Military Veterans here, what are some common misconceptions in fiction about the military?

Oh yeah, he was definitely a master of verbal ass-kickery and all kinds of bizarre sideways insults.

 

"filthy sewers"

 

US Army vet, Cold war and desert storm.
I will grant, some of the "Misconceptions" may be due to procedural difference between the branches of service, but some things do require commonality between branches.
I can think of one area, where the errors abound, and drive me nuts. That is communications traffic, Especially "Over and out"!
Reality is:
Over = Done talking your turn.
OUT = Done with the conversation.
Break= more to come, need a pause.

 

Can you please explain why they say that? I have seen this in the books and I've never understood what it means.

 

Only a commissioned officer is addressed as Sir/Ma'am. An NCO, non-commisioned officer, is addressed by rank, and depending on branch of service there may be some flexibility there. Ex. US Army, a Sargeant, Staff Sargeant, or Sargeant first class may be addressed as Sarge. A first Sargeant, as Top. The NCOs handle the day-to-day activities of the unit, are are often doing the work beside the men. Officers are more concerned with planning and reports. Think blue collar vs white collar for the difference

 

Well made point.
I will refer to the
The Seventy Maxims of Maximally Effective Mercenaries
2.A Sergeant in motion outranks a Lieutenant who doesn't know what's going on

 

I'm thinking Lt. Gorman from Aliens.

Vasquez: "So how many combat drops have you done?"
Gorman: "Counting this one? Three."
Everybody: Ohhhh shit........

 

That reminded me of a time in W. Germany.
A buddy of mine and I recorded a bullet ricochet from an old western on a Walkman, it was the mid 80s. We had the Walkman in a coat pocket, playing over a speaker, with a long lead. We saluted the new butter bar, and said,"Sniper check Sir." The look on his face when he heard the bullet sound, priceless.

FYI custom is to not salute in the field, because of snipers.

 

So do bullets really make those crazy noises when they ricochet? I never hear that in actual shooting videos. Is it mostly just a film convention, like always having tire-squealing sounds even if a car rips out on sand or dirt?

I also don't see massive muzzle flashes like you see in the movies. I think at most I've seen very small flashes.

 

For a bullet to make that kind of sound it would have to strike something to bounce off of. Som film convention. The guys in folley are just being lazy when that happens, by grabbing a sound effect from the library.

I also don't see massive muzzle flashes like you see in the movies. I think at most I've seen very small flashes.[/QUOTE]
A muzzle flash is the result of unburnned propellant leaving the barrel while still burning. Many modern rifles have a flash suppressor on the barrel. Which defuse any flash. You are more likely to see a flash from a pistol, or black powder weapon because of this. Though at night a flash is more noticeable even from a suppressed weapon.

 

I recently read that machine guns ammo used to contain tracers at certain intervals so you can see clearly where your shots are going, but it also told the enemy exactly where you were, so they discontinued that. They would also put a tracer near the end of a magazine so you know you're about to run out, but then so does the enemy...

 

Muzzle flash will also depend on the load of the round. Modern military ammo is designed pretty specifically for the weapons that it's going in, but sometimes on a civilian range you'll see someone using ammo that was loaded for a long-barreled varmint pistol, for example, in a shorter-barreled revolver and end up with a huge cone of fire coming out the dangerous end.

I've always wanted an Enforcer pistol, which is an M1 carbine chopped down to a 10 or 11 inch barrel. They're reported to be loud as hell and spit flames like a dragon. Utterly ridiculous but looks kind of fun.

 

Rather noticeable even with the standard muzzle break on the weapon.
Stupid ROE is almost a trophy. I used it in a zombie story.

 

When your sitting behind a well positioned MA duce, I wouldn't be to worried unless the bad guys were know to have RPGs. Tracers were about every 5th round, when i was in. They are a big help walking your fire into a target.

For the enemy to know, a tracer is the end of a mag. They need to know your doctrine. Or have been in multiple fire fights with you. With proper support from your fire team, a mag change isn't a big deal.

 

I'll take a siega 12ga. I'd I have to open fire, I want them to stay down.

 

Got to love the political realities of service, NOT.
Atleast you don't have to wear those red coats any more. I spent sometime with British units while at Graf. A bunch of good guys, and had a fun time with them at the beer tent after the competition. Good times.

 

When were you in Ulster, big soft moose?

 

I found that Black Hawk Down tends to be one of the most accurate movies because of its treatment of RoE. It uses it like a long running joke which is very close to reality. Service members are given a vague RoE pre-engagement, which leads to inconsistencies and confusion.

That disarming crap was a problem during the Iraq and Afghanistan engagements for the US as well. They gave us weak humvees instead of more armored assualt vehicles as the main convoy and transport vehicles, which basically have paper for paneling. Mechs had to rivet and weld on large plates to make them relatively viable, but, naturally, that meant a huge drop in engine power to weight ratios. A lot of Marines died with that blunder.