{"id":279,"date":"2003-11-10T08:35:27","date_gmt":"2003-11-10T08:35:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/?p=279"},"modified":"2003-11-10T08:35:27","modified_gmt":"2003-11-10T08:35:27","slug":"riding-with-the-marines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/2003\/11\/riding-with-the-marines\/","title":{"rendered":"Riding with the Marines"},"content":{"rendered":"

John Koopman of the San Francisco Chronicle was embedded with a Marine combat unit in Iraq. The first chapter of his account is posted here<\/a>. He’s the rare newsie with a military background, having done a four-year peacetime hitch in the Marines. A highlight from haircut day: <\/p>\n

It’s June 1976 and I’m sitting at attention in a wooden barracks. This is Parris Island, South Carolina. I’m 17 years old.
\n


\nWe’re waiting to get haircuts. We all have hair down to our shoulders, or longer. And Marine barbers don’t really cut as much as shear.
\n


\nThey’re taking guys four at a time into another room for their three-minute shearings. I’m staring out a screened window at people passing by. Marine wives and friends, laughing and strolling. They’re free. I’m not.
\n


\nI hear a commotion. Some brave young man has approached a drill instructor. The recruit is short and muscular. Handsome, with beautiful, dark curly hair. There’s been a terrible mistake, he says. He’s not supposed to be here.
\n


\nI expect the drill instructor to explode and scream. But he doesn’t. He smiles. He’s going to pick the wings off a fly. What’s the matter, young man, he asks gently.
\n


\nThe boy, emboldened, smiles back. He says he lied on his enlistment papers. He has a bad back, a wrestling injury. His recruiter told him to lie about the injury so he could enlist. But now his back hurts and he realizes it was a mistake. Can he go home?
\n


\nThe DI smiles and calls to another couple of drill instructors. Listen to this sad story. And the boy says again, he has a bad back.
\n


\nOne DI says, I think we should process him right out of here.
\n


\nI agree, says another.
\n


\nBut first, the original DI says, you’re getting a haircut.
\n


\nThe three DIs grab the boy and pull him toward the barber room. He screams. No! It was a mistake! I don’t want my hair cut!
\n


\nHe had gorgeous hair. Then it was gone. His scalp was mottled. When he crawled out of the barber’s room, they took him from the barracks and we never saw him again.
\n


\nWelcome to the Marine Corps. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

John Koopman of the San Francisco Chronicle was embedded with a Marine combat unit in Iraq. The first chapter of his account is posted here. He’s the rare newsie with a military background, having done a four-year peacetime hitch in…<\/p>\n

Read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}