Going Commando

by Mark Time

  Invariably, I would end up stuffing half my rations back into my large pack, leaving even less room for the next lot. Often, we ate our rations cold to save time. In the summer this wasn’t a problem, but as training progressed through the colder months, hot food would become an emotional, as well as physical, spur.

  Of course, after the speed eating and drinking that left indigestion burbling away within our sweaty bodies, every culinary accessory had to be spotlessly clean. If even a grain of salt was noted on the KFS fork on field inspection, then food poisoning would be a welcome alternative to the punishment we’d receive. If the merest speck of black should be found on a mess tin, pain followed. Unfortunately, whether by accident or perverse design, hexamine blocks leave a sticky black residue on the base of a mess tin slightly harder to remove than caramelised soot mixed with woodchip wallpaper. It wasn’t too bad if you got to it while still damp, but if you let it dry it was like removing week-old Weetabix from a bowl.

  Despite all of this, eating rations and assembling a bivvy was quite exhilarating for me. I thought myself a tad nearer to being a commando as I’d used my webbing as a pillow and, although non-tactical, spent most of the night with one eye open, waiting to batter to death any approaching enemy with my new weapon: a mini-baton made from the packet of Arabic Rolos.

  Other than the four-mile run back to camp wearing new boots that started to slice up my feet from the ninth pace, Exercise First Step was the easiest thing I’d yet done, mainly due to Hopkins. But for him, just being there must have been extremely difficult.

  Back at CTC I did a lot more physical exercise: more walking in circles in various well-pressed, if ill-fitting, uniforms; saluting; trying to remember my new first name; cleaning everything from the cheese under my foreskin to the soles of my boots to the inside of a toilet. More than once, I reflected that if I failed Royal Marines training I’d be able to start my own cleaning empire and call it something ridiculous like the Gleam Team.

  What I didn’t do much of was sleep. On nights when I did manage to get to bed before 03.00, the DL would invariably come in and wake us with some important task like reciting Royal Marines Victorian Cross winners, or chanting the weight of a 7.62mm self-loading rifle.

  One night, he came in offering a nighttime snack. ‘Anyone like a teacake?’ he said, cheerfully.

  Elliott, keen to redeem himself after the locker incident, bravely accepted his offer. Depending on where you come from in the UK, a teacake is a current bun, a bread roll or a scone-like pastry. I don’t know anywhere other than CTC where a teacake would be a large lump of butter atop a dry teabag. Elliott ate it. It was better than many of the disgusting items that would pass my lips in the years to come.

  Whatever reason we were awoken for, I found the tone of our wake-up calls humorous, never feeling threatened or bullied by the DL’s antics. Looking back, it was to test our resolve as sleep deprivation is the catalyst for many a person to quit in any walk of life. There would be many more sleep-deprived weeks to come.

  We were also deprived of time. Although induction was meant to prepare us for the rigours of training, it was a full-on, twenty-four-hour carousel of running around, cleaning, lectures and physical exertion. We were often late and the DL, after a generous allocation of very slow press-ups, explained we needed to ‘make time’. What a classic!

  General relativity allows for the existence of ‘closed time-like curves’ and, in theory, time travel into the past. The first equations that permitted closed time curves were proposed by Kurt Gödel in 1949 – a solution known as the ‘Gödel metric’. We had to solve the elusive ‘nod metric’ that would have allowed a Royal Marines recruit to deal with the seemingly insoluble issues posed by these curvatures in space-time. Unfortunately, I never did solve it and I never knew anyone who did. (I did know a few bootnecks with a GCSE in woodwork, though.) So we joined the most revered physicians in history in being unable to ‘make time’ within a stand easy. Einstein, however, was never thrashed for being adrift.

  I was the only one still awake. Trying as best I could to fold down the ironing board without wrestling it to the ground, I looked at the clock. It was 02.05. It was the earliest I had yet managed to finish. The outer door opened and in strode a corporal with all the purpose of a man carrying a toilet roll to the loo. I stood to attention immediately, holding my ironing board reverently upright.

