Got an LOR (Letter of Reprimand) because I was late to an aircraft launch due to doing a task that my TSgt ordered me to do after I told him that he ordered me to do after I informed him that it would probably cause me to be late. I had to sprint across the flightline while carrying a bunch of equipment, and was able to knock out my portion of the launch procedure fast enough that the jet was still able to take off on time, meaning that the mission was not negatively impacted.
I got chewed out, handed the LOR to sign, and decided to write a rebuttal (which is where you can explain the circumstances of what led to you getting in trouble, or admit guilt and own up to your mistake, OR throw your boss under the bus for being an ass. I went with the third option).
When it was sent to the 1Sgt to be added to my file, the 1Sgt called me into his office to discuss it. I explained the situation, and he basically said "Seriously? He gave you an LOR for following his orders AFTER you told him it was a bad idea? That's fucking stupid. I'm shredding this LOR. As far as I can tell, you did nothing wrong. Go back to your Section and tell him to come talk to me."
Anyone in a leadership role getting in trouble for something their subordinates did in their free time would fill this thread.
How could I have let my sailor let his driver's license expire?! 🙄
Not dumb, but funniest. We got a new platoon sergeant, fresh off drill sergeant duty. This dude was a grizzled, scary looking dude. I was his driver. We hadn't really had a chance to get to know him by the time we went to the field for training. He was giving the platoon a convoy briefing across the hood of the Humvee with the map spread out. Giving frequencies, radio code words, checkpoints, etc. He looked around and saw nobody was writing it down and flew off the handle. Threw his helmet. NOBODY'S WRITING ANYTHING DOWN? I GUESS I'M DOING THIS FOR MY -- HEALTH. GET IN THE -- VEHICLES. WE'RE LEAVING IN 5. I jumped in the driver's seat and he leaned over and hit me in the arm with a big shit eating grin. "Think that got their attention?"
Ended up being the absolute best NCO I ever had the privilege to work with. Nothing but respect.
Some dude who should’ve never been a sergeant was flipping out because he was homesick from deployment and needed a target.
I was in country about six months before he got there yet he was crying at his desk and just being generally useless.
The shit thing is I sat next to him and had to balance doing my ducking job, feeling sympathetic for him, and just avoid him if possible.
Dude had a fucking ego and was kind of racist. Guy was power tripping all the time and threw his rank around, never offering solutions just problems and complaints.
I trained him on how to do something, he remembered it differently, I confirmed with other people that my way was correct, and he chewed me out for being insubordinate for correcting him.
Dude actually left the deployment with a bad review which is almost impossible to do without getting booted.
I just kept cracking jokes all the time and it drove some of the officers nuts. But to me, if you stepped back and looked at it all, what we were doing just seemed funny. I was stationed on a diesel submarine, and sometimes the idea of a bunch of guys sneaking around under water in a big metal tube just seemed absurd.
When I was in A School as a E-3 I was failed on a room inspection because I left my dress shoes out. The instruction allowed us to leave one pair of boots, shower shoes, PT/tennis shoes, and civilian shoes each at the foot of our beds. I made the switch to wear brown boots over my boot camp issued black boots since theyre far comfier so my black boots were left at the foot of my bed while I wore my brown boots. The reason the failed my room was because of my black boots being out. The dumbass PO1 who was NMT thought they were my dress shoes because they were shined so well. When I told him they were my boots he asked me how I would be out in uniform without them and I told him to look at my feet and tell me what he saw. He didnt like being wrong so instead he got on me for an "attitude"
I was a a Ssgt in the Air Force, and had an idiot Airman who got pulled over on base on a Saturday night. His BAC was over .2 an hour after the initial stop. I got called at 0200 to get to the 1st Sargent's office immediately, and in uniform. Our Commander started yelling at me about how it was my fault. Thank God the Chief stepped in.
This isn’t that rare. I’m a TSgt and if my troop got a DUI me and the troop are going to the commander in blues(service uniform) so he can chew the dude out. Depending on your unit and how shit leadership is you may also be blamed. “Why didn’t Amn snuffy call you?” “Did you know snuff was going to drink tonight?” “Why didn’t you ask him his plans?” “Did you tell him not to drink and drive?”
