LEAKED EMAIL FROM SAF BMT COMMANDER EXPOSES HELICOPTER PARENTING AT ITS WORST

My friend’s brother went for BMT and his fellow recruit father sent in a cringe worthy email to the commander which makes me feel that parents nowadays are way too protective. I mean cmon, your son is going to the army. Not going to secondary school camp. Please find the content of the email below.

“Guys, please see for info. Some of the listed; personally I have no issue but some are really not good – if you remember my points on realistic timing for recruits to meet and preserving their admin time.

Take some time to read and reflect. Thanks

A parent sent me via email. 39, I have replied and cc to u that u will follow up and get back to him.

For the rest, if the feedbacks are true and I believe some are, you guys will understand why I keeping harping on the same points over and over again. We need to enforce it on the ground.

To whom it may concern:

I am an extremely concerned parent with regards to my son’s training in BMTC Sch 3 under Ulysses Company and I have a few points to raise:

1. Demands of the commanders

I do understand that the recruits will undergo tough training in BMT but there has to be a limit in the demands of the commanders, not to the extend in which demands are irrational.

-I understand from my son that the commanders informed recruits that they are not allowed to walk on the ground floor of Ulysses company and they have to run around the ground floor to get things done. At times, the staircases or floors may be slippery because of rain or washing and this is a safety hazard and recruits might slip and fall if they are forced to run around on the ground floor of the company line. I wish to understand the reasoning for this.

-The commanders expect the recruits to scream and shout ALL THE TIME, from warm up exercises to marching daily to route marches. I heard that if the recruits do not shout loud enough, they get scolded and shouted at into the ears. I understand that singing songs together loudly will boost morale during route marches but in normal camp activities, why are the recruits always expected to shout at the top of their voices all the time? Do the commanders really expect our sons to lose their voices in camp? What is the rationale for this?

-I understand that Ulysses Company has a chant that sounds like that of the gang chant. What is BMTC School 3 teaching our sons to become? Future gangsters? I would not allow that.

2. Unreasonable treatment/Punishments

My son has feedback to me about certain issues that happened during camp.

First, my son has to squat down whenever he has to conduct field camp or route march force preparation sessions the night before and each session lasts about 30-45 minutes. My son is also expected to squat down after cycle of combat physical training warmups. I am concerned that squatting for prolonged period of time will cause harm and damage to the knees of the recruits.

Second, the commanders always threaten the recruits with “SOL” or “confinement”. I wish to have a clearer understanding of the guidelines in SAF. Are the recruits able to be punished with the abovementioned if their bunks are not completely sparkling clean? Similar for being late to fall-in? I also understand that commanders have been making recruits do more than 20 pushups for punishment and they purposely force them to restart from 0 to avoid exceeding the 20 pushups mark. Where is the ethics of the commanders?

Third, I heard commanders in Ulysses Company always purposely waste the admin time of the recruits by finding reasons to be unhappy with their performance or purposely dragging their time. A platoon has about 60+ people and it is unreasonable for them to be only released from parade square 15 mins before lights-out to wash up and sleep. Also, there have been instances where my son has to wake up earlier because there wasnt enough admin time the night before to pack up for the next day’s activities. My son also feedback that there were times where the recruits were not given 7 hours of uninterrupted rest, which clearly breached the criteria, and they WERE FORCED to say yes when the safety commander asked the recruits this question during safety briefing.

Fourth, my son’s company was forced to run down from the lecture theatre to the parade square and back 4-5 times because they were not fast enough and they were screamed into the ears by their seargants (Bryce Tan, Zul, Sune Aik, Irza). They were forced to run down the staircases and this is a safety concern. A company of 200 + people running down the staircase at the same time is very dangerous.

3. Reporting Sick

My son’s company recruits were forced to bear with their knee pains or ankle sprains and were scolded for being weak. There were instances whereby multiple recruits from the company fell sick and had diarrhea from eating the chicken pie at the cookhouse and the seargants just told them to keep quiet about the matter. Is Ulysses Company not concerned about the well-being of the recruits? Are the commanders trying to hide matters under the floor?

The training programme for the recruits is also concerning me. The recruits appear to have been given a strenous programme with not enough time for them to undergo muscle recovery before they are put through the same routines again. I wish to seek clarifications as to how the programme is being planned and why insufficient time and understanding is given to the recruits when they fall sick or get injured because the training programme is too intense.

My son came to tell me that Ulysses Company is an enhanced and leadership batch. I also wish to understand how these recruits are selected. My son and some of his friends have no intention of going command school but are being forced to undergo the same training and being forced to agree to whatever the commanders and OC sir says in camp.

To end off, I am extremely concerned about my son’s well being in camp and I seek an investigation and explanation to certain routines in Ulysses Company-BMTC school 3. I also expect that the recruits will not be threatened by their commanders because their parents send feedback emails to the management.

I look forward to a favourable reply

Thanks,
Patrick”

Wee
A.S.S. Contributor