Swingman responds:
Yeah, pretty much the same for anything in the Crotch, but during training, and on base stateside, it's essential to keep up appearances. Or so we were told. Sort of like the British in the desert when there was no water...but they stilled shaved, long, long before battery razors.
I always got a kick out of the deadly flat blue-black of the metal assemblies and the glossy walnut stocks. With our Drill Instructors, there were also the glossy leather slings, with brass--highly polished--buckles and clips. I lusted after one of those until I got to ITR and made a real April in NC discovery of mud, sand, rain, more mud, a lot more sand and various insects waking from a winter's nap to gnaw on any exposed bits of our skin.
Charlie Self "Bore, n.: A person who talks when you wish him to listen." Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary