My Son the “Grunt”
BY Herschel Smith
18 years, 3 months ago
I have created a new category: Daniel. I have introduced you to him before about the time of School of Infantry graduation. I don’t know him as Private, or Smith, or as he knows himself — “grunt.” I know him as my son, Daniel.
But he currently lives in a world of very difficult training and preparation, and he knows himself as “grunt.” He is not a poag (person other than a grunt). He is infantry … boots on the ground. When the Marines go in, the ones who go in are the infantry. The others, while important, provide support to the ones who are at the tip of the spear. The Marine Corps infantry has the most dangerous job in the world (with all due respect to Alaskan Crab Fishermen).
Daniel lives in a world where they wake at 0200 hours, put on 40 pounds of body armor (18.14 kg) and 100 pound backpacks (45.4 kg) and “hump” (a very fast march, or walk) 20 miles (32.2 km). They practice “stacks” and “room-clearing” in urban warfare simulations. They get to sleep — sometimes — for a couple of hours per night when out in the field, only to wake and have to pull leeches off of each other. It is difficult to sleep, though, with artillery going and jets overhead. They train on every weapon that they might have to use, and are expected to be very good with their own weapon, the M16A2 or the M4. If you look carefully, you will notice a scar on Daniel’s neck. A hot 0.50 caliber shell, ejected from the .50 caliber machine gun, landed there in between his body armor and his neck. This scar was the result.
Boot camp was very hard (mentally hard). School of Infantry was much harder, physically speaking. Being in the “fleet” is the hardest of all (in every way). So he loves to come home on the weekend. God has blessed us, and we live close enough for Daniel to come home some weekends. He loves to disconnect from the Marines, if only for two days. In the picture below he is pontificating about something … I don’t recall what. By the way, what in the world is this deal with wearing two T-shirts at the same time? I will never understand that. The top shirt has on it: CSYO — for Charlotte Symphony Youth Orchestra, that his brother gave him (who played in the symphony). Two worlds collide: The U.S. Marines, and the Charlotte Symphony Youth Orchestra.
I am very worried. As the time comes for him to deploy (early 2007), I will lean heavily on others and ask for daily prayers from my readers. This will no doubt be a very difficult ride for me.
On August 6, 2006 at 1:12 am, CharlyG said:
Our thoughts and prayers go with him.
aka lyricman
On August 6, 2006 at 7:21 am, Rhod said:
This will be a difficult time for you. I have three sons in this war, two in Iraq (101st) and another in Afghanistan (formerly of the 82nd, now attached to the 10th Mountain). All of them are combat arms.
We also live in Connecticut, where the war is widely regarded as criminal adventurism. You learn very quickly about true friendship, and where it intersects with politics. Most friendships, in the end, aren’t worth keeping.
I’ll keep Daniel in my thoughts. There are thousands of parents like us now, and we need to be as courageous as the kids we raised and stand with them every day. Semper Fi.
On August 6, 2006 at 12:25 pm, Howard said:
Welcome to the fray. My USMC son took his platoon to Fallujah last year and brought them all back in one piece. You will find that your son will be growing up real fast, if he isn’t already, and will be years ahead of his civilian contemporaries.
Communications with your son in the fleet should be fairly good. We were always in contact by e-mail, instant messaging and telephone.
On August 9, 2006 at 1:29 am, Mike said:
I have some of those same shell-casing burns, but hopefully that will be the worst of it. No Purple Hearts, thank you. Tell him to make optimum use of all the time he has before deploying. Train hard, train smart and train constantly. There’s a serious learning curve in combat even for “cannon fodder”, which is what they call we grunts. Buy him a copy of Grossman’s “On Killing”. And we’ll all pray that he’ll return safely. Godspeed!
On September 16, 2006 at 5:58 am, Linda said:
I understand your concern and pride. When I voice my concern and fear, I have been told I should be proud. The first time I was speechless, of course I was proud and impressed by my son’s undertaking Marine boot camp and now SOI. – one does not have to do with the other.
My son wants to be a writer and was actually a freelance critic for a small newspaper before he went to boot. He did not know ALL the options open to him and based on that lack of knowledge he chose infantry. Since he had graduated boot he has discovered there a lots & lots of choices and combat correspondent is one of them – which would be in the same area of his college plans. I pray that this war will be over before our boys get there. Miracles do happen. My Dad (Army) was headed to Korea when peace was called and he ended up doing peace keeping duty.