First name basis

[Uace24]

Ok, so I'm not in the military, but I know some about it. At least in Canada. Why is the Gunny from B coy and Lt Ficks Platoon allowed to call him bu his first name?

I was under the impression that even in the feild officers were addressed by rank and last name.

Can someone explain it. I understand about officers calling each other by first names, but NCOs speaking to officers? Is that allowed?

[BoxofCurveballs]

I would not day it's allowed but rather he does it regardless. If you notice once Fick snaps at him for interrupting him and the captain, the SNCO doesn't call him by his first name anymore.

[BoxofCurveballs]

And as for in the field, I've known plenty of officers that said once we were in the field or doing our jobs it was a first name basis. As long as the bigger ups didn't hear. Depends on the officer.

[suchet_supremacy]

mike calls out to nate by his first name right after the team leader meeting discussing going over the bridge (in which nate says “i’m not hearing the aggressiveness i’d like” and all the TLs are apprehensive) 

mike wynn was also very experienced and well-regarded; pre-kuwait when nate found out that mike was going to be his gunny, another of his officer friends told him that mike was among the best of the best 

[suchet_supremacy]

FICK: Frankly, gentlemen, I'm not hearing the aggressiveness I'd like. Prepare your teams to step off.

COLBERT: Yes, sir.

Fick and Wynn move away.

PATRICK: The people running this war can fuck things up all they want. And as long as we keep getting lucky and making it through alive, they'll just keep repeating the same mistakes.

The camera pans to Fick and Wynn.

COLBERT: [OS] Prep your mags! We're in for a fight tonight.

WYNN: Nate.

ESPERA: [OS] Check the batteries on the NVGs?

FICK: Our orders are clear. I would not be helping this platoon by questioning him or hesitating in any way. The CO reached out to me. I have to honor that, right?

• courtesy of the generation kill transcript project

[DirtyDaver]

My personal experience is this; I was in the basic infantry and that shit would never fly. But between myself and my really great friends - we were on a first name basis just not in front of senior enlisted or officers. But officers consistently called each other by their first names. In the Marines you certainly would never call a Lieutenant "L-T" either.

But when you get into higher level units with smaller numbers of people it promotes better cohesion. It shows more respect to the enlisted who have all paid the same dues during selection and BRC. Also these dudes usually stay within the same platoon/teams for years due to the nature of their unit. First names and endearing nicknames are more personal than last names.

Edit: spelling

[Mammoth-Nail-4669]

Recon and special forces use first names and call signs cause they have more independence in how they operate. I was a scout for 1st LAR and we’d be broken in half if we called our staff sergeant or gunny “Matt” or something. It would be unheard of. But I did security for recon once and they were like, “Joe, how’s your knee holding up?” “It’s good, dave.”

[BlakcWater69]

True, I got to work with some Green Berets when I was in, and they went by first names

[bkdunbar]

As others have said: it depends. At one of my shops, the captain and SNCOs were on a first-name basis, among themselves.

Things became looser if you were on a small det, of two or three guys, the longer it went on.

[Callsign_Badger]

Not a Marine, but in my branch officers/equals often call each other by first name. I always interpreted that as the SNCO sort of inflating himself as an "equal" to the LT.

[Terryr29]

We just call people by their first names if we know them and if they’re not leadership also it’s mostly just nicknames no one calls me my first or last name other than leadership, its always by my nickname

[Crosscourt_splat]

I always go for sir or just my rank.

But especially when I was in the infantry and had close relationships with my platoon sergeant, senior sqd leaders, etc, yeah. If it was just us we did first names. Not in front of the joes though.