Has anyone ever been in a screaming match or any altercation with their superiors?

Never with seniors, never with subordinates. When I was a 1stLt Company XO there was a 1stLt rifle platoon leader who regularly, (almost weekly) went "over the hill" with me to settle a difference of opinion with fisticuffs. There was no doubt the Company CO and Battalion CO and XO knew what was going on. I doubt if there was ever an entire two week period where one or both of us didn't have a black eye, fat lip, or stitches. I'm sure the entire company knew what was going on but there was no doubt that we presented a united front in front of the Marines.

Sure. Me E5, him O1. Outside the wire in Somalia (93), during a somewhat tense moment. He was wrong and I let him know it. We both cooled down. I kept my rank, because he didn't realize that he should have took it. Lucky day in the life. Made me more forgiving, made him think before issuing lawful orders that come with real consequences.

When not behind closed doors? No never. I got into some strongly worded disagreements but never a screaming match. Just like in marriage, nothing is resolved if it gets to that stage; add on "military bearing" and having things reach that stage means you will not get a good solution.

I was on med hold at ft dix after returning from iraq and i was the staff duty nco for ft dix, when they were clearing some areas with bulldozers in the training area and one of the dozers pushed up a buried 500lb bomb from WWII, well we had to evacate the training area and the training fob which shutdown all predeployment training for units going to iraq and Afghanistan. I called ,I believe it was fort Monmouth for eod support and talked to a major who if I remember correctly was SDO and notified him of situaton and requested eod .about 6 hours after hearing nothing I called back and was told it's late and he would notify eod on Monday as everyone was gone and this was Friday night so my bases training was completely shut down to which he said that's unfortunate but he's not calling in eod and other assets on a weekend, to which I laid into him hard and told him what I really thought of his chickenshit ass and he threatened to have me court-martialed and hung up on me. I called our base commander and he went off and he took care of it. I never heard anything else about it and nevery received any punishment and base CSM said I did good so all well that ends well.

I've had seniors scream at me, but I never raised my voice back. The louder they got, the more determined I was to not give in. They would get way more angry lol

Even as a private I practiced the principle of courtesy and respect. I have always been of the mind that, when the shouting starts, the one that refrains from yelling is the victor.

Verbal conflicts are rarely solved at the point of origin, especially when there is yelling.

My drill sergeant was quiet; spooky quiet. On the first day, with all other drill sergeants roaming around chewing trainees out, he would walk up to each of us, put his nose almost to ours, and I honestly felt he was staring into my soul. He would stare for what seemed like forever, and other drill sergeants would get in our ears and yell at us, "are you eyeballing him!" When we would look away, our drill sergeant would whisper to us "eyes front soldier", and when eyes were front, the beatings began.

Of course, we were scared of them all, but with a drill sergeant who was a Vietnam vet with a CIB and a 101st combat patch, who rarely spoke: we were terrified.

This meant that, if he started yelling, hell had froze over, and he was looking to get rid of the ice right quick and in a hurry.

The one who walks around blowing his horn and yelling AFTER basic training, is normally the one with little respect and is not taken serious, or becomes "that guy."

Yelling is counterproductive, but a yelling match is total loss of self control and discipline, and in my opinion, does nothing but ruin both parties reputation.

Bruce Lee had a famous quote that I believe should be part of a warriors life:

"You must be shapeless, formless, like water. When you pour water in a cup, it becomes the cup. When you pour water in a bottle, it becomes the bottle. When you pour water in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Water can drip and it can crash. Become like water my friend."

That's all I got to say about that.

SPC (Join to see), choose the direction you want your military career to go, but always keep improving yourself. Don't let promotions drive your desire for military education, truly have a desire to learn, and never take shortcuts, we have too many soldiers doing that already, so go against the crowd, and don't take cheat sheets and shortcuts.

Be the leader you want to be in charge of you!

COL Mikel J. Burroughs SPC Douglas Bolton SP5 Christine Conley SSG Chris Erickson SPC Christopher Green 1SG (Join to see) Cpl Gabriel F. SFC Shirley Whitfield SMSgt Minister Gerald A. "Doc" Thomas Cynthia Croft SSgt Robert Marx

Section Sergeant (E6) and I (young E5) almost came to blows twice. We were in Kuwait. Disagreements that I escalated line an immature ass. We ended up both being right. Say down later and worked it out after things came to a head. He was the bigger man and saw that I was being an immature hot-head. Learned a lot from those incidents.

Back when I was a SSgt I had one MSgt that was well overstepping His bounds. Myself and My Men had complied with things He told us to do but It wasn't good enough for His unreasonable approach. He continued yelling and I walked away from Him. I wasn't going to get in a verbal yelling match with Him and felt He was out of control. I figured that was better than punching Him in the mouth which was what i wanted to do but knew that was not the proper approach. I went straight to His boss a SMsgt and His boss a Captain removed Him from His position and assigned Him a job where He supervised no one Inside of 3 days that was done with full approval and the blessing of the unit Commander. We weren't the first ones to have a problem with Him. His replacement another MSgt who had recently arrived PCS turned out to be a great man to work for and the problem was solved.

Only time I lost it was with a supply E-6 that since he was in charge of inspections for his section took it upon himself to remove all the serviceable tags on all the aircraft parts that were signed verifying that the parts were operational and replaced them with his tags that he signed saying inspection good. Not sure why he personally delivered them but I flipped out and started screaming at him and my E-7 had to pull me out of the room, told me to sit down, and then proceeded to scream at him, himself and have him send $12m in parts back to the shops to re-certify they were good. Looking back at it I was lucky not to get written up for the incident since I was an E-5 at the time. Not sure what happened to the E-6 from supply though since I never saw him again. But I'm we had to cancel three missions because there were no serviceable parts for the helicopters.

I once almost decked my division officer. He ordered me to a one on one meeting over some dumb stuff that could have been easier resolved using the proper chain of command. Some elevated voice discussion ensued and I almost lost it. Thankfully, I had a clear enough head to walk away and find my chief. Chief fixed everything.