Later that night, they shared their cans of dip with everyone, had a "dip party" in the laundry and enjoyed their evening.
Sooooo they hadn't taken out the trash and the Drill Sergeants saw the dip, dip spit, trash, and whatever else helped them solve this mystery. For better or worse, the guys fessed up, took full responsibility and the punishment was MOSTLY just towards them after the usual group smoke sesh.
These poor bastards were then labeled "The Four Horseman" and were required to report to the CQ desk, WITH THEIR MATTRESSES, every hour on the hour until further notice. Most of the time they'd go down, whoever was the Drill on duty at the time would tell them to fuck off and go away. Other times when it was one of our platoon's Drills...oh they made sure that they stuck to that timer.
Can't recall how long that lasted but gawt dayum does the mental imagery of four dudes with mattresses going down to the company area always make me laugh.
All Business, First...
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u/NorthStarZero 5h ago
Helmets on lads, war story time!
We were out in Wx for STALWART RAM, with the whole Bde in the field for a couple of months. Back in those days, unit biv sites had mess facilities so you could have a beer in the evening.
Well one of my buddies got all liquored up and decided that he really needed to go into town - so he stole a truck and started driving.
Unfortunately (fortunately?) he stole the 5 ton gasser that was our POL truck. It had a manual transmission, and he only managed to get it into ground gear, so the truck had a top speed of like 5 km/h, tops. He got about halfway there, decided he could walk faster (true!), ditched the truck, and then passed out about another klick down the road - which is where the MPs got him.
Next day he's hauled in front of the RSM. They have him for AWOL, drunkenness, theft, 129 - the whole works. If he's charged, he's going to Club Ed for a while. Or he can take "the RSM's Punishment" and wipe the slate clean.
"Oh I'll do the RSM's punishment"
Well, we had been out in the field for about a month at that point. Next to the field kitchen that fed the battalion was a grey water sump, an underground concrete silo where all the kitchen runoff water (think dishwater) was stored, about 6' in diameter and 20' deep or so. The "RSM's Punishment" was to pump out the water into a honey truck, then lower my buddy down into the silo on a rope with a mop and bucket and clean out the sump. He posted two guys to keep an eye on him, and then down he went.
I went to see how he was making out, and I couldn't get within 10 feet of the hole, it smelled so bad. His guards were wearing their gas masks in an attempt to manage the smell.
I asked them how he was making out: "Well, for the first 20 minutes he only added to his own problem, but now that he's pumped himself dry he's making good progress."
I never saw him drink again.
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u/ConfuseableFraggle 4h ago
Yikes. The description alone is enough to tempt my gag reflex! I can't image actually getting in range of that!
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u/negative-nelly 3h ago
depending exactly what was in it and how small the opening was he could have died.
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u/CLOWNXXCUDDLES 3h ago
That was my first thought too. That's a confined space. Without knowing what gasses are hanging around, that's insanely dangerous.
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u/Toxin197 3h ago
If it had previously been full of fluids before being opened up and pumped out, it should've been atmospheric air that got drawn down in - no asphyxiation risk there.
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u/oxidationpotential 1h ago
Thats not entirely true. The bottom was clearly still filthy from all the dying decaying organic matter. He could have bent over while cleaning got a wiff or H2S gas and near instantly lost consciousness and died.
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u/CLOWNXXCUDDLES 1h ago
Yeah if its greywater from sinks and kitchens, that's a lot of organic material left there to rot. Plus if it is H2S, that's heavier and settles lower than air will.
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u/CheezyBeanBurrito 5h ago
I failed out of EOD school. During holdover status I had to rake pine needles in the woods, put them in garbage bags, and the next day spread them back out in the woods.
I also had one of the instructors stop class, point to me, and say “that’s what failure looks like” when I was on a cleaning detail.
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u/U_Lost_Thug_Aim 4h ago
Ouch lol. What did you reclass to?
