 One of the more pleasant duties of the Army's chief of staff occurs each year in the Pentagon. It is to express the Army's recognition of one special soldier, from among a special breed of soldiers. As he presents the Stephen Ailes Award, named in honor of the former secretary of the Army who initiated the Drill Sergeant program in 1964, to the man chosen as the Army's outstanding Drill Sergeant of the Year. Yet as rewarding as any in the Army. On behalf of the Drill Sergeant of the United States Army, which I believe I will represent here today, Mr. Ailes, thank you very much. We do appreciate what you have done for the program and in helping us become what we are today. What is a Drill Sergeant? To many soldiers, he has many different things. To officers and non-commissioned officers, he is a professional, to be respected and even envied for his ability. To junior officers and non-commissioned officers, he is a man to whom they may turn for help and advice. To the Drill Sergeant, he is a product of a way of life and a support that can be the plenty. He is a Drill Sergeant who never gets shaken. You can see this on me today here. To receive this award is a special honor. It says in effect, this man is the best, from among the best. Because the Drill Sergeant of today's Army is not only a professional soldier, but the world's best maker of soldiers. A man of patience, skill, knowledge, dedication and maturity. A man who is firm, but fair. A man who demands a 100% effort from trainees, but who respects the individual's dignity and looks after their welfare. In today's big picture, we'll take a look at the man behind the title. See what he is and what he does. What it is that makes him the Drill Sergeant. All right, men, settle down. Good morning, men. I'm Drill Sergeant Martin. First time I saw him, he scared the hell out of me. Of course, you know, I wasn't used to this kind of environment. I'll be your Drill Sergeant for the next eight weeks or until you finish your basic combat training. It's my job as your Drill Sergeant to see that you get the most out of these weeks. And it's your job, starting now, to absorb the instruction that you receive. You think about it. You'll see it makes sense. When it comes to the Army, I know what it's about and you don't. So listen and learn. Just a few hours ago, you were a civilian. A couple of hours from now, you'll be an Army uniform, but you'll still be more civilian than soldiers. Eight weeks from now, you'll be well-training the basic skills that every soldier has to have. You're going into advanced training to qualify you in the military specialist. And you'll be in shape. I'll see to that. From now on, what you're going to be is busy. The Drill Sergeant oversees the fitting and issuing of clothing as well as numerous aptitude tests, which the new trainee must take to determine what job he is best suited for in the Army. All right, man. Moving in form three, I can get off her back. Let's go. Quickly, quickly. We talk was rough and everything, but I think we get a lot out of it because, you know, that's what they're here for to teach us, because they've been through the same thing before. All right, man, when I dismiss you from this formation, I want you moving the billets on a double. I'll be in to show you how to set up your Army. The Drill Sergeant. The guy with the hat. And the boots you can see your face in. Men with the leadership qualities and the professional know-how to teach civilians how to be soldiers. These are special men. Ask any trainee. Ask any commander in a training brigade. Special men. Where does the Army get them? Where do they come from? They come from schools like this. There's at least one in each Army area throughout the United States. When the Drill Sergeant candidate checks in at such a school, whether he's been assigned or has volunteered, he's already an outstanding soldier. Otherwise, he wouldn't be here. He has to be physically in shape to do the job. He has to have that quality known as military bearing, emotional stability, a clean service record. In other words, he has to have the makings of a leader. If he has, the school can build on his experience to qualify him as a Drill Sergeant. The course is not easy. Some don't make it. Ahead of each new Drill Sergeant candidate are six weeks of intensive work. In the classroom and out of doors, five days a week. Plus the hours he'll spend in private study or in supervised study periods. Married Drill Sergeant candidates, if their family is with them, may not have to live in the school dormitory area. Though in some cases, if the student's progress seems to demand it, it might be required. In any case, he's going to have plenty to do. What about this concept of leadership? What's the first thing that you think about when you think of a real leader? Hey, Fairburn. A man who knows what he's doing. All right, good. A man that knows what he's doing. But what else does a leader need to go along with that? It ain't long. He not only has to know what he's doing. He has to look like he knows and act like he knows. All right. You've touched on two important elements. Professional competence. Burying or attitude. The second plan is essential if you're going to get the most out of a period of instruction. Why is that? Because you only have so much time available to make your point. Therefore, it's essential that you take advantage of every second. In presenting a period of instruction to the basic trainee, your time is always limited. You have to plan what