John Tinseth tells how the cowardice of one can drown many.
Originally appeared at The Trad
Ft Bragg’s main pool was divided into 10 lanes. At both ends were NCOs wearing green berets with the white training cadre flash. The test consisted of two surface laps in fatigues and boots. No kicking off the side. I thought it would be fun to swim the laps underwater.
A strong swimmer, I earned the senior life saving card my junior year in high school. I told the old man who promptly suggested if I ever swam out to save someone I should take a 2″x4″ with me. “Why?” I asked. “Cause when people are drowning they’re gonna look at you like you’re the pier.” he said.
Half way across the pool the wet boots and fatigues turned into anchors. What was an easy underwater lap, with air to spare in swim trunks, was turning into no air with a quarter length of pool to go. I frog kicked harder and swam to the surface breaking water and gasping in front of the sergeant watching my lane. He smiled down at me, “Nice one, smart ass. Now swim back underwater.”
My father reached the river that ran by Vinh Thanh and saw two bodies floating on the surface. He knew what happened before anyone said a word. An officer was drowning. A sergeant went to his rescue. The officer took the sergeant down. Two men dead because one man didn’t take a swim test.
I nodded to the sergeant and went back down. I made it a quarter of the way before surfacing. I looked back to see the sergeant laughing and side stroked the rest of the lap. Checked off a clip board, I squeaked to the showers for a change into dry fatigues.
He stood in the locker room waiting for me. Parker was a medic and friend from East Texas. He asked if I would wear his shirt and swim his laps. No one would ever find out. I remembered the two Green Berets, told him no and walked past. He failed the swim test and never spoke to me again. But that was okay.
It was better your buddy fail because he could still learn to swim and pass even though he didn’t think so. He didn’t understand that you did him a favor.
Raul- I agree. I failed the compass course. I still have no sense of direction which is why I thought it best to leave the Army. Michael- Thank you for the introduction and kind words. Tom- Thanks for reading and commenting. Danny- It was the earliest I remember my father talking to me about anything in Vietnam. It would be the last until I joined the Army and he slowly opened up. While I was at Ft Bragg, I met three of his NCOs from his A Team in Vietnam who told me stories about what my father did in… Read more »
Powerful short tale on morality and ethics…
A team is as strong as its weakest link and if swimming is a vital skill then the weakest swimmer (or non swimmer to be precise) is the weak link and stands a strong chance of messing up the mission or more importantly getting someone killed.
Thanks for joining us here at GMP John. A beautiful piece that is so true.
Powerful, powerful story. This is the calibre of writing we need to see more of here at the GMP, strong writing that stands alone, and tells men’s stories in such a way that the story itself is the jewel quite independently of any underlying “message.” Bravo, Mr. Tinseth. Well done!
As an Ex-Service member and living in on an Island where it is critical to know how to swim I agree that failing the test was the best for him and any possible people that would have ended up on his team.