What Things Did You Learn About Yourself That Were Unexpected or Surprising During Your Military Service? Login & Share to Win!

So many things but perhaps the one that has lasted longest is working at as a team to achieve exceptional outcomes.

Following Infantry OCS I had leadership ability that was of use in Nam.

I learned a lot of little things, but the biggest was that I could not always take no for an answer. If I was given a problem but no support, the job was taken care of anyway. Even if I had to go around a supply Sargent to get the parts. He was furious to have 1400 line items to process after I repaired everything at an AFRTS TV station that Depot hadn't visited in years.
The funny thing was, I built a TV tuner to repair a piece of test equipment to replace one that could not be purchased. Rather than being satisfied that it was working again, I was threatened with a Court Martial for 'Destruction of Government Property'. I had saved an otherwise irreparable piece of equipment that would have cost $600 to $800 to replace, at no expense to the Army.
I learned to politely but firmly deal with incompetent 'leaders'. They may have outranked me, but they didn't have my MOS, or my skills so I refused to let them interfere with my duty.
I was E3, and at an Air Traffic Control Tower to swap out their video monitors for PM. A new lieutenant that had graduated only a few minutes earlier ordered me to drop a large monitor to salute him. He slammed the tower's door shut and blocked my way. I yelled at him to open the damned door and step aside, and that I wasn't going to destroy a $300+ piece of equipment just to give him his first salute from an enlisted.
I was so loud that the Colonel who had conduced his graduation ceremony came running. He yelled, "At Ease! What the hell is going on?" "Sir! This moron ordered me to destroy this monitor, just to give him his first salute. I only have nine minutes left to get this upstairs, or make a phone call to shut down the flight school and have him sent to Ft Leavenworth. Sir!" He turned to the Lieutenant, "Open that damn door and apologize to this man! If I ever find out that you try this again, I will make you swallow those butterbars without the backers." Then he turned to me, "Have a good day , soldier!" "Yes sir! Thank you, Sir" At that moment I learned that I would not be pushed around by self important people when I had a mission critical job to do. Get it done, and deal with it later. I learned to be confident and to deal with idiots.
I apologize if there are any typos. I am waiting for cataract surgery.

I CAN have confidence & accomplishment!

In spite of a previously poor academic career, I learned I could excel in the classroom at Hospital Corps School. At Field Medical Service School, Camp Pendleton, tough Marines taught me I could be strong enough to proudly serve in the FMF. And, in that service I learned I could use those skills taught me to keep Marines and sailors alive. All this prepared me well for my following civilian life. And I am grateful, most grateful for it all.

I learned that I don't panic in an emergency I just get really calm and logical instead. So I never worry about panicking in a new situation even when my husband got his hand caught in a running lawn mower I kept it together, wrapped his mangled hand in clean towels put the kids in their car seats and calmly drove to the base hospital at Travis AFB. The nurses thought I must be in shock and checked me over but I was fine.my husband not so much it took 18 hours of micro surgery,six weeks in the Oakland hospital, and 12 months of therapy before he could work again.

I learned I am Rh negative (O Negative, to be exact, the universal donor). Shocked the hell out of my O positive mother (nothing nefarious, it's just a recessive gene).

What I learned about myself is that I am not a quitter, I am determined, I am a fighter and I can do all things I truly put my mind to do. I also learned that loving on your family is so very important; after being away all that time.

I learned that I really did like Kids, And not all of them are the same.
Most kids that I dealt with in Afghanistan showed me that most kids in Afghanistan showed me the one's that I dealt with where vary great full of the attention we gave them. I know that some of them just tried to play us for anything they could get. Seeing how they lived and how they where treated changed I thought of them. And just how lucky most of us have it here.

Some of the skills I found that I learned that transferred into civilian life was being able to multi task and meet or beat deadlines. I also learned I had a talent for writing.

Many different things…but two off the top of my head would be I am a stress eater and I’m much more apt to speak my mind then before. I can also function longer with little to know sleep!

The absolutely weirdest thing I learned about me, was that I could jump over the rail in the rear of a deuce & half, at seventy MPH, going around a sharp high-speed turn, sucking Tylenol 3, and wearing a back brace, AND NOT GET A SCRATCH!
At least, that was the version that had spread all over Ft. Sill from 2 AM to 6 Am formation!
The truth was not as dramatic. The truck was only going about 25. Everything else? yeah.
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2e3trg
This was strictly for entertainment purposes. This is not me. I am not Russian!
T

The real Army is totally differant from the "Movie Army". They just don't act the same and surly aren't like Bettle Bailey and Sarge Some thimgs will be an eye opener on your first couple of weeks in BCT!

