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When you think of military combat training, I’d imagine it conjures up some distinct thoughts. Drill sergeants yelling at trainees, automatic weapons fire, explosions, and the like. Images of operator groups, in full kit, performing dynamic entries in shoot houses is pretty standard. But what about the blooper reel? Is there any examples of the not so professional warfighter in action? Damn straight there is. Look no further than the United States Army to produce 2 of the worst Battle Buddies in history.
Oldie but a Goodie
Admittedly, this video is from back in 2015. However it is still reviewed by todays military as an example of what not to do, ever, for any reason. That’s because the cascading failures these 2 battle buddies experienced where catastrophic and compounding all the way till the end. These boys where lost like balls in tall grass. Ain’t no one ever gonna’ find them.
Immediate Errors
The video starts off with 2 hapless Army recruits in a live fire exercise. They have 2 drill instructors observing them. Both of which are dumbfounded by what they see. At the start of the video we hear the command “grenade time,” from one of the drill instructors. The recruit on the right says, “I want to move battle buddy!” The drill instructor then asks, “where you going? Where you going?”
Compounding Mistakes
And here is where it falls apart. The recruit on the right thought this was a warning that a grenade was incoming, I would guess. But it was a command to throw a grenade. The right recruit, let’s call him Righty, then realizes what the command was. So he yells out, “I want to throw my grenade battle buddy!” His cohort on the left, now dubbed Lefty, replies with “I got you covered battle buddy,” as he turns his weapon to the right.
Another drill instructor corrects Lefty immediately by saying, “targets are on the LEFT! Over there!” This is followed by a “Christ, what the hell is going on over here!?” What’s going on is these 2 guys both had immediate errors in judgement and it put a hitch in their giddy ups. Lefty fires a few rounds while Righty again calls out, “I want to throw my grenade battle buddy!” Lefty replies, “Got you covered Battle Buddy!”
Cascading Failure
Righty again calls out “I want to throw my grenade battle buddy!” Lefty then replies “I’m out! Changing mags.” This bring the drill instructors back into the fray with “well I guess you can’t very well cover him can you?” Lefty lowers his voice and says, “no drill sergeant.” Lefty changes his magazine, then goes immediately back into firing position. This reveals yet another error.
The drill instructor yells, “it only works if a round is IN THE CHAMBER!” Lefty presses the bolt release and sends the BCG home, finally. And on cue, Righty says once again, “I want to throw my grenade battle buddy!” Lefty then accurately says “I got you covered battle buddy!” Finally, righty pulls the pin, throws the training grenade to the right, and yells “frag out!”
FRAG OUT!
Both recruits drop to the prone position behind cover. A drill instructor grabs a strap on Righty’s plate carrier and lifts him up. The drill instructor asks, “what’s in front of you?” Righty says, “the enemy drill sergeant.” Drill sergeant replies, “but they’re over there right?” As he points to the left. Righty answers incorrectly and tells the drill sergeant he threw the grenade to the left. Good lord.
Errors Before It Started
At this point Lefty looks like he’s lost something. He then admits while motioning behind the camera, “drill sergeant I think I dropped my grenade over there.” Dropped your grenade!? If I was their drill instructor, I would have come unglued. The amount of spit and anger they would have slung in their collective faces from my ass chewing would be drenching.
Mental Overload
This brief 95 second video highlights a common problem in combat training, mental overload. Steam was coming out of these boys ears as they where trying to remember all they have been taught and performing on command. They made mistakes off the bat, and they continued the entire video. And when you think it’s over, the genius at the end admits, he screwed up before the video even started.
Learn From Mistakes
I have a cousin who is a Gunnery Sergeant in the Marine Corps and he has seen this video. He told me, “that’s the Army there.” He said they use this video for training purposes to highlight cascading failures and how to not do what these battle buddies did. I was surprised they still utilize this video, but my cousin said, this one was legendary status. The only thing worse would have been if the failures in training would have led to someone getting injured or killed.
Thankfully that wasn’t the case here. Therefore, I think it is perfectly ok to laugh out loud at this video and enjoy the failures of others. Even the best trained military on the planet has their dweebs and nincompoops. Battle Buddy Lefty and Righty are our clowns for the day. Thanks for the laugh y’all!