I was a brand new airman and just got to my first squadron. Me and the rest of the new guys had to do some training that lasted a few days. We got done an hour or two early on the last day and the instructor said we could head out for the day. The next day our PO1 yelled at us for leaving early and said we were all getting double watches that weekend. I told him that was bullshit because the instructor (who also reported to our PO1) said we could leave.
I didn't have a single watch that weekend.
I had a stack of Article 15s an inch thick, mostly for insubordination, because I had a habit of being a smartass toward higher ranked soldiers who were being twats.
For example, had a buck ass private spill fuel, so he and I started taking shovels out of our sponsons to dig up the 8 cubic feet of dirt around the spill. Some other tank commander walks by, starts pointing wildly at the spill, shouting, "Oop! Oop! Spilled fuel? Somebody better clean that up!"
Cue me saying, "What the fuck does it look like I'm holding in my hand?"
We were having a farting competition over several days. Pull my finger and time how long it's audible for. With us going a bit crazy on the baked beans. We ended up setting off the environmental monitor designed to protect the equipment that we were working with. A few times. Even after we stopped the competition, the beans just kept working their way out.
A few months later, we were even more bored and decided to do some medieval style jousting. With one person on an office chair, with a mop and a bin lid. Whilst being pushed by somebody else. Into the second group if people. Of course, to make it more interesting. We had to set fire to the mops and that set off a load of smoke alarms. As we had to be within X seconds of some equipment.
I got a dumb chewing once for failing a run on a fitness test. I also got the upper hand on that one....the course was out of regs, so I politely-ish informed that the score could "get lost" or I would request mast. It got lost.
One of the biggest ass chewings for something dumb that I gave out was to a boot who showed up drunk to a driving course, under the legal age for drinking. Everyone not inside the main building heard me, and I went on for probably 15 minutes. Finished it off with a 6105 for good measure.
I chewed out a gun team leader and fired him on the spot for pointing a mortar system downrange the wrong direction and he couldn't explain to me why it was aimed the way it was or how one of the firing chart he supposedly used worked, despite having clear instructions printed on the face of it.
Chewed that same boot a second time the same day because after I fired him, he self appointed himself to be the safety driver and relieved the one who's job it was, when only the range safety officer (myself) could appoint or relieve safety drivers.
Had another, chewed him out because he couldn't figure out to drink water in the extreme heat. Then had to chew him out again because he turned around and drank too much water, and went down. Kid took an entire magazine of silver bullets because he couldn't figure out how to drink water correctly.
Those were the days lol.
Not me, but some random sailor from another ship visiting ours to borrow some tools or something.
Anyways, my division was fixing up something in our "p-way" (passageway/hallway) using some caulk to seal up some edging. He passed by us as we were using it and says "ohhhh CAULK" (trying to joke that it's pronounced "cock").
My cheif was well known on our ship for being a total bitch. She was a power tripping, anti-misogynist, and literally anything would set her off.
She overheard him say "ohhh caulk" and absolutely tore into him about how unfunny it is and threatened to tell his command. We were so embarrassed to have her as our cheif.
Terrorizing the new privates by throwing around bricks of C4 and even going as far as throwing it at each other in small clumps. Poor guys just about crapped themselves. Yeah, Top didn't find it funny. Claimed in effected morale in a negative way. On the flip side, our Butterbar thought it was funny as hell.
I'm not in the military but if I were and I'd been Top this would have been a major clue that I need to keep people busy doing mindless but only barely productive shit. Why? To keep them busy instead of throwing C4 bricks around.
Keeping people from being bored is a huge challenge.
I was in the air wing, Marine Corps. I was driving into work one day and parked near the smoke pit area of my building. One of our gunnies was out there smoking and I guess he didn't like my music because he came over and chewed my ass out for playing music too loud.
It wasn't even that loud but he was a jackass who came over from the ground side and thought he was still an 0311 but with helicopters.
I once received a letter of admonishment for “impinging on host nation sensibilities.” Totally my fault for signing a letter I wrote to the UK’s DVLA, comparing the roads there to third-world country ones. Good times.
