I just got home from Fort Sill, Oklahoma after being given a medical discharge.  My experience in the Army was a mixed bag of experiences so bear with me. I had entered the 95th AG in Ft. Sill last September and made it through to week 7 of my 13B OSUT (in the 1-22 FA)before I started to have serious respiratory problems.  I toughed it out for another week before my Drill Sergeant sent me to sick call, where I was diagnosed with an upper respiratory infection.  After the doctors there recomended me to take a breathing test at the hospital, it turned out that I had a breathing condition which would have made me inelligible to enlist.  I was given a few options: 1.  Take an EPTS no questions asked and leave as soon as the Army out processed me. 2.  Try to go for a medical discharge and state the problem wasn't around before I joined the Army. 3.  Lastly, I was given the option to fight a discharge and try to get back in training after more tests and waivors. I took option 3 with the hopes that I'd get back in training soon. Afterall, I had completed 8 weeks and was beginning to get to the good parts of OSUT (AIT portion- the stuff I signed up for).  So you could imagine how dissapointed I was that I had to ride a CQ desk for a few months while I saw my class graduate.  I'll admit, I was pretty depressed but I had hope that I'd be placed in another training platoon to finish my training.  I waited a few months until mid-January when I was told by the medical boards that I was rejected.  I was pretty crushed, but my 1SG told me that my being a soldier just wasn't meant to be and wished me luck before I went to Fox 1-19 FA for my outprocessing. The Foxtrot battery over in Ft. Sill is probably the most depressing place ever (it's where all the chapters and Patriots (i.e. discipline problems) go).  A few of the Drill Sergeants there also had serious problems (one was like 250 pounds and was constantly made fun of by other DS's for his weight problem).    In many respects, I couldn't wait for yesterday when I finally got to come home.  I also felt a little bit of sadness that I left Fort Sill and have felt ashamed that I didn't get a chance to complete my training.  My family and friends (including a cousin of mine in the Indiana NG) tell me I have nothing to be ashamed of.  They tell me that I at least tried and went to Basic Training which is something 95+% of the American youth would never bother even to contemplate.  I did things I never thought I could do (like jump off Treadwell Tower despite my total fear of heights) and I went through hardships I never thought I could endure as a civilian.  I'll take it as learning experience and hopefully get used to civilian life again (it feels weird not having to shout At Ease every 15 minutes or so). I just wanted everyone to know where I'm coming from, so that's enough about me.  What concerns me are the things I've overheard during my time in CQ offices (talk about the most boring duty).  It seems the Army has changed its Basic Training program into this thing they're calling Warrior Ethos.  Many of the DS's it seems absolutely loathe this new program of training.  The complaints I've heard are as follows: 1.  The PT regimen has completely changed into soft stretching exercises.  It seems that the conditioning drill is designed to add flexibility to the joints but the DS's complain that the time spent on this cuts into time that could be used for push-ups, pull-ups, side straddle hops, and abdomen work. 2.  Another major complaint is that there are few runs for this new training program.  In Red Phase it seems that there have been only 4 AGRs.  The DS's are complaining big time that they only did 4 runs in three weeks (and I guess the old rules have changed for night runs as well - it used to be where a DS could run his platoon at night but now he needs to have either his BC or Btry XO present to do that - and there's a snowball's chance in hell for officers to stay at night for training.  Turns out lots of people are failing their runs in the PT test. 3.  The training time has been cut by one week.  I heard this through a couple of new guys who were expecting to graduate in mid-April and found out that their date was pushed up by ten days.  I later heard in a 1SG's office something to the effect that confirmed this.  Both the 1SG and Senior DS didn't sound happy about that and my father (former vet during the Vietnam years who stayed stateside) said this sets off alarm bells for him.  It sounds like the Army is trying to rush fresh guys over to Iraq and sacrificing training time.  My dad said this sounds like the days before things got real bad in Vietnam.  I hope that the Army isn't going to do this. 4.  DS's also seem to complain that they're more restricted in how they can discipline the new recruits.  They were big on telling the new guys that they've got it easy and it seems to be true.  I sat in the CQ office of C 1-22 on a Red Phase platoon in week 2 and saw them get away with stuff I never would have.  The DS's complain that they can't put the fear into new privates like they could before Warrior Ethos.  They also complain that most of the D&C practice has been removed from training. 5.  It seems like this Warrior Ethos training is having a pretty high amount of wash-outs.  And the majority of them are for either mental EPTS's or chapter 5-17's.  This has caused the chapters platoon to become more crowded than it used to be (or so said this one kid who sat in the chapters platoon for four months.  He told me they'd get 10 or so trainee chapters a week but since Warrior Ethos started the battery has had about 30-40 chapters/EPTS's a week come). 6.  Fort Sill is also getting rid of its Fitness Training Battery which according to more than one DS is a bad thing.  I heard a speech by one when I was doing linen duty to some trainees in classroom formation that it used to be that guys who failed their APFT after AIT/OSUT would spend a week or two there, get worked out like crazy, pass the test, and move on to their duty stations.  The new policy is to stick these guys in a platoon three weeks back to the beginning of Black phase, have them do PT in the morning, and then ride a CQ desk all day because they've already gone through the training.  The DS than said those guys lose their spirit to be in the Army and eventually become discipline problems. Honestly though, from what I've read in the Cannoneer and heard from guys in Warrior Ethos platoons it doesn't sound all that bad- they spend their first night out in the field and then proceed to do their entire BRM out there.  Camping for 14 straight days sounds like fun (even if it's cold).  They also did tactical movements as sqauds and platoons in marches in the middle of week 1.  Sounded more fun than the Red Phase I went through.  Outside of my ramblings on the new training, I have a few other random thoughts: *  Is supply really a bad area to work in?  I ask this question because every supply Specialist I've met hates their job and can't wait to leave.  As I worked CQ for a a few months, one of the ways I was able to get interesting work was to volunteer to be the manual labor for supply Specialists who needed privates to do all the lifting.  After a couple months, I got on talking terms with 5 of them and all 5 hate what they're doing and told me they couldn't wait until they ETSed.  The impression I get is that supply personel are treated pretty bad.  Or maybe I just happened to meet 5 disgruntled soldiers. Either way, it didn't give me the impression that things get much better after the initial training. *  Army Values: they're a great code to live by, but it seems that far and few of the people I've met in the Army are capable or willing to live by it.  I've even seen a few Drill Sergeants outright lie and then lecture their platoons on integrity.  I mention that because I have a lot of respect for most DS's even if I didn't really like them.  Most were stand-up guys who had two sides to them and could even talk to us like men.  It's a shame that some can't live up to the values they try to instill in their trainees. *  I admit I have to catch up on information on this topic as I've been in an enviroment where I've been restricted from the outside world since September (I didn't go home for Exodus because I didn't want to waste my leave until I got done with training if I was allowed), but I've heard through conversations with some permanent party Privates and Specialists that re-enlistment is at an all-time low and that they Army is stretched pretty thin.  Is this something we should all worry about or is this how it's always been in the Army? Some of these people make it sound like the Army is in dire trouble. That and the fact that the war in Iraq looks more and more unjustified by the day, it looks like things could go south fast. I'll close this long post now.  i just had a few things to get off my chest and I'm wondering what soldiers out there who know more than me think about the changes going on in the Army and it's condition.  Even though I had some bad experiences in the Army and unfortunately didn't get a chance to complete my training, I still believe the Army is an institution that is worthy even if I've lost the idealism I had when I signed my name to the contract.  There were times I thought I had it hard but I just can't imagine what those men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan must feel like. Take Care, Henry Miller