This is my very first post, from back around Sept. '98, wen The Straight Dope was carried on AOL.
The message board was a lot less structured, being more of a chaotic free-for-all than the organized, regimented, moderated order that we have all come to know and love. :rolleyes:
But anywho, here it is, my very first post on The Straight Dope:
[Obligatory Editorial Disclaimer: Do not try this. Anywhere!]
Anyone here ever driven a Tank? A real, honest-to-Odin armored combat vehicle with a really huge cannon on it? They’re a lot more responsive and nimble than the movies or TV gives them credit for. Like that “Be All You Can Be” ad where the M1 tank is hauling butt, hits a bump, and flies 30 feet through the air like some kinda sick Evel Knevel sorta thing. Silly me, I promptly went and talked to my local recruiter.
After looking at my aptitude test scores, he says to me:
“What MOS (military occupational specialty, or job) do you want?”
I ask: “What do I qualify for?”
He says: “You have great scores on your ASVAB. You qualify for all entry MOSs. These Military Intelligence MOSs offer great enlistment bonuses, Army College Fund and G.I. Bill. And with your scores, it’ll be a snap to get you into them.”
I says to the man: “I wanna be a tanker.”
He continues: “Or these Communications fields; great technical training, make it real easy to get a great paying job, if you ever get out of the Army.”
I says again: “I wanna be a tanker.”
My recruitrer set my folder down, rubs his eyes, mumbles something I don’t quite catch about ignorant, snot-nosed civillian punks.
Some time later, I’m a tank driver, stationed in H Co. 2/2 ACR, Bamberg, Germany. We drive around in training areas, shooting things, and maneuver around in mudholes. We occasionally get to go to the city of Hof, on a Border rotation, and watch godless commie East Germans watch us watch them watching us. Every now and then, an Ivan pokes his head out and we take lots of pictures of him.
On one of our training rotations to Hohenfels, Germany, my gunner and I get saddled with a new Tank Commander who hadn’t rode a tank in three years or so. He is annoying in his tendency to treat both me and the gunner as if we were complete idiots. He is especially annoying in his tendency to shout into the intercom, causing severe pain in our ears. He is most exceptionally annoying in the fact that he’s driven a desk at Ft. Knox for the last three years and couldn’t pour pi… urine out of a combat boot if the instructions were written on the soles of the boot. The Level of Annoyance has reached the point that I decide to test some of the Newtonian Laws Of Physics, as they apply to Armored-Combat-Vehicles-Weighing-In-Excess-Of-60-Tons.
I specifically remember that thrice-darned recruiting commercial where the M1 Tank goes flying through the air in defiance of all common-sense imparted to us by all those old WWII movies where tanks and such crawl around about as fast as a lame turtle.
So I turn down the volume on my intercom (anticipating much wailing and gnashing of teeth), find a fairly smooth stretch of ground, and open the throttle for all she’s worth, knowing sooner or later, I’m gonna hit something and launch this big mutha like the space shuttle [I should note at this time that Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” was playing in my mind at excessive volume]. My opportunity came soon enough when the ground dropped away about three feet coming off a slight slope, like there was a cut running the width of the slope, and we went airborne like an F-14 leaving the deck of the USS Nimitz.
We flew like one of those downhill ski-jumpers, the ones who have to file flight plans and pack a sack lunch because they fly for so long. We hit the ground like King Kong hitting the pavement after his header off the top of the Empire State Building.
Just for your information, the driver of an M1 Tank has the most comfortable position on any combat vehicle: he drives in a reclined or semi-reclined position, and quite often falls asleep during long drives, which enlivens some really boring stretches of road and keeps the locals on their toes.
Thus was I suitably braced for our re-entry into the atmosphere and our susequent landing. Unfortunately for my experience-deficient Tank Commander, who was in the tank commander’s customary standing position, those Newtonian Laws Of Physics propelled him right out of the tank commander’s hatch like an ejection seat was strapped to his ass.
The only reason he wasn’t thrown completely clear of the tank was the intercom cable attached to his crew helmet acted as a sort of bungee-cord and he landed on top of the turret about the same time we were touching down.
If I wanted to be an even larger booger-snot than I allready was, I could’ve put on the brakes while we were airborne. That way when we landed, all 65 tons and 80 sq.ft. of tractive surface could’ve stopped us on a dime and made 9 cents change, giving me the opportunity to see my tank commander launched into the air and snapped back like Wile E. Coyote.
Well, everyone who witnessed that episode went into testosterone-overload, pumping my hand and slapping my back. My Company Commander wanted me to do it again, so they could get it on film, especially the part of my tank commander flying through the air on a separate trajectory from his tank, then landing and flopping around on top of the turret like a fish out of water.
My Plattoon Sergeant, despairing at being able to do anything with his experience-deficient tank commander, took me to the side and, in a friendly, fatherly fashion, threatened to terminate my life functions if I ever took a notion to do something like that ever again. He speculated about the quality of my genetic makeup, alluded to some dubious ancestry on my part, and wondered how a semi-evolved simian such as myself could have possibly been allowed to join his beloved Army. He told me to return to my vehicle, apologize to my bruised, battered and sedated tank commander, and contemplate the joy and honor of showing proper respect to my non-commissioned officers.
Properly chastised, I fled his wrath and returned to the cozy, comfortable embrace of my beloved tank, where I would contemplate the situation, and my further prospects of service to our nation’s armed services. The last thing my Plattoon Sergeant said to me as Inturned to go: “By the way, great driving!”
The lessons that I took from this incident are:
- What Goes Up, Must, Sooner or Later, Come Down.
- The Bigger They Are, The Harder They Fall.
- Anything That Can Go Wrong, Will Go Wrong.
- Hold on tight.
- BEEPBEEP!
ExTank
“Ah, to be young and foolish again. Or at least young.”
Platoon Sergeant: :wally