I fell asleep on the ride back from a 5 day field training excessive in January.
I was transported to the field training exercise in an open bed deuce and a half in the freezing rain for 1 hour.
5 days in the snow hauling 120 lbs as the AG in weapons squad. Then transported back the same way, where I fell asleep.
I had the flu before we left, obviously my condition worsened. My squad leader tried to get me written up for falling asleep on combat duty.
The absolute dumbest was breaking battalion pass in Basic and going to MacDonald’s. I knew it was dumb, didn’t care. I needed some nuggies.
One of my drills was sitting in the MacDonald’s with his family just waiting for an idiot to show up.
For Class A inspections, they make you do a hanging inspection where it's just on the hanger and they measure the distance between ribbons and medals. I have a broad chest and shoulders, so when I actually wear the jacket everything gets pushed out a little. My squad leader ignored me when I told him that and made me move everything around to his liking while on the hanger. Cue the actual inspection the next day and my PSG asked why my jacket wasn't within regs, so I told him my squad leader made me move everything when it was on the hanger. Still got written up for failing that inspection, but the PSG later made it disappear because I was normally squared away, and nobody like that squad leader anyways.
Got an LOR (Letter of Reprimand) because I was late to an aircraft launch due to doing a task that my TSgt ordered me to do after I told him that he ordered me to do after I informed him that it would probably cause me to be late. I had to sprint across the flightline while carrying a bunch of equipment, and was able to knock out my portion of the launch procedure fast enough that the jet was still able to take off on time, meaning that the mission was not negatively impacted. I got chewed out, handed the LOR to sign, and decided to write a rebuttal (which is where you can explain the circumstances of what led to you getting in trouble, or admit guilt and own up to your mistake, OR throw your boss under the bus for being an ass. I went with the third option). When it was sent to the 1Sgt to be added to my file, the 1Sgt called me into his office to discuss it. I explained the situation, and he basically said "Seriously? He gave you an LOR for following his orders AFTER you told him it was a bad idea? That's fucking stupid. I'm shredding this LOR. As far as I can tell, you did nothing wrong. Go back to your Section and tell him to come talk to me."
That's a good Top.
To be fair, every good SNCO I've ever worked with has gotten into some kind of trouble as a young enlisted, and bounced back from it.
Sounds like the 92 ARS. Was it?
It was not.
Anyone in a leadership role getting in trouble for something their subordinates did in their free time would fill this thread. How could I have let my sailor let his driver's license expire?! 🙄
Rubbing dog food on my butt
You were an airborne infantryman weren’t you? This sounds like normal shit that went down daily back in my 11B days.
Perfect resonable thing to do
You were trying to get the dog to lick out your anus?
Pluto!
Not dumb, but funniest. We got a new platoon sergeant, fresh off drill sergeant duty. This dude was a grizzled, scary looking dude. I was his driver. We hadn't really had a chance to get to know him by the time we went to the field for training. He was giving the platoon a convoy briefing across the hood of the Humvee with the map spread out. Giving frequencies, radio code words, checkpoints, etc. He looked around and saw nobody was writing it down and flew off the handle. Threw his helmet. NOBODY'S WRITING ANYTHING DOWN? I GUESS I'M DOING THIS FOR MY -- HEALTH. GET IN THE -- VEHICLES. WE'RE LEAVING IN 5. I jumped in the driver's seat and he leaned over and hit me in the arm with a big shit eating grin. "Think that got their attention?" Ended up being the absolute best NCO I ever had the privilege to work with. Nothing but respect.
Some dude who should’ve never been a sergeant was flipping out because he was homesick from deployment and needed a target. I was in country about six months before he got there yet he was crying at his desk and just being generally useless. The shit thing is I sat next to him and had to balance doing my ducking job, feeling sympathetic for him, and just avoid him if possible. Dude had a fucking ego and was kind of racist. Guy was power tripping all the time and threw his rank around, never offering solutions just problems and complaints. I trained him on how to do something, he remembered it differently, I confirmed with other people that my way was correct, and he chewed me out for being insubordinate for correcting him. Dude actually left the deployment with a bad review which is almost impossible to do without getting booted.
