Chelsea Manning during basic training

[Independent voter]

Guy was in basic training with Chelsea Manning. It seems to me she, he back then wasn't a good fit for the military. They were likely desperate for recruits at that time so they didn't kick her out.






Really long article at the link

http://www.f169bbs.com/bbs/news/3873...u-havent-heard

One morning at formation there was an audible rumble on the other side of the PT pad in Manning's direction virtually as the Drill Sergeants were walking up and long after anyone should have even been whispering. What was going on? According to most, the general story went: Manning called out the uniform of the day, waited until her squad was dressed and had moved out to the morning formation, when she then put on the real, correct uniform of the day and ran to catch up. The commotion at the formation was her saying that she heard at the last minute what the real uniform was and it wasn't her fault they were wrong; the rest of the team apparently was having none of it. In the Army, if everyone is wrong together, then they're still right; uniformity is one of the highest virtues in our military. If one person is technically "right" but the rest of the team is uniformly wrong, then the technically "right" person is still wrong; everyone is still punished equally. By week two everybody knew that, lived it and lived with it. Everyone, except Manning.

A typical exercise sequence bear-hugging the Jerry Cans always started slowly, but rapidly escalated:

"Run in place. Now on your face. Now roll on your back. Stand up. Faster." "Move like your hair is on fire, and the only way to put it out is go faster!" "Run in place, on your face, on your back, Faster!" "Runinplace,onyourface,onyourback. Faster!"

I remember Manning during one of these exercises, because she was struggling. We had to hold the Jerry Can over our heads, arms fully extended and locked at the elbows while we did squats, in cadence, counting from 1 to 10. If we made it to ten, the exercise was over. However, if a recruit got out of sequence and stood when s/he should have been squatting, we started over at 1. If a recruit dropped the can, we started over at 1. If we didn't all count together, we started over at 1. Manning couldn't hold the can and do the exercise, but the truth was, nobody could. The purpose never was to really to get to 10. It was to inoculate you to stress and to teach you to never quit, no matter how much it hurt or how hopeless even the simplest group-task had become. When the Drill Sergeants finally reduced the goal to a 5 count, and then 3, and then to a 1-count held for just 10 seconds by everyone in unison, they let us stop. That is, everyone who had tried their hardest. A handful needed additional motivation and had to keep going. The Drill Sergeants, as intense yet consummate professionals, circled around Manning and matter-of-factly laid out the task, "get it over your head now!" It was the rest of the recruits in the group who saw this and told Manning, "C'mon, don't quit. You've got this. C'mon Manning, you can do it." And then, in that most Soldierly of acts, a handful said "Here, we'll do it with you. We'll do it together." Her immediate battle buddies picked up their jugs and stood around her, doing more of the exercise, trying to coordinate with and motivate her. I remember watching with the rest of the group. She never made eye contact with any of them. There was no connection to the people trying to help her. Instead, I saw her face turned scarlet, sweat pouring off her face, grimacing. And through grit teeth, she moaned in agony, "I can't," and she dropped her Jerry Can.

"Two minutes and fifteen seconds remaining," the Drill Sergeants would call out across the building. We swallowed every mouthful with a swig of water so it would go down faster. We knew we'd be near throwing it up in less than 30 minutes, but for that - "one minute and fifteen seconds remaining -" that we still had food, we were happy to eat anything. Our meals were taken at only that Dining Facility, or in the field. Any food taken, consumed, or even found anywhere outside the Dining Facility was considered contraband and would be punished under Article 15 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Chow time was sacred.

At 10 seconds, the Drill Sergeant would start the countdown. God help you if you were still chewing when the count ran out.

"3. 2. 1. You're done. You're done! Spit it out! SPIT IT OUT. YOU ARE DONE WHEN I SAY YOU'RE DONE, DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME." Everyone understood - Drill Sergeants are not to be messed with. Their rules are laws. You do not cross them, you do not question them, you do not deviate in any way from the norms and behaviors they established way back on day one. Everyone knows that.
Except Manning.

After five weeks of this same lock-step script at the Dining Facility, rehearsed the exact same way three times a day, a commotion in the middle of the facility broke everyone away from their food. Manning was standing up, away from her seat, in the middle of an aisle. What the ...