  ‘Stand by your beds!’ he yelled, switching on the lights in the darkened room. ‘Stand by your beds!’

  I ran to my locker and stood again to attention. It was the first time since starting training that I’d been the first to do anything. I didn’t feel quite so tired now either, as the adrenalin pumped through my veins.

  The rest of the troop, bleary-eyed and half-naked, did their best to stand to attention, some with a morning glory showing within their boxers. The strange corporal walked down the middle of the room with his hands behind his back. He looked a bit like a physics teacher, only more menacing and without elbow patches. He regarded an indeterminate point somewhere in the far distance.

  ‘I have been hearing things about you lot,’ he said. His tone suggested otherwise. ‘And it has not impressed me.

  I was right about some things.

  ‘It seems you have difficulty grasping the concept of getting ready on time. You lot think you can turn up when you want and not give a fuck. Well, let me tell you fellas, I give a fuck. In the Falklands, we lost men ’cos people like you were adrift.’

  I didn’t really know where he was going with this. I did suspect that, whatever the outcome, it wouldn’t be what I wanted at this unearthly hour.

  ‘Five minutes, outside Portsmouth Company HQ building in gash PT rig. Go.’

  He walked out of the induction block, leaving a bevy of nods climbing into their lockers to take out their civilian PT kit. I only needed to don my trainers, so ran as fast as my legs would carry me to the meeting place where the corporal stood, hands on hips like a superhero, his body silhouetted against the light behind. He said nothing as we arrived in dribs and drabs, only occasionally looking at his watch. We stood in three ranks, hanging on his every word like dogs awaiting a Barbara Woodhouse command.

  ‘Five minutes, I said,’ he intoned, his voice calm and level. He sounded like he was going to read us a bedtime story. ‘It has taken you six. You lot are taking the piss. When I say “go” you lazy twats will run as fast as you can, up past the guardroom, back down the main drag and meet me by the water tank.’

  Even though we were stood at ease we were as primed as anyone could be at such an unearthly hour, as if the corporal was Ron Pickering at the start of a We Are the Champions race.

  ‘Stand by, go.’

  With only a survival instinct to guide us, we hurtled up towards the guardroom and back down the camp to the bottom field. The individual speed of nods differed and the troop was soon strung out, leaving the slower ones a couple of hundred metres behind the racing snakes. No one even thought of making use of the many short cuts we passed. We daren’t.

  I reached the water tank with my breath rasping. The corporal stood there as before: silently, menacingly, and, as it turned out, impatiently.

  ‘Everyone here?’ Again his voice was cool and quiet. ‘Good. Front support position place.’

  We automatically spread out and adopted the press-up position. We held the position, until our stomachs started to cramp.

  ‘Arms bend.’

  We bent our arms and they remained in place, shaking under tension.

  ‘Six minutes to get ready.’ He walked around slowly. ‘Six long minutes.’

  The gurgling of those struggling to hold the press-up position punctured the cool night air.

  ‘Why it took so long I don’t know. Arms stretch.’

  We straightened our arms, relieving the tension in our triceps and shoulders only for the pain to transfer to our stomachs and groin. His silence was deafening.

  ‘Even after that warning, it seems only a few
of you put the effort in to get here in good time. It has taken you lot another four-and-a-half minutes to get here. Not good enough, men. Arms bend.’

  His soothing tones didn’t make the deathly slow press-ups any easier.

  ‘It shows me some of you are loafing…’

  One nod’s body weight collapsed, as he could hold the position no longer.

  The corporal didn’t shout, just made a quiet threat that reminded me of an evil Bond villain. ‘Get your chest off the fucking ground.’

  He carried on after the rude interruption.

  ‘…Yes, loafing. And you’re not even out of induction yet. Stretch.’

  The gasps of relief rolled around the prostrate group as we locked our arms straight again.

  ‘You have wasted ten-and-a-half minutes of my life, so I am wasting ten-and-a-half minutes of yours. Arms bend.’

