"He's Shooting At Scraps Of Metal." - Generation Kill (2008)  

A problem of many commanders of First Recon in OIF is that many of them had little experience of being combat commanders. They were experienced as administrators, logistics, planners, intelligence analyst, etc ... Remember that First Recon were supposed to be employed in small squads and teams to be dropped behind the enemy line, not to engage in combat, but to perform recon on foot and avoid combat. The "combat" commanders are the team, squad, and platoon leaders and by and large, those were shown to be adequate in GK. The Platoon and Company commanders of First Recon were basically never meant to lead people into combat. They are good at other things, but not leading during combat. It's really a case of the division commander and battalion commander rushing to use First Recon in ways that doctrinally, they were ill-suited for, but they ended up being used that way anyway. Once on the field, someone has to take the role of combat commanders, and thus Encino Man and Captain America. (Reddit: @SmirkingImperialist) YOU CAN WATCH THIS TV MINI SERIES "GENERATION KILL" (2008), THROUGH OUR WEBSITE IN OUR BIO

I regularly quote “Follow my tracers” in video games.

the fact that they were sent to destroy a tank column with only humvee and mk19 for "best" anti-tank weapons they had ....

“He’s got his fucking bayonet out”

Seems like incompetent leadership always finds a way to be in a leadership role and thier incompetent asses always let the shit roll down hill...

- "Sir those are civilian huts and scraps of metal" + "How do you know that?" - "Your ass would be shredded if they weren't"

Because of this scene, my platoon will point out far ass stuff ie. Mountains, buildings, etc and just belt out “FOLLOW MY TRACERS!” Always geeks me out 😂

How Cpt America passed Force Recon training is beyond me

This was such a good show. The level of incompetence among leadership was pretty terrifying, however. I mean these guys weren’t your everyday ground pounding crayon eating infantrymen. These were Marine Recon.

Captain america is just intiating recon in force

A hero in his own mind.

"...obay any LAWFUL order I am given..."

This show really encapsulated the sentiment behind the saying "shit floats"

Infantry here. Our third platoon had a platoon Sargent been in since late Vietnam. They called him "the grip" couldn't even read a map. Had exemptions for everything, the guy was obese and constantly harassed people with extra PT as punishment.

I was in the Marine Corps from 99-08. When people ask how it was in Iraq I ask them have they watched “Generation Kill”. Pretty spot on what my deployments were like. A cluster fuck of “who’s on first”. My second deployment we had all matching desert cammys and bulletproof HMMVEEs without open tops. Crazy times! Miss you all brothers!

Bro hopping out with two rifles to shoot at nothing killed me

Captain short bus is funny AF

Damn, I'm a welder. They just made the safety supervisor the warehouse supervisor. He's never welded. 😂 Go figure.

This reminds me of Jarhead and the scene from black hawk down where the guy on the turret goes. “They’re shooting at us, colonel they’re shooting at us!” “Well shoot back”

“Doing his Rambo” LMFAOOOOOOOOOOO

That is a future US Senator right there.

This Officer is so cataclysmically stupid.....I would stay as far away from him as I could

I watched a dumb ass platoon Sgt clear a room during practice with a bayonet 😂. Dude was so serious 😂🎉

The actors, writers and the actual guys they portrayed did a good job making us hate Captain America.

Best believe he tasked a staff member to write up a package for going "above and beyond the call of duty" "He Spearheaded 50x recon marines in a 5km assault route on the conformed location of 70+ enemy armor units, single handedly coordinating overwatch on 5x enemy fortifications, leading to the total destruction of a $1.5M enemy vehicle depot to secure FLOT maneuvers within the region." Or some flowery crapola like that.

the loop from civilian huts to the convoy is a lil funny

Well, at least Captain America will be dumb enough to confirm if the enemy have a machine gun position while everyone else stays in relative cover to assess.The situation the Captain clearly misread.

Next time my wife complains that the beer isle is to far away to get my beer,"Move into position Engage!"

Is that a t-34 in the background?

T34 in the corner pretending it did not see anything

Is this accurate 😂 cos if it is this type of marine I didn’t come across in Afghan in 09. Them guys seemed chilled switched on and similar to us Brits. Ready to go just as quick as being ready to take a dump

"Can you believe that asshole is in charge of people?" 10 years in the AF, and yes, I've seen people like that in charge.