Red in the face, coughing and gasping and holding her throat with one hand, Manning gurgled out, "Drill Sergeant, I'm choking. I'm choking, Drill Sergeant. I can't breathe, I can't - " when she reached out a hand, and physically placed that hand on the Drill Sergeant's forearm.

The earth might as well have split open; a private made physical contact with a Drill Sergeant. Intentionally. In one ferocious movement and a grip of steel, the Drill sergeant threw Manning's hand from off his arm and barked,

"Private get your hand OFF ME or I will RIP your arms out of theirs sockets and I will beat you to DEATH with them. Now SIT DOWN and SHUT UP!"

Manning stopped choking instantly. She put her arms down at her sides, turned away and said, "Drill Sergeant, yes Drill Sergeant, it won't happen again." She sat back down, and finished eating.

- -

The last time I saw Manning in person, it was in the Field during a training exercise. I remember that exercise because nearby there was a hold-over recruit from a previous BCT class who had failed his final Army Physical Fitness Test and was always around. He never quite trained with us, but he always in the field with us wherever we went. He thought he knew the answer to everything, and he thought he was somehow in charge because he had been in the Army nine weeks longer than the rest of us. But what stood out the most about him was that he always had candy. Candy was like food, only worse. It was not allowed to be purchased or kept, consumed - it could not even be mailed in a care package unless there was enough for every member of the platoon to have some (I'll never forget when Private Pletz's mother sent 42 Butterfinger candy bars in the mail just so her son could have one). Still, everyone knew that the holdover somehow had contraband packages of Snickers Bars and M&Ms all the time. During my basic training cycle, he came under investigation for allegedly offering to exchange packages of candy for sexual favors from the female recruits. His days were numbered, and everybody knew to steer clear of him. That is, everyone but ...

At the end of the field exercise, that holdover was walking up to groups of us, offering to sell us candy for $20 a package. We all knew to keep our distance from him - he was untrustworthy, he was in trouble, and he was only going to get you in trouble too if you associated with him. And yet, Chelsea Manning bought a package of M&Ms from him for $20. I remember that scene, because Manning was not quiet about it. She was practically bragging out loud that she had contraband candy. At six weeks into basic training, it just wasn't worth it, and yet that scene has stayed with me all these years, because for Manning, it somehow was worth it. Maybe by then, she thought she had nothing else to lose.

[Independent voter]

So the Military did a shit job at weeding people like them out is all i am gathering from this.

Still not a reason to help the enemy.

[Gamdwelf]

So the military is a shit hole and they treat people like shit and they expect them to be loyal?

[drakensoul]

Some people lack the ability to be authoritatively controlled. I get that the point of the military is to beat you down until you don't have a personality left to fight back with, but obviously some people just lack the ability to get over themselves in that way.

Resilient ego. Quite a few personality types (bordering on disorders) that display it, and ultimately none are probably a good fit for the armed services.

[Coombs]

POAG basic training sounds lovely.

[Mihalik]

Still not a reason to help the enemy.

All you have to do is take a look at that kid and is obvious that someone somewhere failed at flunking out someone clearly not physically fit for service. Which would inherently meant that service had to be a psychological hell.

It's fairly obvious how she ended up with a desk job. But he is most certainly NOT a traitor by any definition. When faced with the degree of systemic moral failure that she was faced with, disclosing it was the only moral choice.

Soldiers are not automatons. They must have a moral compass, "Just following orders, and looking away" doesn't cut it.

[Felya]

You do realize what this is saying about our military? The Manning crap is sensationalism, but the accusation levied towards US military is pretty harsh. This is embarrassing for Manning, but it also questions the quality of every single US military personnel.

[King Shark]

You do realize what this is saying about our military? The Manning crap is sensationalism, but the accusation levied towards US military is pretty harsh. This is embarrassing for Manning, but it also questions the quality of every single US military personnel.

Fortunately, the military can hold up the thousands upon thousands of other exemplary members as a counterpoint to this one bad apple.

[Hiricine]

Related topic---I do not believe people can retcon their gender identity from when they identified as a previous gender. I don't believe they can change their gender identity either in general, but they send men to basic training with other men, therefore article is incorrect in referring to Chelsea as a female during training by any definition.

[Gamdwelf]

Related topic---I do not believe people can retcon their gender identity from when they identified as a previous gender. I don't believe they can change their gender identity either in general, but they send men to basic training with other men, therefore article is incorrect in referring to Chelsea as a female during training by any definition.