you're going to teach and follow that plan step by step. You'll have plenty of practice in preparing lesson plans and presenting periods of instruction from your lesson plans while you're here at the school. As a matter of fact, your next assignment is to prepare a lesson plan and to present a wide range of problems. Some personal. Some social. Maybe a problem with morale in your platoon. Even religious problems. You'll run into problems with discipline and administration. None of these problems are new. They've all come up before. We're going to talk about some of the typical ones today. For example, suppose a trainee came to you and told you... There's nothing that does so much, so fast to give a group of men the feeling of being a unit, or team. As drill sergeants, drill instructions. And inspections are an important tool. They tell you how the trainees are progressing as individuals and as a unit. You'll receive instruction and practical work on the correct way to form a unit for inspections. You'll learn how to report. You'll practice escorting inspecting officers for in-ranks inspections. And do the inspecting yourself of the trainee's uniform and rifle information. Also of his individual clothing and equipment in the barracks. You'll also learn how to use inspections to teach. Six weeks of instruction. 240 hours of classwork, testing, practical demonstration. All of it demanding. Among those taking the drill sergeant course are men of the Army Reserve. They wear no special identification. In fact, most instructors don't know which candidates are reservists and which are regulars. They take the same course, meet the same high standards, and succeed or fail on their individual merits. Learning to reserve units across the country. They are important men. Should a nationwide mobilization ever be called for, the Army Reserve will have a large role to play in training the massive army that would have to be quickly created. And competent drill sergeants will play a key role in that training. By graduation time, the 70 to 80% of the class, which has made it through, is composed of men whose already strong leadership potential has been honed and polished to a high level of professional competence. Traditionally, the honor graduate of each class of drill sergeants is recognized. In this school, the special recognition takes the form of a parade sabre, engraved with his name, and the date of his graduation from drill sergeant school. As of now, they are drill sergeants. Like every graduation, this is an ending and a beginning. They'll go from here to training companies or back to their reserve units and begin to practice their distinctive trade. Thousands of others have gone before them, and more will follow, because the need for them is great. It's an ending and a beginning. This afternoon, you will learn disassembly and assembly of the M-16 rifle. And the first step in disassembly of the weapon is to clear it. You do this by pulling your charge and hammer all the way through. All the intense training of the drill sergeant school is aimed right here, at the point of contact between the professional soldier, instructor, and the soldiers to be that are in his charge. And the drill sergeant is there for one purpose, to prepare his trainees to function as soldiers, to give them the know-how that will make them effective soldiers. Once you get it out, separate the two, place your axis spring in the appropriate place, and then you'll buff our assembly. All right, good. Now we're going to take it in reverse order, step-by-step, and reassemble the weapon. Now you're going to do this many times. You've got to really learn how to take care of this weapon, even if it means in the darkness or sitting in a foxhole in the mud. You take care of the weapon, it'll take care of you. All right, the first step in assembly of the weapon is to pick up your axis spring, open rank! First rank, set it. The drill sergeant's school conducts considerable instruction with practical exercises on the subject of inspections. Small wonder if the graduates of the school do the job with efficiency and style. Fourth rank, set it. Second third and fourth rank, set it! Inspection tells you several things. One is the state of training that the man is in. I, myself, normally go by the way he wears his uniform. All his buttons are always buttoned. His uniform is neat, his giggle line is straight, boots are shined. You never have to instruct him on shaving. He's neatly groomed at all times. It's what I've been told a long time ago. You've got to have that fine, thin line between you and the trainee. I'm a firm believer that you've got to keep your distance if you're going to get a respect from him. Come on, Corey, it's your attention. I want all 40 sets of heels to come together at the same time. Now, now with the word snap, S-N-A-P. As you might expect, a drilled sergeant is right at home when it comes to teaching a platoon the fine points of the teamwork that is drill. Hooray! He stands up, he gives command. He's rough, he knows he's rough because he's been embellished before, been embellished before. And cannot break! Hey! Classifier him as a professional, they have a job to do, and they do the best they can. They're just professionals, that's all. The drill sergeant gains the ability to spot potential leaders in his platoon within the first few days of basic. He knows what to look for. Hooray! His uniform properly, and he's responding to all commands or orders. Then this tells you right away that you've got a good soldier in the making. As they move through the days together, the drill sergeant continues to mold the affinity and teamwork of his platoon and sees the signs that he is succeeding. Well, you've got a group of 50,000 out there working together and you've got something big coming up the next day. A PT test for an example. And you tell them, okay, we're going out there tomorrow and we're going to come out high on the PT test. And they go into the PT test and you can see them going through the different events. The by-run is a good example. 