Corporal Who Verbally Abused Female Recruit During Training to Be Removed From Army Immediately
An Army instructor finds himself in hot water after verbally attacking a female recruit as she completed a bayonet exercise and after filming it with a mobile device all throughout.
To add insult to the injury, the video was posted on Facebook and was viewed over 300,000 times. As soon as the identity of the corporal in the video is verified, he will reportedly be immediately axed with sources saying that defense chiefs are fuming because of the incident.
In the video, which has been shared and liked by thousands over the past few days, the instructor repeatedly screams at the recruit, saying that she is "f—ing weak."
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He asked her if she is a killer or a mouse and then told her off as she marched her way across sandbags, which represent the enemies in the training.
The corporal then fakes sympathy, asking why she is crying and saying that she has completed the exercise before verbally attacking her once more, telling her that she is nowhere near the finish line. Throughout the ordeal, the recruit can be seen bawling her eyes out.
After watching the clip, former Army head Lord Dannatt condemned the behavior of the corporal and hoped that they can get him out of the Army as soon as possible.
"I hope the identity of the corporal is discovered very quickly and that he is removed from the Army at the earliest possible moment," he told Daily Mail. "Tomorrow would be a day too late. This kind of behaviour is totally unacceptable," he went on to say.
Johnny Mercer, an Army officer who fought the Taliban at close quarters in Afghanistan, said that while bayonet training can be brutal, the instructor did not have to film the whole thing and upload it on social media for the whole world to see.
"I used to run commando training, and it was a deep privilege to go with people to their darkest places and realize what their characters were actually made of," Mercer recalled.
"I would never think about filming it and putting it online, though, which is a deep breach of trust and respect for that individual," he continued.
For the uninitiated, a bayonet is a short knife that can be attached to a rifle. As part of basic training, every Army recruit is required to learn how to use it. The recruits are expected to thrust the bayonet into mock enemies during the exercise.
The video comes just weeks after the Army launched a "softer" recruitment campaign that promotes itself as a safe, touchy-feely environment for anyone who wants to join.
The campaign, which focuses on women and ethnic minorities, was initiated with a series of clips that indicate it is okay to cry, be emotional or to show weakness in the Army.
Clearly, the emergence of this new video contradicts everything that these clips represented, much to the disappointment and embarrassment of the defense chiefs.
A representative of the Army says that the video is now under investigation.
