Army (1969, sound)

times I had records piles down to Fort Dicks with me to uh to see psychiatrists in the army. He told me he says he goes you can't because civilian life is uh is really different than army life. He goes he goes goes uh but civilian rules and laws are different than army laws and you're just going to have to learn to live with it. You know he goes you here for good and you're going to have to stay here and there's nothing you can do to get out. And I just they from there they took me to SPD and from there I from there I just you know came back home again. I sort of managed to get away. Ready. Remember ma'am prepared our command is ready. Ma'am execution is seats. Would I say ready seats? You will hit your seats like 2,000 sex potatoes. Set it down. You will do as you're told and that's the only way you will do. Do you understand that? When you left home, you were under your mother's care. You're now under mine. Every time you move, breathe, blow your nose for anything else, I'll tell you to. Is that clear? Yes, sir. Is that clear? Yes, sir. Now going fast big classes you may get the idea that we consider this a factory just to turn out so many pianos or radios. That is not true at all. This is a factory if you want to term it that produces the finest product in the world. And we consider each of you as an individual. And please don't think we consider you just so many bodies. I grew up on the south side of Pittsburgh. Went to high school there for almost 3 years and just couldn't take it. I'm sorry. So a group of us decided to drop out which was great for a couple of months. Just hanging loose, shooting pool, [ __ ] around, you know. Do you have to cut it so short? Then my old man stepped in and I was out looking for a job. There was nothing there for me. There were a few skilled jobs. I didn't have any training for, but I had to keep looking. Put a number on the back of your hand. Did you draw up yet? Get over here and get a tile draw. About a month later, when I got my induction notice, it really looked good to me. I hadn't turned up anything myself, and this was everything I needed. Money, job, train. Everyone look at me. I'm going to show you how to make a bomb out of your clothes and send them home. You will send everything home that is in your bed. When you have that done, you take your shoes and put them down next to the car. Then you roll it up tight to tie up with your belt. Is that clear? Well, dah. This afternoon, you dropped your rifle. Yes, sir. You had to drop it, huh? No, sir. What do you mean, no sir? You did, didn't you? Yes, sir. Are you calling me a liar? No, sir. Why did you have to drop it? I don't know, sir. Here. All right, sir. Yeah. Move. Move. My rifle without me is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. Revery, get in there and make a fiveminute head call. First squad, get in the head. Get out for push-ups. Get out for push-ups. Get out. Get out. Get on your feet. Get out. What? What? Everybody will do them, people. Everybody will do them. One. He beat back straight. Two. If any of you have any burning sensation of the eyes, your protective mask is not in good working order. Remove your mask. Oh my. Don't worry about it, men. You got your M50 ointment, which you can take out, and you rub it on your skin and your face and maybe under your protective mask. But don't take your protective mask off. I mean, if you got a shot of the deadly mustard gas in your face and you take your N60 mask off to put your N50 ointment on your face, you'll die. [Applause] Right. If you do take your M60 mask off, it's Mox next to me, gentlemen. Like my mind is just one blank. I'm going and I don't care. I don't care what happens. [Applause] Good afternoon, men. I'm Tech Sergeant Thurman. You people out here today for your third phase of bayonet training. Now, remember one thing. On the bayonet course, we only teach the art of killing and that's all. I'm done. That's what I like to see. A little man get out here and do something. That's all it takes. It's not how big you are. It's how good and aggressive you are. All right, you two get out. Give me two more. Each man will take one knife, one fork, and one spoon. You will put in your right hand. You will hold a tray with both hands. The next thing you see will be a cup. You will put it in your left hand. You will not talk. You will march straight in. And when you are doubt the end of the line, you will go to a table. Basic training has a purpose. It breaks us down until we're ready to do everything the military wants us to do without any questions. Swallowing the [ __ ] and taking the petty harassment is called obedience. Disobey, ask the wrong questions, step out of their line, and they throw us in the stockade. We have no say in what we do, and there's only one way to do things, the way we're told. The military's basic training program is pretty clever. It isolates us, keeps us exhausted all the time, keeps harassing us, and keeps us from talking to each other about the political purpose of our army. It's the only way the military can be sure of us that will do their work without question. The military says we are in Vietnam at the request of their government to defend it from aggression from the north. But the South Vietnamese don't fight. Except maybe if the sun is shining and there are B-52s behind them, but no, no one wants to be near a South Vietnamese unit during a firefight. They've got the best American weapons, but they're so sloppy. They might as well be ammunition dump for the Vietkong. The Vietkong fight. They fight hard. And they fight like that because they've got a lot more than good American rifles or because they have to serve. [Music] fight like that because you know why you are fighting because you believe in it. The Vietkong are fighting for the right of the Vietnamese people to run their own country. [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] This war is no different from the others. It's a money war. Nobody believes that America feels any responsibility to poor countries. I don't buy that. That's not why the government spends $3 billion a year just for bombs and shells. That's not responsibility. That's big business. Take the M16 rifle. Now, who in the hell wants a rifle that jams when it gets a little dirty or when it heats