No, different problem. At Corpus Christi for flight training the year before, I ran a 4 minute, 25 second mile in combat boots, 2nd fastest in the midshipman company. I just can’t kneel unless it’s on a really thick gel pad. And before Corpus Christi, I survived amphibious training at Little Creek, VA by scooting under the barbed wire on…
No, different problem. At Corpus Christi for flight training the year before, I ran a 4 minute, 25 second mile in combat boots, 2nd fastest in the midshipman company. I just can’t kneel unless it’s on a really thick gel pad. And before Corpus Christi, I survived amphibious training at Little Creek, VA by scooting under the barbed wire on the obstacle course w/o touching down on my knees. We also did three-mile runs in combat boots, and all I needed was salt tablets, provided by the Marine Colonel in charge.
The doctors at Quantico said that going through the training would cripple me, but I didn’t agree, citing my experience at Little Creek (not that my opinion counted). I was sent home at the end of the week. Then my heart murmur was evaluated at St. Albans Naval Hospital by the Chief of Cardiology to be the result of a very athletic life (football, ice hockey, lacrosse, & track), and enlarged ventricles moving more blood than the valves could handle, not valve damage. Still, the Navy didn’t want me back in the program as a Naval officer because of the remote possibility I’d have to be medically discharged. The Draft Board was suffering from the delusion that there were different physical standards for the Army and Navy; they were wrong, as the Surgeon General eventually told them.
I still feel guilty, not because I didn’t serve, but because I’m sure there were many draftees in worse physical condition than I who got shipped out to Vietnam because they didn’t have my resources: money for orthopedic exams and books on the Draft Laws. The clownish attorney who was supposed to advise draftees around Columbia, including a good portion of Harlem, knew nothing; I was advising him.
No, different problem. At Corpus Christi for flight training the year before, I ran a 4 minute, 25 second mile in combat boots, 2nd fastest in the midshipman company. I just can’t kneel unless it’s on a really thick gel pad. And before Corpus Christi, I survived amphibious training at Little Creek, VA by scooting under the barbed wire on the obstacle course w/o touching down on my knees. We also did three-mile runs in combat boots, and all I needed was salt tablets, provided by the Marine Colonel in charge.
The doctors at Quantico said that going through the training would cripple me, but I didn’t agree, citing my experience at Little Creek (not that my opinion counted). I was sent home at the end of the week. Then my heart murmur was evaluated at St. Albans Naval Hospital by the Chief of Cardiology to be the result of a very athletic life (football, ice hockey, lacrosse, & track), and enlarged ventricles moving more blood than the valves could handle, not valve damage. Still, the Navy didn’t want me back in the program as a Naval officer because of the remote possibility I’d have to be medically discharged. The Draft Board was suffering from the delusion that there were different physical standards for the Army and Navy; they were wrong, as the Surgeon General eventually told them.
I still feel guilty, not because I didn’t serve, but because I’m sure there were many draftees in worse physical condition than I who got shipped out to Vietnam because they didn’t have my resources: money for orthopedic exams and books on the Draft Laws. The clownish attorney who was supposed to advise draftees around Columbia, including a good portion of Harlem, knew nothing; I was advising him.