  The agonised groans told me many were struggling to hold the position. I was one of them. Twisting the arms against the body relieved the shoulders, only to isolate the triceps, a different yet equally substantial pain that made the teeth grit rather than the face gurn. When held in this position for such a long time it becomes rather undignified. Dribbling is the norm, snot bubbles burst from the nose as breathing becomes difficult and eyes are squeezed so tightly that stars appear (with no Mathew Kelly in sight). It was a long ten-and-a-half minutes of agonising press-ups; it was a good job we’d only done about 200 in our earlier PT session.

  ‘Stretch. Right, stand up.’

  We struggled to our feet, the lactic acid burning our quivering arms. I looked around the darkened faces; few seemed particularly overjoyed.

  ‘When I say go, you are to run, jump in the tank and be back here within thirty seconds. Go.’

  It wasn’t too difficult to meet his strict deadline. The silent, shimmering water tank was only ten metres away, and the piercing cold water only encouraged the most fleeting of dunkings. We returned to our press-up area, the sound of dripping clothing drumming the hard-mudded area beneath our feet.

  ‘You lot have not impressed me one bit. I don’t know who I’ve upset, but I am going to be with you for the next twenty-eight weeks. You better start switching on, or I will start switching some of you fuckers off.’

  I hoped that was it. My body was starting to cool and the cold, wet clothing was causing goose bumps to ripple my skin. At least we could go back to the accommodation now.

  ‘Front support position place. Arms bend.’

  I was wrong. Apparently, we had only completed six minutes of press-ups. We carried on again for an extra four-and-a-half minutes, completing two extremely slow and difficult press-ups in our soaking wet clothes.

  The novelty of staying up late was beginning to wear off. We tramped back to the induction block, and the general consensus amongst the drenched group was that this corporal was there just to fuck us about and welcome us as induction recruits. Never mind, induction would finish in a few days and we could maybe get a bit more sleep after this.

  How ridiculously naïve were we?

  * * *

  The two-week induction phase completed, our DL introduced us to the rest of the training team who would now become the most important men in our lives. One of them was the corporal who had beasted us on the bottom field at silly o’clock the week before. He said little and smiled even less, so we named him ‘the Unsmiling Assassin’.

  We were evenly split into sections of ten men, which was easy as only forty of us remained, and were now to be led by a section corporal. Just below God in importance, the section corporal would assess the amount of punishment we would receive, while giving the appropriate amount of instruction to facilitate our progress. Above him was the troop sergeant who, in our case, was an aged alcoholic. Supposedly above them all was the troop officer who, in reality, was just there to do administration and talk posh.

  Luckily, I wasn’t thrown into the Unsmiling Assassin’s section; our section was headed by Corporal Stevens. A good-looking, chisel-jawed Adonis, he wore the ‘King’s Badge’, meaning he had been the best recruit when in training. He was also a sniper. All in all, I was in total awe of him. Here was a man who had been chosen to shape us into future commandos, our mentor, guide and disciplinarian; a man of integrity and honour who would instill these commendable traits through careful guidance, education, and prolonged bouts of intense pain.

  Leaving the induction block as immaculate as we’d found it for the next troop of new joiners, our new accommodation was in one of the ghastly white behemoths that towered over the rest of the camp. The view across the River Exe from my room was worth a million dollars. The estuary flow had receded, leaving a dark-brown mud flat. Adjacent to the train platform, the mud had been temporarily tattooed with footmarks spelling ‘519 Troop’. With a recruit troop every two weeks, it seemed that these guys in week ten had severely fucked up and been offered a mud run in lieu of death by firing squad.

  Although the view was splendid, I never had much time to relax and appreciate it. I was endlessly running from one lecture to another, repeatedly changing uniform like a catwalk model, just without the long legs. It was information overload into a brain buzzing twenty hours a day.

  My mates in the sixth form at school would be getting up at 8am to dress slovenly, in an un-pressed school uniform. I was now up at 05.30 to undertake industrial-standard cleaning, before ramming down my full-fat breakfast ahead of a 07.30 morning accommodation and uniform inspection, or a run, or whatever surprise the training team had up their smartly-rolled sleeves. This ranged from a locker inspection to snap shower inspection – only to find one of the training team having a shower, which would lead to us being punished for not having the showers ready for inspection.