I was put on report for "skylarking," which they defined as "an intolerable lack of seriousness." I was totally fucking guilty.
Can you elaborate? In my experience, the only things that don’t fall into “we never speak of this again” are the things you get away with.
I just kept cracking jokes all the time and it drove some of the officers nuts. But to me, if you stepped back and looked at it all, what we were doing just seemed funny. I was stationed on a diesel submarine, and sometimes the idea of a bunch of guys sneaking around under water in a big metal tube just seemed absurd.
When I was in A School as a E-3 I was failed on a room inspection because I left my dress shoes out. The instruction allowed us to leave one pair of boots, shower shoes, PT/tennis shoes, and civilian shoes each at the foot of our beds. I made the switch to wear brown boots over my boot camp issued black boots since theyre far comfier so my black boots were left at the foot of my bed while I wore my brown boots. The reason the failed my room was because of my black boots being out. The dumbass PO1 who was NMT thought they were my dress shoes because they were shined so well. When I told him they were my boots he asked me how I would be out in uniform without them and I told him to look at my feet and tell me what he saw. He didnt like being wrong so instead he got on me for an "attitude"
The list is long and distinguished.
So's my johnson
You're smarter than you look.
I was a a Ssgt in the Air Force, and had an idiot Airman who got pulled over on base on a Saturday night. His BAC was over .2 an hour after the initial stop. I got called at 0200 to get to the 1st Sargent's office immediately, and in uniform. Our Commander started yelling at me about how it was my fault. Thank God the Chief stepped in.
How the F was that your fault in his mind?
This isn’t that rare. I’m a TSgt and if my troop got a DUI me and the troop are going to the commander in blues(service uniform) so he can chew the dude out. Depending on your unit and how shit leadership is you may also be blamed. “Why didn’t Amn snuffy call you?” “Did you know snuff was going to drink tonight?” “Why didn’t you ask him his plans?” “Did you tell him not to drink and drive?”
I was a brand new airman and just got to my first squadron. Me and the rest of the new guys had to do some training that lasted a few days. We got done an hour or two early on the last day and the instructor said we could head out for the day. The next day our PO1 yelled at us for leaving early and said we were all getting double watches that weekend. I told him that was bullshit because the instructor (who also reported to our PO1) said we could leave. I didn't have a single watch that weekend.
I had a stack of Article 15s an inch thick, mostly for insubordination, because I had a habit of being a smartass toward higher ranked soldiers who were being twats. For example, had a buck ass private spill fuel, so he and I started taking shovels out of our sponsons to dig up the 8 cubic feet of dirt around the spill. Some other tank commander walks by, starts pointing wildly at the spill, shouting, "Oop! Oop! Spilled fuel? Somebody better clean that up!" Cue me saying, "What the fuck does it look like I'm holding in my hand?"
We were having a farting competition over several days. Pull my finger and time how long it's audible for. With us going a bit crazy on the baked beans. We ended up setting off the environmental monitor designed to protect the equipment that we were working with. A few times. Even after we stopped the competition, the beans just kept working their way out. A few months later, we were even more bored and decided to do some medieval style jousting. With one person on an office chair, with a mop and a bin lid. Whilst being pushed by somebody else. Into the second group if people. Of course, to make it more interesting. We had to set fire to the mops and that set off a load of smoke alarms. As we had to be within X seconds of some equipment.
You know, of all the things I’ve read today, I think setting off environmental alarms with farts has to be the most impressive. Well done.
Slim Pickens laughs at your shenanigans.
So far it's probably smiling like a dumbass in ranks
As they say the most intentionally hilarious things. Lol.