I learned a lot about what I was capable of. The most important thing that you can learn in the military is if you are capable of taking a life. I found that if it is the right thing to do, I could do it. I was sent to a psychiatric evaluation after the incident. The most important question I was asked was: Did it disturb you to kill someone? My answer was: It was the right thing to do. Off the coast of Vietnam I was asked by an Admiral to deliver a Top Secret folder to someone in Vietnam. I had a Civilian Secret Clearance that included a background investigation by the FBI. The Admiral felt that it was worth Top Secret. I asked how I would get there. He said by Helicopter since we were on an Aircraft Carrier. I agreed. After exiting the Helo I was given a .45 Automatic pistol, the keys to a jeep and a short map to a coffee shop where the person I was to meet was eating lunch. When I got to the coffee shop I decided to wait for him to come out and not disturb his meal. While I was waiting, I saw a woman with a very young boy approaching the coffee shop about 60 yards away. She kept pushing him. When they were closer I saw that the boy was wearing sticks of dynamite and she was holding a detonator. I yelled at her to stop. She laughed and kept pushing the boy towards the coffee shop. I drew my weapon and told her to stop or I would shoot her. She responded by pushing the boy harder. I told her one more step and I shoot. She took two steps and I shot her. As she was falling she pushed the detonator and blew them both to kingdom come. Everyone in the coffee shop came out to find out what happened. I told them. The man I was to meet was in the group and I handed him the folder from the Admiral. He wanted a more complete explanation. When I finished he said he was going to petition to get me the Medal of Honor for saving the lives of more than 50 military personnel who were eating inside. I told him NO, I did not join the Navy to win or earn medals. I joined to pay my country back for all the freedoms and benefits that I had simply because I was born in the United States. I asked him not to tell the Admiral what happened. I drove back to the Helicopter, turned in the .45 and said that 1 shot had been fired and why and then flew back to the ship. When I went to the Admirals Quarters to let him know the delivery was made he wanted the details of what I had done. He also wanted to get me the Medal of Honor and I told him the same thing I had told his friend. That was in 1964. When I was being released from Active Duty, before I could leave the ship, the Admiral asked me to sign a 50-year Non-Disclosure Agreement. I asked him why. He said it was to protect his family from knowing what he and I had done. I signed it not knowing that I would never be able to claim "Boots on the ground."

I learned how adaptable I could be, and in doing so, I could bend but not break. I learned that I could trust my fellow soldiers and family support network and that they indeed had my back.

I never realized that I would be able to give up control quite as easily as I was able to. I immediately understood the reasons for following orders, and being 25 years old in Basic Training as opposed to 18 years old, I thought it might be tough. But it really wasn't.

I was also able to do things physically a lot easier than I had feared. Running, pushups, situps, etc.

It was a revelation that spending time with people who were better at something than I was would actually be enjoyable. It gave me things to strive for.

Being drunk and fighting can cause unexpected injuries

That I can do things I didn’t even know existed!

STOPPING RACIAL ATTACKS
In 1951 after completing basic training and military police training, the Air Force, shipped me off to Clark Air Force Base in The Philippines. My duty assignments as a corporal military policeman included various guard, patrol and gate duties. When on "gate" duty we searched all bags for illegal items. The most profitable item for black marketers' to purchase on base and sell off base was cigarettes. A carton of cigarettes purchased in the Post Exchange for $1.00 brought $10.00 on the black market. That was easy money until we caught you; then you could spend five years in a federal penitentiary act was a felony.
One evening while working at the main gate trying to prevent Philippine workers and military personnel from taking items off base to sell on the black market, we arrested a young African American airman with ten cartons of cigarettes in a duffle bag as he tried to leave the base.
The military police at the gate arrested him, called for a patrol to come pick him up and take him to headquarters. The patrol arrived in their jeep just as my duty time at the gate expired so I asked the patrol sergeant if I could ride back to the military police office with them. He said, “Sure” so I hopped in the back of the jeep with the handcuffed young black man. We started off with the senior sergeant driving, his partner, another sergeant, in the front passenger seat and I was in back with the prisoner.
About two miles down the road, the sergeant surprised me by pulled off the road into a picnic area set among a grove of trees. The dirt road curved behind some bushes, which sheltered the position from the view of vehicles passing on the main road. The sergeant driver stopped the jeep, both sergeants jumped out and brandished their nightsticks. The senior sergeant said, “Come on nigger, get your ass out here. You are going to fall down some stairs and raise some bumps on your head.”
Although I was only a corporal, I put my hand on the kid’s leg and said, “You sit still.” Then I said to the sergeants, “If we go back to the office now, I will forget this happened.” Both of the sergeants were silent for about thirty seconds then they started yelling at me, calling me a “nigger lover” and other racist names. As they became more abusive and approached the vehicle, I pulled my pistol out of the holster and l held it on my knee. This was a questionable move as both of them were armed and I had not yet loaded a bullet into the chamber of my pistol and the 'safety' was still on!
Fortunately, the appearance of my weapon settled them down a bit. They had not planned to have to murder a witness. Eventually they got back in the jeep and drove us to headquarters. Cussing at both of us all the way. When we arrived at the headquarters, the sergeants dismounted from the jeep and called the airman to go with them. I watched the three of them enter the jail. Then I crawled out of the jeep, my knees were shaking. I never heard anything more about the incident and I never saw those sergeants again.
African Americans were not known to me as I had never encountered them in my small, all white town in up-state New York. In the Air Force I had not interacted with them as whites and blacks did not mix socially. This incident opened my eyes and I have fought racial injustice sense then.


Paul Valentine, Capt. USAF (RET)
3102 78th Ave E
Sarasota, Florida 34243
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I learned that I needed to push myself to be the best I could ever be and try to set a good example for others.