up? I knew a lot of guys who threw theirs away and used AK-47s. The brass said they were satisfied with the M16. What they meant was Colt and somebody else is making a pile of money and the brass doesn't want to rock the boat. Well, I saw guys died with jammed M16s and they weren't satisfied. There are about 100 B-52s serving NAM. And each of them cost the people around 8 million bucks. And every time it drops a full load, there's another 60 grand. Now, who sees to it that the brass has all those big bombers to play with? We do. That's our taxes and our bread and butter flying around up there. And I can't exactly afford to pay for it on my salary. I make 238 bucks a month, including 55 for combat pay. That's a buck 85 a day extra for getting shot at. You know, I'm not the one who's doing this for money. The officers are the only ones who've got it made. When they get back, they've got the soft jobs waiting for them as managers and executives in the same businesses that are cleaning up from the war. But we're the army, not the officers. We're the ones who've got to face Charlie on the battlefield while the brass brings up the rear. We're the ones who die in the rice patties. We're the ones who get nothing out of this war except maybe some shrapnel in our guts. Vietnam is only a small part of a world market. [Music] When and if we finally get out of here, the really big businesses are going to come in and make their profits off new markets using the roads and airports we built from the cheap labor in the Asian cities while we go back to the States. And to what? What kind of job have we been trained for? A cop. Throughout our history, there have been occasions when local authorities could not maintain law and order and federal troops had to be called in. Heat. Heat. [Music] I've got no business in Vietnam and I've got even less business marching in this city. See, they want me to move against people who are learning how this society works to keep them down. When those revolutionary brothers begin to demand control over their communities, the man wants me to protect his [ __ ] and relevant institutions. People are waking up to the fact that this is a racist society, that it doesn't do anything for the people, that it doesn't listen to what they have to say. People are beginning to understand that they have a right to expect their government to serve them. And when they discover that it doesn't, they also have a right to do something about it. And when they start doing something about it, the [ __ ] gets too heavy for the cops to handle. That's when they call us in to be the cops to put our brothers down. Men who have the power in this country are isolated from the people. They use them to get what they want, which is money. Those are the men whose businesses we supposed to protect when the people come to burn them. Nobody is about to ask us whether we think we should be there. We are ordered in there used like a club to keep the people quiet. And we know whose hands are swinging that club. The same big businessmen who use the army to open up markets around the world. These are the guys who need the cops and the soldiers. People are waking up to the fact that they're going to have to fight for what they want. And as more people wake up, the man is going to be looking for bigger and bigger clubs until the whole [ __ ] country becomes one arm camp. We all have a choice to make. The guy's order is in Nam. We need three and a half million troops to put down resistance. Wherever people are struggling against American exploitation are the same guys who create the misery here at home. Whether we're in the service or not, the choice is the same. We serve these guys silently or recognize them as our true enemy and responsible for the oppressive conditions they create. These men will do anything to stay in power. That's why they try to keep us divided. Whites from blacks, men from women, civilians from soldiers. When our bravest people stand up to them, they use their phony courts, they rott in laws to isolate them. They call them criminals, and they bury them in their stockades and prisons. The whole legal system is used like the UCMJ to keep everybody in line. But the Army's uniform code of military justice, which is nothing more than legal blackmail, wasn't enough to stop over 250,000 GIS from going AWOL last year. A congressional group has voted to bring contempt of Congress. We can pretend we don't have a choice, but we'll end up doing guard duty over our brothers in the pound. More and more of us are standing together against the brass. We're not alone. [Applause] [Applause] At the presidio, at Hood, at Jackson, at Bragg, and at Dicks, we discovered that we have the support of a lot of people outside the service. Thousands of people came out here to support the Fort Dicks 38, guys who would refuse to keep taking [ __ ] from the army. The 38 saw that people are always going to get [ __ ] over as long as they let it happen. So, they stood up for all of us against the brass. [Applause] and thousands of people across the country stood up with him in a national campaign. By the time of this demonstration, hundreds of GIs had already been released from the Dick Stockade. [Music] We're on your side. We're on your side. We're on your side. We're on your side. We're on your side. [Applause] The brass is up tight. They panicked at the Presidio trials, pitting us with 15 to 16ear sentences. The GI stood together and with the support of the civilian movement, we forced the army to back down. The GI movement is strong and the army is afraid to let us see it. They're trying to suppress our newsletters, whipping out the UCMJ to put the papers off limits. People are finding out how all their different struggles are actually the same fight against the same men. Black and Latin people are fighting in their communities. Poor miners in Appalachia, steel, auto, and transportation workers in every big city are striking against their bosses and even against their own unions. College students are fighting against the army and big business who control their universities. High school students are fed up with being humiliated and held for four years. The GI's fight is part of these struggles. Heat. Heat. [Music] [Music] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] It beep.