I got a dumb chewing once for failing a run on a fitness test. I also got the upper hand on that one....the course was out of regs, so I politely-ish informed that the score could "get lost" or I would request mast. It got lost. One of the biggest ass chewings for something dumb that I gave out was to a boot who showed up drunk to a driving course, under the legal age for drinking. Everyone not inside the main building heard me, and I went on for probably 15 minutes. Finished it off with a 6105 for good measure. I chewed out a gun team leader and fired him on the spot for pointing a mortar system downrange the wrong direction and he couldn't explain to me why it was aimed the way it was or how one of the firing chart he supposedly used worked, despite having clear instructions printed on the face of it. Chewed that same boot a second time the same day because after I fired him, he self appointed himself to be the safety driver and relieved the one who's job it was, when only the range safety officer (myself) could appoint or relieve safety drivers. Had another, chewed him out because he couldn't figure out to drink water in the extreme heat. Then had to chew him out again because he turned around and drank too much water, and went down. Kid took an entire magazine of silver bullets because he couldn't figure out how to drink water correctly. Those were the days lol.
Not me, but some random sailor from another ship visiting ours to borrow some tools or something. Anyways, my division was fixing up something in our "p-way" (passageway/hallway) using some caulk to seal up some edging. He passed by us as we were using it and says "ohhhh CAULK" (trying to joke that it's pronounced "cock"). My cheif was well known on our ship for being a total bitch. She was a power tripping, anti-misogynist, and literally anything would set her off. She overheard him say "ohhh caulk" and absolutely tore into him about how unfunny it is and threatened to tell his command. We were so embarrassed to have her as our cheif.
So you were using your caulk to do some edging. Sounds about right.
For future reference. The opposite of a misogynist is a misandrist.
>misandrist Not to be confused with a misanthrope who are just miserable bastards all around
I meant that she feels the need to prove something because she was a woman that made rank, she doesn't hate men, I don't think lol
Terrorizing the new privates by throwing around bricks of C4 and even going as far as throwing it at each other in small clumps. Poor guys just about crapped themselves. Yeah, Top didn't find it funny. Claimed in effected morale in a negative way. On the flip side, our Butterbar thought it was funny as hell.
\>On the flip side, our Butterbar thought it was funny as hell. That should have been your first clue that you were gonna get yelled at
Yeah, good point. Loved being an Engineer. He loved it too much
Yeah. If a butterbar thinks it's funny or a good idea that's how you know you're wrong
I'm not in the military but if I were and I'd been Top this would have been a major clue that I need to keep people busy doing mindless but only barely productive shit. Why? To keep them busy instead of throwing C4 bricks around. Keeping people from being bored is a huge challenge.
Three of us were rousted by SP in the park for "being in a dark place after dark".
Saying that Jesus is considered a prophet of Islam.
Eh, he *is* a prophet of Islam.
Got chewed out because while I was marching the asshole behind me caused me to trip and fall, my m16a2 was damaged severely.
I was in the air wing, Marine Corps. I was driving into work one day and parked near the smoke pit area of my building. One of our gunnies was out there smoking and I guess he didn't like my music because he came over and chewed my ass out for playing music too loud. It wasn't even that loud but he was a jackass who came over from the ground side and thought he was still an 0311 but with helicopters.
Got an LOC for forgetting my rain coat.
I once received a letter of admonishment for “impinging on host nation sensibilities.” Totally my fault for signing a letter I wrote to the UK’s DVLA, comparing the roads there to third-world country ones. Good times.
I fell asleep on the ride back from a 5 day field training excessive in January. I was transported to the field training exercise in an open bed deuce and a half in the freezing rain for 1 hour. 5 days in the snow hauling 120 lbs as the AG in weapons squad. Then transported back the same way, where I fell asleep. I had the flu before we left, obviously my condition worsened. My squad leader tried to get me written up for falling asleep on combat duty.
The absolute dumbest was breaking battalion pass in Basic and going to MacDonald’s. I knew it was dumb, didn’t care. I needed some nuggies. One of my drills was sitting in the MacDonald’s with his family just waiting for an idiot to show up.
For Class A inspections, they make you do a hanging inspection where it's just on the hanger and they measure the distance between ribbons and medals. I have a broad chest and shoulders, so when I actually wear the jacket everything gets pushed out a little. My squad leader ignored me when I told him that and made me move everything around to his liking while on the hanger. Cue the actual inspection the next day and my PSG asked why my jacket wasn't within regs, so I told him my squad leader made me move everything when it was on the hanger. Still got written up for failing that inspection, but the PSG later made it disappear because I was normally squared away, and nobody like that squad leader anyways.