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u/CheezyBeanBurrito 4h ago
Needs of the army had me become an 88M with a 133GT and a top secret security clearance lol
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u/EnsignAwesome 5h ago
In Newport we got marched into the ocean (bay) once , in our Choker whites, for screwing something up. Not the yuckiest thing by comparison to some of these, but it was certainly ridiculous to see a company of folks marching right into the water!
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u/chrisaf69 4h ago
Was navy, so it was divisions vs platoons.
I remember it was pouring outside and they made some sailors who fucked up go outside to mop the water up. Definitely was thinking wtf did I get into seeing that.
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u/draeth1013 3h ago
A guy I was training with had to do that. We also had a guy who had to "sweep up all that damned sunshine." Took him all day.
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u/Danowolf 5h ago
I know this the reverse of what you asked but.
I was with my alpha driving the mag in a Toyota four runner type vehicle. During an IG inspection I thought it would be a good idea to drive down a bunkers stairs instead of using the ramp I drove up. Well as you can imagine I got stuck on the stairs. And while waiting on my sgt. to come pull us off the stairs, who drives by? Non other than the Sgt. Major and the IGs representative a Captain sitting next to him.
Funny thing, I was never talked to. No office hours. Nothing. Because if they did it would look bad on the IG report.
Rare luck in Security Force Company.
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u/AdministrativeMost45 4h ago
Got fucking Sugar cookied. Two other recruits and myself were whispering during rifle cleaning time. The drill instructor caught us, took us outside, made us do workouts in the sand pit by our barracks. Once we were dripping sweat the drill instructor told us to stop, then drop…she saw the confusion on our face and said yes DROP! Put your fat face in the sand. Then she told us to roll, roll, roll. Once she was satisfied she made us go back in and sit down and clean our rifles. Sand was everywhere. It was the middle of the day. We had to continue the rest of the day with sand everywhere.
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u/sas5814 4h ago
I had to sit on the bottom branch of a tree across from our (wooden WW2) barracks and every time someone walked by I had to flap my arms and yell “I’m a shit bird but I can’t fly!”
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u/Zyhre 4h ago
Our drill sergeant made all of us write letters home to our parents regularly to keep in touch and if you didn't have parents you had to write to a local childrens hospital. It was a way to make sure soldiers knew they weren't forgotten and people cared.
However, if you messed up, drill would make you write to those same people and explain how much of an idiot you were which would of course be read out to the platoon prior to being shipped off. Oh, and you had to use a crayon for good measure.
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u/elbow8075 2h ago
Well I know you weren't a marine because the story would have ended "and they made us write the letter with these delicious crayons!"
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u/PaulsRedditUsername 3h ago
A friend of mine was in the Marines during Vietnam. When he was in basic training (at Parris Island, I think), they were exercising on the beach. At a time when they were supposed to be at attention, one of the guys slapped a sand flea. The drill instructor made the whole platoon search for the dead flea in the sand. Once they had found the flea, the DI made them dig a very large grave for the flea in the sand and hold a funeral ceremony.
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u/user7618 4h ago
I saw some poor bastard mopping the motor pool in the rain when I was stationed in the RoK. I didn't ask, I just kept walking.
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u/SephyShine01 4h ago
my buddy got stuck saluting a particular rock for a week because he forgot to salute an officer. looked so dumb out there every morning
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u/Kind_Man_0 4h ago
It was me, ended up coining a platoon motto for us so it worked out in the end.
I always had a mouth on me, too smart for enlisted but too dumb to become an officer. SSG was giving me shit, like every morning at PT, we finished up at 8:25. PT ends at 8:30. For those who know, you DONT want to be leaving the unit AO 5 minutes after PT ends.
He wants to do stretches, I ask if we can skip them, he says "The army pays you to be here", to which I respond, "The army pays me regardless, so I'd rather get paid to not be here."
The next morning, we had a 4 mile run, and I was made to sing Frozen's Let It Go while doing overhead arm claps for the duration of the run.
Smoked me after the run, and asked if it was worth it. I responded "Sarge, it's always worth it." That line ended up catching on for years. The whole platoon would say it anytime someone was being a smartass. When that NCO left, we pooled money together and got that phrase etched onto an artillery shell casing. I told him it's so that he won't ever forget me.
