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Why Become A Paratrooper?
FORT BRAGG, N. C, July 13 (AP) ---
The deepest and oldest human fear, psychologists say, is the fear
of falling,
Almost all the others have to be acquired through experience.
But the tiniest baby will react instantly to the danger of falling or
being being dropped.
This being so, did you ever wonder what makes a paratrooper?
There is a man who deliberately contravenes a powerful
natural instinct. He falls by choice. True, he has a
parachute, but there is a long moment of falling before it opens.
And, if it doesn't open, he has to be able to control his
terror so that his hand won't "freeze" and fail to rip open the
emergency chute.
Paratroopers are all volunteers. Now, why would you volunteer
for that kind of warfare?'
Well, they get $50 a month extra pay, that's the reason.
On the beach below Salerno, one moonlight night during the last
war, I posed the sane question to a trooper from the 82d airborne
who had just landed. He grinned: "I'm a frustrated flier. This is
the only way I could get in the air. Perhaps that's a reason.
Some Army psychologists say that a man becomes a paratrooper to prove to
himself that he isn't afraid to jump. It could be,
When you watch the 82d training today, you could get still another
idea.
These men fight a very different, a very special kind of warfare.
The job itself sets them apart from all other troops. To
handle it they nave to be hard-bitten, physically and mentally. A
paratrooper is all man.
His training la designed to build up that sense of being special. A
paratrooper isn't allow to walk. He has to run, wherever he
goes.
He runs on an assignment, and he runs with his
company on a "hike." He gets more calisthenics than anybody.
When he jumps from either 'the 250-foot tower or the 34-foot tower,
the instructor is "talking him up" |
to the other members of his team. It
sounds like a hot
football team getting up a head of steam in scrimmage:
"When this last
man hits the ground, I want to hear you fellows give. Come on now, talk
it up. Here he comes.'"
The men cheer for each jumper ať though he were the first in human history to make the jump.
With considerable pride, they tell you that the new commanding general of the 82d. Maj.-Gen.
Thomas F. Hickey, had to go off the training tower 34 times
before his instructor. Lt Joseph
C. Prescott, said, "I
should've sent him back for one more,
but I guess he's got it now."
In short, nobody gets by in the 82nd, not even
the boss.
Meanwhile, new airplanes and new technicians have come to the 82nd.
The individual jump is only a small part of the paratrooper's job.
In the last war, the paratrooper went down with nothing but his own equipment
and perhaps some anti-tank weapons and a jeep,
Today, they drop a 5900-pound howitzer, and a three-quarter
ton truck weighing 6750 pounds. a 90-millimeter gun, and even a
bulldozer! The latter required six 'chutes. This is a
"big drop,"
The glider --- that factory for air-sickness' --- is obsolete.
The paratroopers, when they don't jump, now are landed in
air-assault transport planes. Each plane carries at least a
platoon with full equipment.
The main characteristic of the plane is that it can land and
take-off in a ploughed field, or on equally rough ground. It
is specially designed for a unique job.
So is the paratrooper himself. When he finally gets his jump
badge, he has a symbol on his uniform that sets him apart from
anything on land, sea or air. It signifies that he is ready
for a unique task.
That is why men become paratroopers.[Fitchburg Sentinel, Fitchburg, MA,13 Jul 1951, Fri, Page 14]
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