She was always a woman

[Deleted]

The fact that he plays a female now already tells you he isnt military material.

But I think youre right. They likely were short on people so they took in everyone.

[Hammerfest]

There are a lot of people who slip through the cracks when it comes to the "weeding out the undesirables" aspect of US boot camps.

Interesting story: When I was in basic training we had a guy who made himself a radio so he could listen to ball games. He managed to obtain through scavenging the materials he needed and made a headphone out of a razorblade and cotton ball. Rumor was he grew the crystal in a toothpaste tube, but that part was sketchy. Anyway, he got kicked out of basic training and therefore the Navy. You might ask yourself, "Why would they get rid of a guy who could make a radio out of practically nothing?" The reason was simple: You're not supposed to have a radio in basic training. It doesn't matter if you smuggled one in or shoplifted one from the NEX or made one out of scavenged crystals, copper wire and cotton balls. It's a test of obedience, not resourcefulness. If he would have waited until after basic training to do this Gilligan's Island shit, he would have been fine.

[Deleted]

She was always a woman

This trope is just annoying, it's more nuanced than that.

[Gamdwelf]

There are a lot of people who slip through the cracks when it comes to the "weeding out the undesirables" aspect of US boot camps.

Interesting story: When I was in basic training we had a guy who made himself a radio so he could listen to ball games. He managed to obtain through scavenging the materials he needed and made a headphone out of a razorblade and cotton ball. Rumor was he grew the crystal in a toothpaste tube, but that part was sketchy. Anyway, he got kicked out of basic training and therefore the Navy. You might ask yourself, "Why would they get rid of a guy who could make a radio out of practically nothing?" The reason was simple: You're not supposed to have a radio in basic training. It doesn't matter if you smuggled one in or shoplifted one from the NEX or made one out of scavenged crystals, copper wire and cotton balls. It's a test of obedience, not resourcefulness. If he would have waited until after basic training to do this Gilligan's Island shit, he would have been fine.

Rules for the sake of rules make the whole world blind.

[Endus]

This seems like a pretty baseless hit-piece, without any corroboration. I'd take it with a pillar of salt.

Particularly with the HUGE doses of completely asinine hoo-rah bullshit, like the ranting about how drill sergeants are some kind of divine nobility or some bullshit. They're just dudes that are particularly good at yelling and keeping their shit together. That's literally all it takes. They're not divine superhumans who bless you with their hatred or some garbage. They yell to stress you out, and that's it. It's a stupid game. It's literally the same thing Gordon Ramsay does on Hell's Kitchen. The moment you REALIZE it's a stupid game is the moment basic training stops seeming impossible, because you realize you're not supposed to actually ACCOMPLISH most of the tasks you get given. Just survive the trying.

And before anyone takes this the wrong way, I'm not saying drill sergeants are idiots or something. Just that they're soldiers like anyone else. They have a particular set of skills that involve looking good in uniform and yelling a lot, and that's all it really takes; the techniques for pushing recruits to the limit can be learned pretty easily. I'm not condemning them as "bad", just taking issue with the hoo-rah nonsense spewed in the article.

[Xar226]

It's fairly obvious how she ended up with a desk job. But he is most certainly NOT a traitor by any definition. When faced with the degree of systemic moral failure that she was faced with, disclosing it was the only moral choice.

First of all, I agree: She is not a traitor. I support some of what she did. I also support what Edward Snowden did. (In fact I support it more because I think he handled the second part of my response better.)

However, that doesn't absolve her of responsibility for everything she did.

That helicopter attack video Manning released? I fully and completely support it. I think that is something the public needed to know, and something that the military was trying its best to cover up. And while, yes, exposing misdeeds of American troops might increase danger to those troops I don't think that is a valid reason for hiding it. This is precisely the kind of thing I support releasing.

But there was more, far more, that she released, and she released it to an organization nobody had heard of at the time, who lacked the infrastructure, funding, or honestly even the interest in properly going through those documents to cull or redact them. Even once they began their dumps their response was basically just "hey media, redact these for us would ya!" Their organization is one who believes in ultra transparency (at least as long as it doesn't involve rape allegations for their founder, I guess). It went far beyond "the public should know how this war is being prosecuted" into vindictiveness. For example, there were thousands of diplomatic cables that had nothing of substance in them other than foreign policy guidance and sometimes a personal opinion of staffers regarding their foreign counterparts or international leaders. Their release served no purpose other than to embarrass the United States. I don't know if that was Manning's goal all along; it certainly was the goal of the organization she gave the documents to. Having done something right in this exchange doesn't excuse the things she did wrong.