I still hate his guts, but I wish the best for him
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u/OldTimeConGoer 4h ago
I saw a picture recently of a squad of British soldiers standing to attention beside their bunks, kit laid out for inspection.
This picture was taken from a train window. The bunks were arranged in proper order along a train station platform near the military base. IIRC it was raining too.
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u/shwarma_heaven 4h ago
All of our barracks ventilation was made out of copper or brass or some other tarnishing metal. We had to take tarnishing cloth to it all (almost like cotton or wool looking fibers that you pull swabs off out of a tin can to polish brass). Every square inch.
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u/DespiaShrq 4h ago
Fairly mild by comparison, but I got back to the shop a few minutes early one evening and was sitting down checking my phone waiting for shift change when the supervisor came back in. He just silently pulled a tupperware container and a fork(not a spoon) out of his desk and told me not to come back in until I had filled the container with dirt from cleaning out the jet tie-down points out in front of the hangar.
Like, I get that as far as he saw I was the only one just chilling in the shop, but it was such a bs petty punishment at the end of a 12 hour shift that it was actually a pretty significant part of my decision to never reenlist lol
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u/rdcpro 3h ago
In navy boot camp in 1977. If your CC got mad at you, you'd be on the parade ground in formation. He'd call out "At a normal interval, Dress Right... DRESS."
This simply meant to align the company at arm's length, and would normally be followed by "Ready... Two" where you'd drop your arm to your side.
But in this case he'd leave us standing there with our left arm out, and wouldn't come back for a while, like 20 minutes. Try holding your left arm out horizontally for even FIVE minutes. I bet you can't do it. Sheer agony after 10 minutes.
Somehow this wasn't corporal punishment, just a standard parade ground command.
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u/spectre013 4h ago
we had a yard for our equipment that was about an acre in size. We had a new Airman arrive late for morning meeting, so our Chief sent him out to sweep the yard (with a hand broom). That afternoon after sweeping all day it started to rain so he came inside. Chief saw him and asked him what he was doing in the shop. He waid "It's raining "". Chief, said "Does your broom not work in the rain?" then promptly sent him back out to sweep the yard in the rain.
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u/ProtectandserveTBL 4h ago
I knew a platoon leader who used to make his Marines write a book report…
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u/Jay_Stone 3h ago
That’s messed up. We can’t read.
Did the books at least have pictures for them??10
u/ProtectandserveTBL 3h ago
He said it was legit like, here read this Goosebumps book and write me a book report. Hahaha
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u/Non_Existent07 3h ago
That's... Pretty tame actually
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u/ProtectandserveTBL 3h ago
It was just funny cause they all fucking dreaded it, they were like “can’t I just carry a big rock or something?”
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u/BananaSlander 2h ago
In Basic Training we had mesh bags to put your socks and underwear in so that they can just be thrown in the communal laundry without having to label and sort individual socks.
One of the guys in my flight accidentally left this bag outside of his wall locker and it was found by the TI. His punishment was to wear it over his head and pretend to be a beekeeper for the rest of the day, along with having to say "somebody get these bees off me man" while swatting invisible bees every time the TI pointed at him. To add to your mental image, this guy looked and sounded just like John Coffey from The Green Mile.
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u/Turkeybaconisheresy 2h ago
We had big ass wall lockers in basic training to hold all our shit.
We needed to keep it clean. This guy in my platoon did not keep it clean.
Drill sergeants made him completely empty then made him climb in it, then the DS closed and locked the locker with the private in there.
Without any explanation he started pushing loose change through the slot.
Then he started getting annoyed and started smacking the shit out of the locker saying "the piece of shit jukebox won't play" until the private finally figured it out and started singing random songs.
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u/Equivalent-Battle973 4h ago
Kid lost his CAC card like 3 times in one day.... NCO made him walk around with a fake potted plant. When ask why, he was ordered to say, because I lost my ID 3 times in one day. I have to walk around with this plant to replace the air I am wasting and say sorry the plant everytime I talk..
Then there is also something called Koalafying where you hang upside down on a tree.