  Making my bed now took longer than the whole of my pre-school routine. In these times of duvets it seems hard to fathom that making a bed could take ten minutes or more, but the carefully-ironed bed sheets and blankets had to be folded down neatly and tightly at the top. On Wednesdays, it all had to be folded at both top and bottom, presumably to show we hadn’t slept in our boots. On other days we would have to make a bed pack, a specially-designed wrapping where sheets, blankets and pillow had to be measured, folded and wrapped inside the cover sheet to look like a giant Mr Kipling cake. This was for no other reason than to ensure we had to strip and remake our beds – and to remind us of Mr Kipling cakes.

  Whichever bed design we had to create, once made it was treated like a house of cards – impossible to go near for fear of wrecking. So immaculate did we make them, all that was missing was a ribbon with a ‘Happy Mother’s Day’ card attached. It was not at all unknown, prior to more formal room inspections, for lads to make their beds to perfection the night before and then sleep on the cold linoleum floor. Six hours of discomfort was far more appealing than another series of punishment exercises for having a slightly creased sheet. It was easy to work out whether the bed was made to an acceptable standard. If it was, it would remain intact. If it was not, it would be thrown around the room, and sometimes out of the window, to the accompaniment of loud expletives, before being trodden on by the corporal’s polished boot – necessitating yet more washing, drying and ironing.

  FIVE

  ‘If there’s one thing this last week has taught me, it’s better to have a gun and not need it than to need a gun and not have it.’

  CLARENCE WORLEY, TRUE ROMANCE

  WHEN EVENTUALLY ISSUED a weapon, I found I wasn’t very good with it. Being a nervous recruit with a vast two weeks of experience, the drills barked by Corporal Stevens, although clear and succinct, just went in one ear and out the other. It didn’t help that most of the guys in my section had been in the cadets, or were mechanics or safebreakers in their previous lives. They all had far more practical ability than me, my childlike dexterity accentuating my slowness.

  Hopkins soon became Corporal Stevens’ favourite. Not only because he allowed the corporal’s sheepdog to shag his leg when ordered to ‘act like a Wr
en’ (a female sailor), but because he was good at everything. While I fumbled nervously with my gas plug, forgot to tap my pouches or panicked over some complex instruction such as ‘load’, Hopkins would understand first time, every time, and then demonstrate his competency with seemingly consummate ease. To boot, his suave looks complemented his friendly persona, making him an all-round ‘double yolker’ of a man. It was sickening really.

  Theoretical instruction was easier to ‘inwardly digest’. I could remember the parts of the weapon perfectly, and so too the contents of the cleaning wallet: combination tool, oil container, wire brush, cleaning brush, cleaning rod, pull through and flannelette. Not everyone was blessed with so retentive a memory. During one such session, Corporal Stevens asked a recruit the contents of the wallet. He held up a cleaning rod. ‘What’s this then, Lofty?’

  ‘Uh, I don’t know, Corporal,’ the recruit replied. You could almost smell the terror.

  Corporal Stevens looked exasperated. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘I’ll give you a clue. It is a cleaning blank.’

  The recruit still looked confused, as Corporal Stevens tried to extract the word ‘rod’ from his sponge-like brain.

  ‘Uh…’ This was going to be a long lesson.

  ‘Okay…’ said Corporal Stevens. ‘Think of the first name of a famous person whose surname is “Stewart”, and then add it to the end of “cleaning”.’

  A forty-watt bulb dimly lit up above the recruit’s head, and a look of excitement crossed his face. ‘I’ve got it, Corporal!’

  ‘Excellent, so what is it? Cleaning…?’

  ‘Jackie!’ said the recruit.

  My own imbecilic struggle with weapons drills meant I got fitter quicker, as my fuck-ups always resulted in a form of physical punishment commonly known as a beasting. Beastings were commonplace during recruit training. Indeed, rumour had it they were part of the syllabus, just never advertised. They were the equivalent of pensioner sex, or stepping in dog shit: you knew it was going to happen at some point, but you felt sick at the thought of it.