During the second week of the 1982 school, morale was almost non-existent. Many of us were still grieving over the Colonel's death. The advanced team had been split up because of behavior problems, the cadet commander had been sacked and replaced, and many of the cadets were still recovering from the effects of food poisoning during the first week. The loss of nutrients during the Spearmint Tea Incident, combined with our normal starvation rations, ensured that almost everyone was suffering.

My team had been doing pretty well, especially considering I had been absent for three days with some kind of flu. They were good people, and we had some really good NCO students who were willing to step up and help. Even so, our morale was beginning to fade as the days wore on just like the other teams. The schedule had become fluid and there seemed to be a lot more down time than was normally the case. Down time is the bane of good morale.

During a health and welfare inspection, the staff realized that the student latrine had become full. In fact, it was completely full and then some. We were all disgusted and gave the required admonitions to our troops for living in such an unsanitary state, but the fact is, we should have caught it sooner. The student latrine had not been dug deep enough, and we had twice as many cadets as we normally had up there. We just hadn't done the math.

It wasn't just the latrine, though. The entire base was a pigsty by our standards. The teams were each assigned duties to correct the situation. My team pulled the latrine re-digging job; literally the S*** job. My troops were upset at first, but I turned the whole situation around by doing what came naturally.

I had been treated as a troublemaker and rebel the whole time I had been up there. It may have been based on a false impression of me, or maybe they saw some potential in me that I didn't yet fathom. Either way, I finally gave into it. I would become something of a rebel during those two weeks. If that is what they expected of me, then that's what they would get.

I gathered my little band of insurgents and put together a game plan. We went to supply and requisitioned every tool we could get our hands on. We then marched out to the new latrine site. Before we started, I gathered my guys together under the trees and had a little talk with them.

"They think they are sticking it to us by giving us this job. It's the hardest assignment and the least glamorous. They think this is going to put us down, but you want to know something? They can't bring us down. We are Delta Team. You all have shown me by your actions up here that you belong here. Now we are going to show them.

"We aren't just going to dig their hole for them. That's what they expect us to do. They think we will do the least amount of work possible because that is what they would do. Well, folks, we aren't them. We're Delta, and we don't do things halfway. When we go, we go all the way.

"First squad, you have the first digging shift. We are going to dig the deepest, largest latrine they have ever seen. We are ALL going to dig, including me. Second squad, you are on foraging duty. We need something to make a seat out of. We need walls. We need a place to keep toilet paper dry. If you can find a roof, I would be happy to add it on.

"Ladies and gentlemen, we aren't going to just dig a Latrine. We are going to build the Taj Mahal of latrines. We are going to build a latrine that the Queen Mother would be proud to take a dump in. Since Delta doesn't take crap from anyone, we had better give them a good place to leave it. Let's go."

It was like someone had lit a fire under them. By the time I called the first break, the hole was 4 feet deep and almost as wide. It was the deepest latrine I ever saw on Drummond Island. I kept expecting them to hit dolomite (you always hit rock on the Island), but divine providence provided what was probably the only place within a mile of base camp that had dirt deeper than 2 feet.

Second squad had gathered plywood, boards, car parts, ponchos, and other stuff to construct our "Great Taj Ma-hole" as one of my cadets called it. Other names were "The Vomitorium", "The World Turd Center", "The Awful Tower", "The 'I can wait till Sunday' Hotel", and some others we don't repeat in mixed company.

We worked on it longer than we expected. It just kept getting better and better. Several of my guys had suffered the whole food poisoning thing, and they realized how important a good latrine could be! At one point we heard the Wing airplane buzz the compound. The Wing Chief of staff and a pilot were coming to inspect our base. My guys actually seemed excited when I told them that the Wing Chief of staff might inaugurate their masterpiece.

When we had done as much as we were ever going to be able to do, I formed up the troops and taught them some simple manual at arms stuff like Order Arms, Port Arms, and Right Shoulder Arms. Wielding our shovels, picks, and e-tools as rifles, we marched out of the woods in-column, at Right Shoulder Arms, and whistling the song from the Bridge on the River Kwai. The people from Wing HQ saw us and were impressed as this bunch of filthy and sweaty grunts performed a perfect order arms. It was like "swish, CLANK!"

I gave some instructions about taking tools to supply and replenishing canteens. Then I had them fall out. In spite of their soiled t-shirts, dirty trousers, and scuffed boots, they looked like a well-oiled machine. They would have made any drill team proud.

I decided to really lay it on thick. I walked up to the men from Wing (I had to force myself not to swagger) and reported like I was on a parade field. I must have been a sight in my now tan boots, torn jungle trousers, and an olive drab t-shirt that was so dirty it was brown. My beret, however, was on perfect with the flash directly above my left eye. I knew it was because I had one of my guys check it before we had left the woods. I figured it gave me the look of a battered professional.

The wing chief of staff returned my salute and commented that my men looked pretty good. I thanked him and told him we had just finished a new latrine and it was really something to see. I told him I doubted he had ever seen a better one. I think he started to laugh, but then decided otherwise. "Why don't you show it to me, sergeant?"

I thought our commandant was going to have a heart attack right there. He had been preparing a carefully laid out tour of the base camp and our operations. It certainly had NOT included showcasing where we "Dropped Targets", so to speak.

I replied "I would be honored, sir. Can I just make sure my men are taken care of before we go over? It will just take a second." I was playing the trained professional to the hilt. I managed to keep the smile off my face until after I saluted and had done an about face.

I left my assistant team leader in charge and told him to let the guys know that the Wing Chief of Staff wanted to personally inspect our latrine. He smiled, and I learned later that the team had been really excited about this. Hey, so we were pathetic. I guess we were just caught up in the moment.

Unfortunately, one of the school's little Hershey Squirters had beaten us to the latrine. This wasn't very surprising. It was a rare moment on the Island when someone didn't need to go. Although I was disappointed at first, the elated feeling my guys were feeling for the rest of the day more than made up for it.

In general, a good leader can turn anything into a positive experience. Some would say I was fomenting rebellion in my little speech, but those words were long forgotten by the time we completed the job. What they remembered at the end was that they had completed something constructive together. I wish I could say that I had volunteered for that job, but I had actually tried to avoid it. Once I had it dropped on me, though, I decided to make the best of it. I owed it to my people. It wasn't their fault that we staff were screwing everything up.

More importantly, after we were done, I made certain that I expressed my respect and admiration for my people and their efforts. I told them that it took real maturity and discipline to take the worst job assigned and to complete it with professionalism and style. I told them I was very proud of them. Unlike some teams, they had not let their negative experiences be an excuse for bad behavior. Despite some of the things going on at the school, they had continued to do the right thing and did not give in to their frustration and exhaustion. I believe THAT is what they remember me saying, not the speech I gave them at the beginning.