How I Learned to Burn Sh*t

I've posted a couple of items on Writing Along put up buy a serving Marine to showcase some writing by military and ex-military about their experiences. He has stories up by Marines, Army & Navy personnel, but as of this writing is still looking for some Air Force stories. Go on over to get some candid glimpses into the military mindset.

"How I Learned to Burn Sh*t" is the first one which I'll post here for your amusment.

Time: June 1968
Place: 90th Replacement Company, Long Binh, RVN

Like many young soldiers, I was processed through the 90th Replacement Company. It was mandatory to attend morning formation in order to receive your duty assignments.

The very first day the First Sergeant read off the list of guys with assignments and where to go get transportation. Then, he looked over the rest of us and in classic First Sergeant manner pointed to three of us and said "youse mens go with this here acting corporeal, he has a job for you".

The job was burning shit. There were three or four 20 hole crappers in the area which needed our undivided attention. The drill was to pull out half of the drums of crap at a time and burn them. The technique was to put a couple of quarts of diesel fuel in a drum, light it off and stir it with some rebar till dry. That took most of the day.

With my luck I got tapped for the same duty the next day.

On the third day, being experienced, and the acting corporeal having gotten orders, I was given the acting Corporals armband and three other FNGs to go burn shit. Again.

My innovation was to pull ALL the drums into a long triple wide row and pour in not just a few quarts of diesel, but several gallons into each drum and light it all off. No more stirring for me. The flames turned the drums white hot and produced a spectacular column of black smoke.

This attracted the attention of the ever alert First Sergeant who came running and shrieking: WHAT ARE YOU DOING! WHAT ARE YOU DOING!

The answer of course was: Burning shit, Sarge.