Advanced Individual Training. After, Basic training,( see post below), the Army sent me to Advanced Individual Training or AIT at Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Even though I had orders for Engineer OCS, after AIT, the Army sent me to an Artillery AIT to learn Fire Direction Control. In other words, how to calculate how to elevate artillery pieces so it will hit the target. For a guy who had not taken a math course since his sophomore year of high school it was another case of trying to put a square peg in a round hole. Worse, our unit sergeant was trying to run the program as an OCS prep school and there was lots of harassment. Worse yet, our commanding officer was an Oregon State Beaver. While at Fort Sill the draft was changed to a lottery system. I had a low lottery number so it would not have made any difference. This is when Bill Clinton bugged out of ROTC as he had a high lottery number.
Officer Candidate School. After AIT I was sent to Fort Belvoir for Officer Candidate School.(Class 24 Bravo 1) There was lots of harassment as they tried to make you into and officer. To start with we did not have sidewalk privileges, no coffee and had to eat at attention. I became our companies Command Information Officer so I could read the Washington Post and keep the bulletin board updated. I got to report to our unit current events such as the incursion into Laos and the Kent State deaths and John Wayne winning an academy award. I worked very hard at building up my muscles and got into the best shape I have ever been in. Toward the end of our training there was a rumor that the Army was going to offer an Option to OCS candidates they if we would forego the commission we were working for they would give us state side duty for one year, we had already been in for one year, and we would then be honorable discharged after two years service. The Army was cutting back in Vietnam and they had too many officers. With about two or three weeks to go before I received my commission as a Second Lieutenant the rumor turned out to be true and every OCS candidate at all three of the OCS schools were offered the Option. It was a very hard choice to make. I had been working and training for almost a year to become an officer. I was going to be sent to Korea as an Ordinance Officer. On the other hand I had been admitted to law school and the admission was only good for two years, as I had been drafted. If I became an officer I would have at least two more years in the army for a total of three. After those three years I would have to reapply to law school. By that time everyone and his dog wanted to go to law school and it was hard to get admission. I decided my main goal was to become a lawyer. I and about 2/3rd of my unit accepted the offer and I became an E-4 enlisted man for the last year I was in the Army. I was then sent to Fort Carson in Colorado.( For a link to a report on OCS force reduction in 1970 click on the title above.) While at Fort Belvoir I got into Washington DC about three times on pass. I loved to walk around the monuments and give my army buddies the "tour."