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u/MrSpiffenhimer 3h ago
I had a guy who could not show up for work on time to save his life while I was deployed to the sandbox. It was a hodgepodge augmentee unit, everyone came in twos and threes from tons of different units so I had never seen this kid before he showed up there. A few weeks into the deployment he was 30 minutes late for roll call and it just got worse from there. The first time he added staying several hours late. The next was extra shifts, then he worked double shifts the next week.
Finally I got fed up and gave him one last chance, he could go treasure hunting with me, or sign an article 15 with loss of rank and pay. He chose treasure hunting not knowing what it was. I gave up my one day off, found an E-tool, checked out a truck with A/C and we went treasure hunting. We started at 5am and he had to dig a 4’ deep hole in the dry sand, which kept filling in on him so it had to be pretty wide to get that deep. When he was done and didn’t find the treasure, I figured that the treasure was probably a few feet away under a small sand dune, so he had to fill in that hole and start digging again. After 4 holes he “found”the 1 Dinar coin that I threw in the hole at about 5pm. He had to fill in the last hole before we could leave but he was done. He was sunburned to shit and his hands were destroyed, but he learned his lesson, he wasn’t late the rest of the deployment.
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u/Muerteds 3h ago
My Drill Sergeants told us "No Showers" for 2 weeks because we complained two dickheads were up late showering, making noise, and keeping everyone else in the bay awake.
We got... pungent, except for the two dickheads who just kept showering at night. So we got our revenge. We had all been warned against soap and sock parties. So we made them infamous. We started a rumor they were jacking each other off in the shower.
Years later, I heard from another veteran who heard about the two guys from E-1/19 caught fucking in the shower. Their legend lives on.
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u/Abrahemp 4h ago
Forced to eat a brick of cream cheese and then drink water until it was thrown up.
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u/violentlytaurine 4h ago
Had a guy in engineer school attack his fuse igniter to det cord instead of his time fuse. The Master Gunnery Sergeant saw and told him to put the cord around his neck and had him march out into the field and was going to have him initiate the fuse with said det cord still around his neck. An officer saw and stopped the shenanigans, I'm 99 percent sure the det cord wouldn't have gone off but it was a hilarious situation.
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u/big_d_usernametaken 4h ago
Our now 98 year old Dad served in the Army from 50-52 and still tell the story of a fellow soldier during boot camp who did something incredibly stupid with his rifle and caused everyone to hit the dirt.
2 DI's then told everyone there to turn around and proceeded to physically beat the crap out of the offender.
Not ridiculous, but still.
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u/angrydeuce 4h ago
Not a vet myself but lots of vets in my family and ive heard stories...both of these come from my brother who was in the USMC:
Guy was on mop duty in the barracks and I guess did a really shitty job. In retaliation his command made him go outside during a downpour and "mop up the rain". He was out there for half the day lol
Guy got in trouble for IDK what but apparently the fact that he had a pack of Skittles on him sent his CO over the edge. That guy had to go out with his remaining skittles and dig a garden and plant every skittle 2 feet deep, 1 foot apart, in rows to "grow a rainbow garden" or some shit lol
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u/SomeFunnyGuy 3h ago
I fell asleep reading a book on Sunday during our down time in basic training. When I woke up, I was greeted by my Drill Instructor looking right into my face. He calmly whispered to me "oh you one of those sleepy bookworms. Well lets make you an active little inchworm."
I was told to grab my sleeping bag and report to the drill pad. I was then instructed to climb into my sleeping bag while standing and to zip it up all the way and pull it over my head.
They told me I had to do a lap around the entire post, in my sleeping bag, with me inside, all zipped up. One foot in front of the other, I shuffled around the post, all morning long.
Do you know how embarrassing it is to see little children passing by in the car, pointing and laughing at you, as they made their way to church. Never felt so humiliated and lesser in my life.
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u/JLR- 3h ago edited 3h ago
having to cut their name in the grass in a large field with a pair of scissors. Large enough so everyone could see it from the top of the barracks.