50,000 will start running at the same time. One might fall out. Yet the rest won't let him quit. They can't touch him, and he's disqualified. But they help him. When you see this, you know this is a good group that's working together. Counseling trainees is another of the drill sergeant's duties. In the course of experience, he hears a lot of problems. He learns to sort out the real from the fictitious. And he knows the options open to the trainee and getting a real problem solved. The way they say is, if you've got a problem, go to a drill sergeant and explain it to him. And I feel that if you go to him and talk like a man, man to man talk, don't sound like a little boy, like you're afraid of it. You can get it solved. Many drill sergeants are young in years, but there is a maturity that comes through. We sat down one night and tried to guess the ages of the drill sergeants. And I ever shot them by at least five to ten years each one. As long as you're on active duty. I think after we've gone through all these steps, I think this should just about solve your problem. Thanks, Sergeant. I sure do appreciate that. I want you to get back out to training, set your mind at ease, and concentrate on nothing but training. We'll work it out. Thanks again, Sergeant. No sweat. If you go to him, we'll feel a problem near trying to help you. Are we ready? The drill sergeant knows better than most that each step in the trainee's progress from civilian to soldier is built upon the steps that have gone before. Each step is important, and he watches over the progress of his people day by day, with a concentration that never varies. The training being supervised by today's drill sergeants is the refinement of generations and is geared to the time and the type of combat the soldier of today is likely to encounter. Form a good guard position. The first thing you want to do is flex both knees slightly. But most of your weight on that trail leg in front of your throat region, elbow down against your side. Take your lead hand, your right hand, bring it up, break the elbow at a 45 degree angle. You should be looking over your finger tips, fingers extended and joined. Go to the head region, with the lead hand suited straight forward, palm down, fingers extended and joined, striking up on it in the nose region. Very quickly with your daughter hand in the same position. At combat speed, the movement will look as follows. Demonstrate up on the floor to the head region, floor to the head region. And day by day, that's how it happens. Soldiers are made, not born. The drill sergeant supervises his trainees in the closest thing to real live action. Close combat, it's called. When the trainees finish this, they think of themselves as battle-hardened veterans. The drill sergeant, it's never an eight-hour day. Okay, man, there's a few things I'd like to go with you pertaining to this last exercise. On the whole, it wasn't too bad, but your team leaders have to remember. Once you tell that rifleman to get up and move forward, he moves forward. On the double, get down into a covered position and take up a fight. Like our drill sergeant, he's been taking us out the ranges. He's been, you know, taking care of us everywhere we go. Eight weeks is really a very short time for a group of citizens to become soldiers. It's a major transition, but it happens all the time. Every week, there's another training cycle ending. Another two months of intensive effort and learning and accomplishment coming to a close. Pretty important as far as he shapes your whole attitude toward basic. If you have a drill sergeant who tries to help you with understanding, treats you like a man, calls you out for your mistakes, but if you do well, he rewards you. You're going to get a fairly good outlook, and that'll help you a lot in basic. You've got to have a good outlook to get through basic. And the first day we got here, man, I know it would be this kind of man. I'm going to sum it up like this. I just like working with human beings. When I see them pass in front of that reviewing stand, if they're all in step and looking good, then I figure my mission has been accomplished. The cycle ends, and the men that were his platoon move on. You wonder, does he ever run into any of them again? All the time. I was even walking down the street in Vietnam one day, and this Jeep passed. And this first lieutenant screamed out, Hello, Sergeant Martin. And I stopped and I couldn't even recognize him. But he knew me. Went on to become an officer. Another cycle finished. Another platoon of men shaped up. But as any drill sergeant can tell you, there are always more where they came from. All right, you men, get settled down. Stop the milling around. First time I saw him, he scared the hell out of me. Good morning, men. I'm Drill Sergeant Martin. I'll be your drill sergeant for the next eight weeks or until you finish your basic combat training. It's my job to see that you get the most out of these...