What is the best prank you have pulled on a new butter bar?

On our bi-Annual Battalion exercise we had 2nd Louie who was filled with piss n vinegar. A 4 yr ROTCY graduate who knew everything about everything. Demanded salutes inside the building and that we call him by rank and name. Just saying sir or LT was not the respect he deemed appropriate enough. He actually gave SSG extra weekend duty when he told the LT that he reminded him of the Music coordinator in the movie Hood Morning Vietnam. To which LT responded that LT was just a dumb actor n didn’t know s$&t from shinola. And someone sniped him as said “Must be your older brother!” That Sgt drew extra duty as well. Anyway during the 2nd night of exercise the LT had CQ duty. A call came in and stated there was a problem down by the port-a John. He didn’t know what that where or what that was.. Hhhmmm. So all the enlisted made themselves scarce n he had to investigate. BTW our Company n Bn COs were in on our plan. So the LT arrives on station shining a white light in blackout zone. He enters the port-a-john and somehow the door closed shut behind him n got blocked by a large tree branch. He was allowed to remain there the rest of the night, by order of both COs. When he got out later that night he went to his hootch were he found a note “Respect Be gets Respect, It is something earned and freely given to the rank. But man wearing the rank must earned that respect before he can have the loyal respect, support and confidence of his troops. Lesson completed, SIR! Signed your loving Troops n Commanders.” No one got in trouble because it was a sanctioned stunt. But that LT went into the latrine a POS but came out a humbled officer that learned he did know S$;T from Shinola. He became the inquizative LT I’ve ever know. BTW he became done of the finest officers, commander and COL I’ve had the pleasure to know, Serve n respect....

In Vietnam, as I walked by a new butter bar, fresh out of OCS, I just nodded my head and kept on walking. Sure enough he yelled at me. “Sargent don’t you know how to Salute an officer!” I turned and yelled “Holy Shit, get down!” I ran over to him and told him to be quiet. I told him because of snipers, this is a no talking area. He called me on it and we went to the CO’s office, who I gunned for BTW. Anyway after he quit ranting and raving about me, our CO told him he better listen to the NCO’s if he wanted to get home alive. I was busting a gut inside. From then on, whenever we were in that area of base camp, he just nodded and I nodded back.

I had a good prank pulled on me as an ensign. I was standing my first watch on the bridge as Conning Officer when the QMC came over and asked me to go raise the mast. He walked me back behind the bridge and pointed at what looked to be hand crank and said "keep on cranking it until I say it's good." I proceeded to crank the hell out of it, after about 30 seconds when I noticed it wasn't getting any harder or easier to crank, I looked up to see the 21MC (loudspeaker) spinning around freely. I sheepishly walked back in to the laughter of the entire watch team. Good times, still chuckle a bit when I think about it.

When stationed in Berlin in 1976 all of the new guys had all kind of pranks pulled on us. But we had a butter bar who thought he knew everything so we took some C-ration grape jam and put it around his tent. During the night the big wild hogs came around his tent and put him up a tree until next morning and we had to use a gamma goat to get him out of the tree.

Not a prank, just funny. My new 2LT learned somewhere that M-113’s had bilge pumps. While standing beside the track on the drivers hatch side,(bilge pump discharge side) he ask me if the bilge pumps worked. I said yes sir. He said turn them on. I said the pumps were only to be run when the vehicle was swimming. He said, turn them on, that’s and order. I hit the switch and after a second or two of rumbling a gallon of oil, diesel and water hit him right between the eyes. He walked off spitting, sputtering and needing a new set of BDU’s. I had to lay down for a minute. A funny day in Grafenwoehr, and you don't hear that often.

The biggest prank in the Field Artillery was to send a new 2LT to go to Supply and get a box of high angle primers. That said, I agree with most of the other posters who pointed out that hazing a 2LT is a good way for him to lose trust in the very NCOs he should be relying on.

I constantly tell LT's they're rank is upside down its hilarious

No pranks, just let them do what they do and sit back and watch. When they fail (and they will fail), give them good, solid advice to help them get over the hump. When they succeed, give them a thumbs up and a pat on the back, but let them know they ain't all that. In my line of work, there are more mustangs than boot ensigns, so most have been around the block. All of us fail. All of us screw up from time to time. We need to know we have each others' back. When we let someone flounder alone, we all fail. I have been in trouble more than once and had no one behind me. It's not a good feeling being alone. It shakes one's confidence in their shipmates. I got over it, but it would have been easier with someone who had my back. If you mess with a butter bar, make sure he/she knows it's all in fun and you have their back when the shit hits the fan.

When I was Troop XO I asked a newly Commissioned West Point 2LT to go to the Squadron Motor Officer and ask for some spark plugs for an M113A1 ACAV

Not a butterbar but a well-hated Captain, eventually, he got relieved for cause via an IG. About a year before that though, he had taken his Detachment out to the woods for three weeks during which time he removed all of the higher ranking NCOs leaving only his E-5's in control. One night, he had planned for his Sr. NCOs to attack his position but did nothing to group his remaining NCOs together. The Sr NCOs attacked as planned but no one defended and they captured the command. The seniors duck taped both the captain and his exec, stole their pistols, and departed. No one came to rescue them.