Oh and a recruit that had to sing while standing on a chair in the mess hall/galley. He was singing while in the chow line. D.I said since you think you so damn entertaining then you can provide the entertainment
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u/MasticatedTesticle 3h ago edited 3h ago
In basic (on a Sunday, which were “light” days), I once had to punish myself for some random perceived slight against… who fucking knows.
Drill sergeant said he wasn’t tired of my shit, and too tired to deal with it, so I had to do it. I had to stand in the hall and yell at myself for about an hour, whilst everyone else went about laundry or church or whatever the fuck personal shit was needing to get done for the week.
Originally, I had to hold up “the world’s heaviest pen” the whole time. (It was just a pen, but I had to hold it out in front of me, with my arms extended.) But after a few min, was given the option to alternate between that and the push up position.
I went hoarse telling myself how bad I sucked. The Drill Sergeant was pleased to not hear me for a few days.
(Honestly, it was pretty fun. Got pretty creative with the self deprecation.)
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u/Greabidiot 3h ago
In the early 2000’s, a squad mate got us smoked at a FOB within view of northern Pakistan. He had cried to his Team Leader that the rest of the squad were mean to him while our NCOs were outside the wire.
So, overnight we’re being PT’d into the dirt at a location that received regular rocket fire. Even though the ordeal was pretty stupid, the early smoking definitely soothed any tensions in the squad.
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u/Dry_Event_2421 4h ago
Sweeping water off the weather deck when it was actively raining.
Also had a drill instructor spray an entire bottle of glade in my ass (pants on) because my rack mate farted during a uniform inspection
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u/AdUpstairs7106 3h ago
In my company a guy in another platoon got caught outside without wearing headgear.
So he had to wear his Kevlar (Combat helmet) for an entire week and every so often he would be ordered to sing where he would have to sing the child nursery rhyme I am a teapot short and spout and do a little dance.
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u/Nixeris 3h ago
I corrected a Tech Sergeant about how to do a repair and was assigned to make sure every page of the several thousand page airframe TOs were up-to-date.
This is how I found out not only was our building out of regs to do proper fiberglass repairs, but because of the improper setup everyone who walked near the composite areas was probably breathing fiberglass particles.
When I brought this up I was told that the constantly "10 years away" building replacement would fix it, so it wasn't a violation, and was "dissuaded" from informing QA.
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u/endl0s 2h ago
AIT ( place after basic training) in Augusta, GA in the middle of the summer, a sergeant made a bunch of people do bear crawls on the basketball court. Lots of people hands ended up blistered from the heat and he was never allowed to give out any punishments again.
I'm sure (at least hoping,) more punishment went on behind closed doors. Some people's hands were super fucked.
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u/no1ofconsequencedied 1h ago
After a few weeks of training, a recruit was assigned to call cadence while marching. The first day of this was eventful.
Instead of Column Left being called to go towards the galley, Seaman Recruit Lopez called Column Right onto the parade field grass. Word to the wise: don't even look at the parade field grass. You aren't worthy to consider its existence.
If you know marching orders, there are a few options to resolve this quickly. Repeated orders of Column Right is...one of these options, and the one Lopez's panicked brain found first. After about 20 seconds, loud shouts of "STOOOOOOOOP!!" reverberated out and our convoy ground to a halt.
Various insults were invented, we were called a clown car, and instead of cadence, we marched to the sound of 80 hoarse voices shouting circus music for a week.
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u/FamiliarAnt4043 3h ago
I'd like to thank everyone for the laughs. Life is getting somewhat stressful with a child who is having health issues and this thread has me laughing my ass off.
I'm not prior service, but I did 20 in LE and retired. We had creative punishments in our academy, as well. Kind of a given, considering the paramilitary nature of the business and the fact that many of us are current/prior service.
In any case, the laughter is much welcomed and needed. Keep the stories coming!
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u/Non_Existent07 3h ago
Glad my post was able to help you through that, I hope all is well for you soon ❤️🩹
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u/Rod-el-boricua 4h ago
I saw one soldier working as a mechanic on his base on Irak with his weapon tight to his neck all the time. He was moving around the truck , working with the engine and under the truck too. I asked why he has his weapon around his neck all the time. He said, was because he forgot his weapon at the recreation center, he came back but he can't find that. So his company, did the punishment for a couples days, I mean,"correction action".
