Talk:United States Army Basic Training

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To-do list for United States Army Basic Training: edit · history · watch · refresh

Here are some tasks you can do:
  • Expand:
    • Overview
    • Classroom training
    • Sick call
    • Phone calls
    • Basic Combat Training
    • Phase II
    • Week 4
    • Week 5
    • Week 6
    • Phase III
    • Week 7
    • Week 8
    • Week 9
    • History section
    • Criticism/Recent changes

Contents

[edit] Weeks

If you'd like to help create the remaining sections for individual weeks of BCT, information can be found at this URL:

Equazcion (Talk | Contribs)

07:39, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] AIT List Deletion/Overhaul

U.S. Army AIT is for enlisted personnel, so Engineer School should not link to the Engineer Officer's Course. Also, Air Assault school is not a part of IET. The list of AIT's should lead to the correct articles that exist, or be deleted. Dirteater13 17:28, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

You should make the pertinent edits if you see something wrong. As for the red links though, I was hoping to encourage people to start articles for the missing schools. I just finished a massive cleanup of the TRADOC template in which I removed all red links, so that all the training articles wouldn't have them. But if a few individual articles have them, maybe thats not such a bad thing? I don't know... 17:36, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Merge Advanced Individual Training into this article

The Advanced Individual Training article describes a part of US Army Basic Training, and is a stub. I feel it would better serve as a section of this article.

Equazcion (Talk | Contribs)

01:46, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Merge completed. Also merged OSUT stub article. Advanced Individual Training and OSUT now redirect here. 06:14, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Criticism/Recent changes

How about how it's getting softer? Like how recruits can have cell phones and cd players now? Perhaps under a "Recent changes" section? Just a thought. Parsecboy 12:13, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely, maybe under a "Criticism" section. Although we would need good sources for info like that. I went through basic training just a couple years ago and if they found a cell phone or CD player on you, G-d help you. If that's changed then it must a very recent change, like in the past 3 or 4 years.
Edit: I just took a short look look around and did find some stories about cell phones. From what I found they give them back for AIT, which makes some sense since AIT is more of an education period, and less of a mental breaking-down than BCT. Not to mention it can last a long time depending on the MOS. I only found forum threads so far though. 15:44, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, it was the same for me in early 2004, I think it's a pretty recent change. Here is where I heard about it. It's a Youtube of a Fox News segment about it. I'm sure there are suitable text sources, we'll just have to track one of them down. Parsecboy 15:59, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
I just watched it. That's pretty crazy. They tuned down the yelling to only when necessary? Jesus... I'd bet that's to get more people to join, so basic sounds less scary than it used to. I think a Fox news video is fine for a source, regardless of the clip being on youtube. 16:07, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, it's probably to get more people to join, and less to quit once they get there. You're probably right about the clip being a reliable source. If at somepoint someone objects to it, it probably shouldn't be too hard to find something else. On a side note, I've heard some rumint that you don't even have to pass the PT test to graduate anymore, and that you can finish your push-ups on your knees. Who knows how much of that is exageration, though. Parsecboy 16:13, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
I've heard that too. If you have a source for it feel free to put it into the article. For now I'm concentrating on the Overview and Phases sections. 05:22, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Victory Tower/Teamwork Development Course

The Victory Tower we used at Relaxin' Jackson did include rope ladders and rope bridges, as well as the single rope you had to lie down on and slide on. Can't remember what that's called, I'm on 24 hour staff duty at the moment, and am a bit tired :) Thanks for fixing those misspellings. I blame it on being tired too ;). Parsecboy 09:42, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

I remember that rope thingy, and the other stuff. Is that all called Victory Tower? I don't remember exactly. I thought the 50-foot rappelling wall was Victory Tower, and was separate from all the rest of that stuff. I could be wrong. Actually now that I think about it, Victory Tower is that tower with 3 levels, where you have to climb/pull each other up to get to the top. Seems like that would be partof the teamwork course. The rappelling wall might be separate. I really can't remember. Feel free to change it to whatever you think it is. No problem on the spelling. I've been up for a while myself. 09:56, 21 July 2007 (UTC)
At least the one we did it was all one big tower, and it was all the same day. The teamwork course was separate, and had obstacles like an approx 8' wall, with a couple of small wooden platforms (a few inches by few inches), and another wall past that. we had a couple wooden planks and maybe a length of rope to get everyone on the wall and then accross the platforms and over the 2nd wall. I've noticed you've been up a while. Where are you stationed? I'm at Fort Bragg. Parsecboy 10:08, 21 July 2007 (UTC)
We did a bunch of separate things (clearer now that I've slept). Victory Tower was the 3-level thing, but I think Victory Tower referred to everything that resided in that facility, which included the rope that you hang from and climb down, the log you run and roll over, etc. Then, as you said, the teamwork development course was something completely different, done on a different day. The rappelling wall was, for me, just a wooden wall with a ladder going up the side, and that may have been in the same facility as Victory Tower but I don't quite remember. I'll work on the wording in the article so that it can apply to either of our situations.
I'm actually not in the Army — I got out during Basic on a medical discharge, for pain associated with flat feet. Or at least that's what it says on my discharge papers. 16:47, 21 July 2007 (UTC)
For us, the rappelling wall was the "main event" of the Victory Tower. It was part of the whole tower structure. Your idea to reword it to be a bit more ambiguous sounds good to me. I'm sure plenty of people have had different experiences than both of us, too.
Oh, ok. I'm getting med boarded myself. I broke my back a little over a year ago, and they've decided that since I can't deploy, I don't really need to stay in. Parsecboy 17:32, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] its identical????

to say that jackson and benning are identical is just false. benning is much harder than jackson. no doubt. i went to jackson and the guys who went to benning told me of things that we never, unfortunately, endured at jackson. benning is harder no doubt, but the army as a whole is easier than it used to be because the recruit you get isnt as hard as he/she once was. i will say this thought, and that is that dicipline and being a good soldier is a choice. no drill sgt is going to make you a good soldier. you make that choice and i know this because although fort benning is harder, the biggest shi*bags came out of benning. they all claimed to be "real" soldiers, but they had no dicipline whatsoever and didnt live up to the army values for the most part. Ethmegdav (talk) 04:40, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm not really sure which statement you have a problem with. Could you paste a statement from the article that you feel needs to be changed?
Equazcion • argue/improves • 16:23, 12/15/2007

[edit] wake up

daily, especially in the beginning, wake up is anwhere from 3 am to 4 am because tow the line is around 4am or 5 am.Ethmegdav (talk) 01:05, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Schedule and other aspects of the experience depend largely on where you train and who's training you. I therefore chose to just post the official schedule, which in my experience was generally followed with a few exceptions (and I was at Benning). If you want to add a small disclaimer that the schedule is not steadfast and can change depending on the whims of those in charge, you are welcome to, but I wouldn't go changing the schedule based on your personal experience.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 16:22, 12/15/2007