This literally encompasses what it's like to be enlisted... post 1992.

And kids, this is what happens when you eat too many crayons….😂

“Follow my tracers !!!” Collage degree ladies and gentlemen 😂😂

Damn, how did I get here so early? Also great series.

Captain America was an intel marine, from what I've heard and read he was an excellent officer and good at his job but he got picked to go into combat where he was essentially useless

“That was pretty fucking ninja”

Say you're in the military without saying you're in the military...."I can't believe this guy is in charge of people"

A few people in the military told me that they were getting orders from idiots so they made sure to tell me not to enlist several times each. And all of them told me to apply for officer school instead so I can be the idiot giving out orders, because they'd rather have me do that than sit in a cold wet trench under idiots like they do.

I swear, as god as my witness; for those of you with zero military experience or even the latter years of GWOT deployment, this show perfectly captured the essence of those early years. It was fucking insane. Name the city, it was all mired in the incompetence of not just lower level leadership(company level) but also higher level leadership. I swear we were all constantly like “what the fuck did the captain just say??” To piggyback on that, I never had a platoon level leader, officer or enlisted that I didn’t respect with my entire being. I was blessed. I heard horror stories and saw shit from another platoon that made me so appreciative of the leadership I had. I was severely wounded in nasiriyah, had to cool the jets for a few years, and redeployed in 2006, then again in 2010, and one more time in 2012. Iraq and Afghanistan, I saw the same problems play out over and over again. We fucked up those wars so bad, but I guess I’m thankful for the experience. I met a ton of incredible men, and to this day every time I visit a select few of those men’s graves, generally on federal holidays, I pour two out for them and reminisce on the good times and the bad. I can’t drink anymore, so they take mine for me. I keep all those memories bottled up inside as I have a job to do and children to raise, a wife to please and parents/brothers/friends to look after. A few days a year, I hangout w the boys that can’t see the sky anymore and I allow myself to remember. Those wars were entirely, incomprehensibly, indefatigably retarded. We saved nobody, we helped no one, we just doomed two generations of people to enslavement and punishment. That wasn’t our fault. That was leadership’s fault. We did what we were supposed to do, but we were ultimately abandoned by our leadership. I understand my grandfather so much more now than I did when I was a kid. I find myself doing the same things he did. Funny how that works. Stay hard boys. I’ll see you at the VFW.

Gonna tell my kids that this is the real Command and Conquer: Generals experience.

Captain america > encino

And there are some that are like that in real life in the military. Medal and rank chasers.

He probably took some Benzos to calm himself down for the flight ✈️ one two many mixed with Alcohol isn't good should just let dude leave how they stop him and turn it into a situation

This incompetent "leader" reminds me òf some countries' leaders that keep increasing their country's debt, as if they feel very confident that nothing bad will happen if they keep doing the same mistake ...

fOlLoW mY tRaCeRs!!! - Captain America 2003

If those tanks had people in them, half the battalion probably gets wasted, but on call artillery or airstrike would have then LEVELED that air field. If LtCol Fernando survived the assault it probably would have been his last order as a as a marine officer. I’m not sure as a battalion commander of Recon Marines if your career survives losing that many men so recklessly.

If the tank on the left WAS manned they would have chewed him up.

Commandant Spangler taught Eric well.

1830 metres is 2000 yards. The level of detail is spot on, gang.

Good for showing incompetence. Incompetence is abound. In addition War should not be glorified

My old 1st Sgt, 1/9 Nam walking dead alumni, participated in Dewey Canyon op the only one we were allowed to win. Get back in your vehicle Lieutenant, now Lieutenant!

Because of this scene, I mess with friends while on the road. "You see that out there? Way out there. Should we engage?"

Captain America was the best part of this show let’s be honest lol

The first guy is 100% american The second is french

Someone who only knows 40k through memes vs. people who play the game 😂

God Speed Captain America 🇺🇸 🙏 😅

In the eyes of the average grunt, the only thing worse than dangerous, incompetent officers like platoon commander, “Captain America” here, and company commander, “Encino Man”, would be hearing some Jody put the hammer to your wife while she’s trying to sound normal on the phone with you. 🤦‍♂️ Do they still ironically refer to them as ‘morale calls’? Some dudes go fucking batshit crazy distracting themselves with mental images. Enlist and deploy single, kids. You can’t fix the officers though.