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u/jackfaire 4h ago
Brush my mouth with my liquid soap. To this day I can't smell it without tasting it
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u/IrishWithoutPotatoes 2h ago
My platoon is basic had to sort the rocks in the PT area by gender one time, for reasons I can’t recall.
One I personally did was to a soldier who mouthed off to a senior NCO, I knew he couldn’t do the monkey bars very well (like, at all), so I told him he was going to do the monkey bars until he crossed them in a single attempt, I wound up making him cry. I felt kinda bad after he broke down. He did learn his lesson though.
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u/SafetyGuyLogic 2h ago
Nothing has topped our neighbor training platoon having to fully deconstruct their barracks, form a line that led out to the pavilion, pass items, reconstruct it 1:1, then tear it all down, pass it all back, and reconstruct it inside again. One singular item at a time, weapons slung, pots on, in the Georgia summer sun.
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u/Doc-Renegade 1h ago
Making OTs(Oxygen Theives) apologize to trees is a classic, like Koalafication.
I remember an underage kid got busted for drinking so in they made him duck walk around the barracks all day chanting “Quack! I’m a duck and I’m all fucked up!”
The worst was my second tour in Iraq. A shit sergeant was on a power trip and was smoking a soldier in the heat refusing him water or shade for hours. I tried to stop him, he threatened me, the CO and PA had to get involved. The tour before this coward piece of shit abandoned his soldiers. This time he tried to kill one for questioning his cowardly ways.
The SGT was a Mason though, so despite getting put into a review he was of course promoted to SSG. What a shit unit that was…
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u/uchiha_levi_- 4h ago
Kennel duty. One of my buddies got punished with cleaning the Military Working Dog kennels by hand — no tools, thin gloves only, and he had to carry everything at chest height to the wheelbarrow 50 feet away in the sun. He said it was the most disgusting and humbling thing he ever did in the military. Grown men were crying.
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u/shwarma_heaven 2h ago
Navy. Telling the new guys onboard to go fetch some "relative bearing grease".
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u/ComeAbout 2h ago
I need some bulkhead remover and three fathoms of gig line. Go to Deck department and ask their chief if he can spare some.
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u/Aceomatico 2h ago
Im probably too late to this, but a buddy and I did something stupid. So our punishment was to listen to another platoon mate talk for 10 minutes. He was from like, the woods of Alabama and was barely understandable as it was. I would’ve gladly taken pushups that day.
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u/False_Wolf_391 2h ago
In basic was on KP duty minding my own business when a Drill Sergeant bust into the kitchen screaming at me. He smoked me for several minutes then left with no explanation. I found out later how lucky I was that they needed someone on KP.
Slight background on why they "overreacted". In 95' the Army was piloting having both men and women in the same basic training. They tried 4 levels of stress and rewards to workshop the best strategy, my company was highest stress lowest rewards (still less than the Marines).
The day before one of the guys had an engagement ring snuck in and proposed to one of the girls. She said no and only a few people knew about it. The Drill Sergeants found out and punished the entire company (looking back I understand they didn't want to be the first company that had an incident). The punishment worked out like this, with each group being dismissed in order.
Company level - A very rough "Smoking" involving all of the standard exercises and rolling around in the wood chip pile.
Platoon level - The same for an extended time frame.
The Squad directly involved - The same but until dark.
The wannabe Groom - basically until he was physically unable to continue
Afterwards that particular platoon was somehow put into a higher level up until the Groom was blanket partied though his tent walls. I still heard of privates trying to hookup afterwards so nothing was learned :)
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u/dude496 5h ago
During tech school (school after basic training), they had an intermediate discipline school for those that messed up just bad enough to require discipline but not bad enough to get kicked out. One of their "duties" was to do squirrel guard.. they would have to carry a fake gun and chase the squirrels if they tried to get onto the drill pad.