I´ve been to the army and went through some abuse myself but never continued the tradition myself. I hope this is not as bad as it sounds or looks like... Ritual Bullying Of British Marines Exposed http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/november2005/271105ritualbullying.htm http://www.guardian.co.uk/military/story/0,11816,1652362,00.html
Prior Air Force here and have not seen anything this bad. Cannot see how this can be defined as "character building". Glad this got out.
How sick can this get? http://news.findlaw.com/ap/i/629/01-26-2006/350b0032c069fc69.html MOSCOW-Military prosecutors and top officers on Thursday pledged a thorough inquiry into one of the most brutal hazing incidents in the Russian military in years - an 18-year-old soldier whose legs and genitals had to be amputated because of beatings and torture by fellow servicemen. Doctors said Pvt. Andrei Sychev's legs and genitals were amputated after the New Year's Eve incident at the Chelyabinsk Tank Academy, in which older soldiers forced him to spend hours in an unnatural crouched position and brutally beat him. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov promised to punish the culprits. "We won't cover anything ... or anyone up," he said Thursday in televised remarks. According to official statistics, 16 soldiers died of hazing last year, but experts say the actual number of deaths is much higher, with many conscripts driven to suicide by abuse and other bullying deaths passed off as resulting from illnesses. The Defense Ministry said 276 servicemen killed themselves in 2005, but didn't offer any details. (!!!!!!!!!!!)
This stuff happens. No discipline, but not all soldiers are like this. This is a handful out of thousands.
When I did my compulsary army service, it was 1000 killed per year in the Russian army. Many suicides though. This bullying is unknown in Norway, the brutality we experience is from Escape and Survival course. It was compulsary in my time, but now it is reserved for the Jaegers and other specialists. It must be said though that in this course all you have to do is to say you have had enough.
Bullied Russian soldier dies in hospital | Reuters Tatyana Znachkova, chairwoman of campaign group The Soldiers' Mothers' Committee, said Rudakov's death was a small part of a grim picture of poor army discipline. "Nowadays, in peaceful times, between 3,000 and 3,500 Russian soldiers die each year, according to our estimates," she told Reuters. "This includes various accidents and suicides."
I loved the media foam about this 'story' at the time. Anyone who actually knew any Royal Marines saw this as completely normal behaviour for them, barely worthy of comment (go to a party with only a handful present & you'd soon see, naked abseiling with para-cord, and more, being very much par for the course). Then it seems the word filtered through to the press and government and the story completely evaporated. One day a 'major story', the next not a trace or reference to it. Cheers, Adam.
Very true, people seem to have this crazy idea that the marines are 'normal people' and they just aren't!
Here in Portugal an Infantry sharpshooter intructur beated a friend of mine so badly with a cane he missed his formation day cause he was in sick bay. It's the army. It's never normal. They seem to think that this toughens them up. It makes them able to take a beating but I don't know how that helps their training (they are quite good tough I must say!)... Cheers...
I recently saw some video of some Russian patrooper trainees being hazed and abused. Drop kicks to the chest and other things just as harsh. IIRC this has been part of the Russian and Soviet military for many many decades.
I remember 5 or 6 years ago there was a video that got out to the news of the "graduation ceremony" for the US Marines silent drill team. They took boot edge dressing and injected it up their rear ends. It must hurt because they screamed alot. Marines and Seals are indeed a strange group !
My mistake, it was alot more than 5 or 6 years ago. Here is what I found on the internet. Yes, there are rules against a lot of this stuff. For example, the "Hell Night" initiation of American Marine Corps' elite "Silent Drill Team" in Yuma, Ariz., came to the public's attention in 1993 when ABC's "Prime Time" broadcast a video showing the new members of the drill team, naked, having their genitals covered with "edge dressing," the highly caustic polish used to provide a polished edge to the soldier's black dress shoes. They were also sprayed with urine. That certainly was never officially condoned. But it went on until a tape of this reached the public. On lower levels there are officers who look the other way. Of course, there are lots of commands in which this never happens.
I went through a Shellback ceremony (actually three altogether once as a pollywog twice as a Shellback) and through the Chief's initiation both long ago enough they were not watered down into their current status of a joke. Neither was fun and both were grueling experiances. But, both also taught me lessons that proved very valuable afterwards. Two in particular were: Trust in your fellow sailors / chiefs and you can put up with alot more than you think you can. I've also come to see in my later years that it is true: Men are made they just don't happen on their own. With females now in large numbers in the US services I see these long standing initations being watered down into nothing or dropped completely. I have come to believe this is because those same women (and their co-conspiritors in the civilian world the manhole) see them as silly and unnecessary. For females they are. For males to become men they are critical. Without them, the military is far weaker for it.
Stupid displays of testosterone. I thought the idea was to kill the enemy's troops, not yours. 3,000 Russian recruits die of army hazing every year - Pravda.Ru Are we in the middle ages still? This goes for any army, of course the Russians take this to an art form, but this initiation ritual is pointless and harmful.
WEll, if you consider the Spetznaz are trained to do or die trying literally, that's not too harsh... It kinda reminds me of the Kamikaze Royal Scots of Monty Python du know why... Cheers...
1976 was the last year of an all male school at New Mexico Miltary Institute. It was also year of hazing so extreme that one guy lost his vocal chords (broomstick strike to the throat), one lost his nuts (broomstick again) and another had 18 skull fractures (head repeatedly beaten into a toilet). During that year, I did at least five hundred pushups a day. My chest went from a 32 to a 39. I took countless broom strikes to the back and rear. On the last day of the year I was held by two much larger cadets while others came at me with brooms. I am told that I was even beaten while I was unconcious. My mother had to help me undress that evening. Blood had seeped from my skin, to my clothes, and had become glued to my skin. That kind of hazing has disappeared, but if I was ever a judge and a hazing case came before me, I would sentence the offenders to the absolute maximum extent of the law.
It is always the same and it happens in any army. The sad part is that in regards to investigations for abuse within the Bundeswehr it always turns out that it needs a Company or Bataillon commander to be involved. It is those individual mentally unstable characters that eventually discredit the unit or the entire Army. During my early Bundeswehr time our unit was the most notorious within the Army (highest desertation and suicide rate) and had its headlines in every newspaper/magazines right up to Tv-news. And everybody right down from the Division commander to Mastersergeant knew about it. Luckily due to the commitment of the civil army inspection representatives since 1980, most of these rituals found there endings. Specialized training, survival and combat training within the elite Bundeswehr formations are good and tough enough to build up the so called esprit de corps and character forming. There is no need for these mentally retarded officers who encourage these "Rituals". Regards Kruska
True words from an old sailor.... I've been through this a couple of times or more, first as a young sailor, as an army recruit and then as a miner. I can tell you that living in mine barracks for 15-some-years is no walk on the sunny side of life. Attached is a picture from my military service back in 1972. We had this game "No see, No hear, No speak". We sent the poor fellow out on his own, his hands tied up, blinded, mouth and ears taped. And this was just the funny side of it... I hope nobody recognizes the faces some 36 years later. RAM