Would be cool if you showed some scenes with Alpha company as it seems the opposite of bravo with its more competent leadership

Follow my tracers !!!! .

Anyone know what happened to Captain America afterwards? Did he stay in the Marines or retire?

This guy's playing arma 😂

Casual t34 just chilling

I read Flick's book One Bullet Away, and it was far different from Generation Kill. The way he describes it, recon was better suited to scouting and intelligence gathering. Front line combat was a waste of their ability.

T34 at left chilling

I loved this series

i like war movies, but this feels so hokey to me... lieutenant strawman over here...

"FOLLOW MY TRACERS" *IN DAYLIGHT* 😆 🤣 😂 🤦‍♂️ 🤦‍♀️

did anyone else notice the t34 in the back?

🆘️ Remember, he's still considered "Privileged and Entitled", so like, what's gping to really happen 🤔 😏.

Sadly, I've lived long enough to see myself become the villain. When I was in (admittedly 30 odd years ago, and they were odd iykwim), this sort of buffoonery would simply not have been countenanced. If this clip bears any relationship to the reality, then the standards of leadership have plummeted below sophomore ROTC blunder wonders. I pity anyone who served under such asinine puerile leaders. You've been had.

Ummmmm...my .50 bmg is way out past 1800 yds. wtfk. Your shit ain't set up right boy gadam might as well get back on that saw 🤦🤦‍♀️🤦‍♂️

Hmmm... Correct me if I'm wrong, but when did a building being civilian hut ever stopped US army from carpet bombing it? 😑

Negative

love how there's just a random t34 85 in the scene

He's like a 10 year old playing war in the backyard

Captain America is straight out of a classic cheesy 1950s war film. Being in Iraq is hell, but having that dude as your Platoon Commander on top of that? Fuuuccckkk that shit dude.

Military leadership definitely doesn't get that way through merit thats for sure. What company does bayonet boys dad own to get that role?😂

Captain America. 🙄 I’m amazed nobody fragged him.

I hate guys like this. Freaking Glory hunters. Riding out stirring up crap and when the crap hits the fan, they always crapped their pants and turned into fobbits. This is so close to reality. Literally. Just to say they returned fire from fictitious freaking enemies. SMH

FREAKIN!! BOOT "BUTTER BAR"!!

Must be so easy to film this garbage. "Just swing the camera around! The more shaking the better!"

This is what happens when you give fresh CO's authority in the field.

Reminds me of tropic thunder where they all just start randomly shooting into the jungle and ben stillers character is like "thats the trailer right there" lol.

Perfect example of when Recon, scouts, cav scouts, force recon, etc. say the dumbest shit us 11B's ever hear... "we're pretty much infantry". Yeah... and I'm pretty much a Chinese jet pilot named Steve.

Fucking Cpt . America doing his Rambo

why are commissioned military so incompetent? do they really just buy a commission still?

This was such a great show. So under rated. The end when they are all singing come sail away..... I felt that in my soul.

Again this show needs to be used as a training tool to teach leaders how to not be fuckin idiots and how their stupidity at any level of leadership is dangerous for everyone below them. I’m gonna keep preaching it till it happens. Part of the reason we have a recruitment and retention crisis is because of garbage leadership

Problably those civilians shited themselves when they started to hear the gun fire from far away.

Capt America is the kind of guy who wears an American flag shirt and a veteran cap everywhere he goes. And his wife also holds his rank stateside.

I imagine it’s already been covered, and it probably because the marines make do, but why are they wearing woodland camo?

Which episode is this?

Didnt stop us. Ae shot at anything

“gentleman we just seized an airfield”

Pretty sure these analyst lack the ability to know hostility or potentially dangerous sitiuations.

Fix bayonets! CHARGE!!!! doot doot do do dittle dee doot doot doot doot doooooo

What’s wrong not to like a woman lead character? Doesn’t mean I don’t like woven

Glory hounds ruin an already shitty experience.