Whether or not there was any real harm caused to innocent people as a result of reckless disclosure seems to vary based on which sources of analysis you choose to believe. Suffice it to say that while releasing some of this was the right thing to do, releasing all of it certainly wasn't. Does that make her a traitor? No. But hardly a saint either, and one who gave little thought to what she was doing. I don't think it deserves 35 years, but it does deserve some punishment.

Now, contrast that with Snowden. He, too, was faced with a choice and he, too, was faced with incredible amounts of information that he couldn't possibly sift through on his own. He attempted to go through proper channels and was ignored. There was no recourse or oversight available to the public because they did not know the program even existed. Even once the existence of the program was divulged, most of the court cases about it were instantly dismissed because you can't prove you were the target of a secret program because it's a secret. There really were only two choices: Ignore it or divulge it, and given how grossly unconstitutional I believe it was (and is), I think he made the right decision.

But rather than dump it into the hands of a group nobody had heard of, he gave it to journalists to sift through with explicit instructions to vet the information carefully. He explicitly told them not to dump the data; he wanted stories written about it to provide information and context. His goal was to expose a program that couldn't be brought to light in any other way, to create a public debate, and he succeeded. To the best of my knowledge, there have been no unrelated outcomes from his disclosures. There is no equivalent of embarrassing diplomatic cables, no equivalent of dropping the names of collaborators who may be put in harm's way. Everybody is entitled to an opinion about whether the program does more harm than good, or whether Snowden did the right thing or not. But I think most of us can agree that if the conclusion is that the program should be divulged, he went about it the right way. (I'm not wild that he ran off to Russia but I don't blame him either, particularly after he saw how Manning was treated. And since he destroyed his copy of the documents after giving them to Greenwald, I don't know what he could possibly give them that would matter.)


--

As far as Manning in the military, I really couldn't care less. First of all, it's the Army's problem. They're the ones who set and enforce the standards for what they believe makes a good soldier, and to whatever extent they failed it's on them. Even with Manning being back in the news lately, I don't see how this is supposed to be relevant to me. Just seems to be petty vindictiveness to me from a guy who totes knew it all along but only said anything a decade or two after.

[Independent voter]

The information she release put dozens maybe hundreds of people in prison some who are no doubt being tortured as I write this. Sure she apologized for that but how do you apologize for torture rape and the death of all those families and friends? You apologize for forgetting to pick someone up at that bus stop, not for getting them tortured.

[Hammerfest]

Rules for the sake of rules make the whole world blind.

Sure, but that wasn't the case in the story I described. The rule was there for a specific purpose.

[Machismo]

There's guys like this in every platoon in boot camp. It's not uncommon to see people who never properly adjust to the change, and their brain goes into a panic mode. It's similar to the flight-or-fight response, but basically involves the brain shutting down, and people are barely able to cope and function. I've known plenty of guys like that, and most of them still became Marines. We had a guy in my boot camp platoon who stopped going to the bathroom, and actually managed to piss in the middle of the squad bay. We had other guys who simply quit, and would stand nearly catatonic for hours on end.

I think Manning could have easily been one of those people, it would explain a lot. However, the author does not get into what usually happens to guys like that. Contrary to what he was saying, they are actually bullied... a lot. This is especially true in boot camp, where emotions are high when everyone is being punished for the actions of one person. It gets worse when they are out of training, and there's less oversight. I have no doubt that Manning was bullied his entire career, and he just lost the ability to properly reason.

Of course, none of that justifies his actions, but it does explain how we got to this point in time. Personally, I'm fine with the commutation of his sentence, as his actions were not meant to harm people. He did release information that showed our government was lying to us, and tried to cover things up. I don't consider Manning to be a hero, but he is certainly not the Devil.

[Gamdwelf]

The information she release put dozens maybe hundreds of people in prison some who are no doubt being tortured as I write this. Sure she apologized for that but how do you apologize for torture rape and the death of all those families and friends? You apologize for forgetting to pick someone up at that bus stop, not for getting them tortured.

Their choice to join.