They warned us

In my estimation, there are few cultural symbols of the United States as worthy of being honored and still fewer that express the best of our values as much as the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. For 89 years, for every minute of every hour of every day, a sentry has been posted in front of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery, guarding the final resting place of three unidentified service members who died in World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. Since midnight on July 2, 1937, more than 900 soldiers have maintained a constant, silent vigil in an unbroken streak of honor and dedication, through freezing cold, sweltering heat, and raging storms. The inscription on the Tomb reads: “Here rests in honored glory an American soldier known but to God.” I served in the 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment (The Old Guard), the unit from which soldiers are selected to earn the privilege of guarding as Sentinels at the Tomb (also called Tomb Guards), and I don’t think most folks realize how much goes into this sacred duty. So, when news broke yesterday afternoon that a Tomb Guard had yelled at Pete Hegseth and his group for laughing and talking loudly in that space, I’ll admit that I was genuinely surprised by the incident. But it wasn’t surprise at the Sentinel’s reaction. That wasn’t remotely surprising. That young man is among the best-trained soldiers in the entire United States Army, and I promise that’s not exaggeration. Just being selected for training at the Tomb is a small honor in itself. There are soldiers in The Old Guard who volunteer for the Tomb and don’t make the selection cut. They don’t even make it to the crawl phase of the process. A new trainee is a soldier with impeccable physical fitness, a perfect behavioral record, specific height and weight requirements (5’10 to 6’4 for men, 5’8 to 6’2 for women), their commander’s blessing, and an excellent initial interview. The NCOs (sergeants) and officers who select new trainees don’t have to justify their choices outside of those requirements. Maybe the vibe is slightly off. Maybe they wonder if the aspiring trainee is truly committed. Maybe the way they carry themselves—literally how they walk—is perceived as unworthy of the Tomb. I can’t emphasize enough the protective nature the leaders of the Tomb feel over that sacred ground, and simply meeting the basic requirements is no guarantee you even have the honor of going through training. Then the fun starts. Over a two-week trial period, new trainees are required to memorize seven pages of information about the Tomb and the rest of Arlington National Cemetery, including the exact grave locations of hundreds of notable veterans buried in the ANC, from John F. Kennedy to Medgar Evers. Every single word. Every single notable grave. For two weeks, new trainees are basically sleeping six hours a day, getting up early for regular physical fitness, memorizing all seven pages down to the syllable, spending nights scouting out grave locations in a timely manner after the ANC has been closed to the public, doing basic chores around the grounds of the Tomb, beginning to learn basic uniform prep to Tomb standards, getting smoked for mistakes (push-ups, etc.) and trying—very hard—to not screw up your audition. Got a family? Got a spouse? Got kids? You’ll see them in two weeks. This isn’t a summer camp. This isn’t a frat house. You don’t get points for trying. At the end of that two weeks, you’re rewarded with the first test on all the information you were required to memorize. The standard is simple: exact recall for any question asked related to that information. 100% score. No misses. Maybe they’ll take pity on you if there’s a minor goof on one or two questions and you can retest. Maybe not. Maybe after all that hard work, the other new trainees scored perfectly, and the leaders of the Tomb decide they have all the candidates they need to proceed with the next phase of training. Thanks for auditioning. Good luck with the rest of your career. The reward for proceeding is months of qualification training. You learn Tomb manual-of-arms with your M14 Garand rifle, the marching choreography (called “the steps”) for the Changing of the Guard, the cultural standards expected of a Tomb Guard, and my god, the uniform standards that would make any Army Drill Sergeant go: “Damn, that’s intense.” To this day, I can tell if an Army soldier is a Tomb Guard by the look of their Dress Blue uniform. It’s obvious. The difference between their uniform and any given squared-away soldier in the rest of the Army is like comparing an oil landscape with a very well done paint-by-numbers. The jacket and trousers are perfectly pressed with no shadows from the lining and every stitch centered within the seams. Zero pilling, of course. Perfect consistency of the coloring, which isn’t easy to do with daily pressing. It looks like the most elegant cardboard you’ve ever seen. You didn’t know a Dress Blue uniform could look this perfect. And the shoes. Oh god, the shoes. New trainees spend hours and hours and hours shining their shoes into flawless mirrors. You could spend a good chunk of the day just shining your shoes to such a state that after putting them on for guard duty and taking those first few steps, the area just above the toes slightly cracks the polish, an acceptable and reasonable flaw in the quest for perfection. Hopefully, you only have a few medals and badges. God help the sergeant with several years in who joins the Tomb and learns the hard way that being a decorated soldier just means more labor in preparing the brass you’ve earned. No errant strings, of course. All medals and badges looking as though they’ve been printed from a textbook and shined flawlessly. All of them placed according to regulations within two centimeters on the uniform. Oh, but that’s the other thing. Yeah, technically, the standard is two centimeters, which is measured with a micrometer, but really, if all your brass—no matter how well prepared—is consistently at the 2cm cutoff, you’re gonna get some dirty looks and your commitment questioned. The Tomb could well be described as the only truly justifiable cult in America because these new trainees pretty much have very little life outside of it. Months and months of full days preparing your uniform, learning the exacting rifle manual, learning more knowledge for the written exam, being graded on the guard duty itself (your actual, formal “walks” as they’re called), keeping up physical fitness, doing constant cleaning around the Tomb and whatever other random, silly shit you get assigned as a new trainee by the more senior members — all while being regularly tested throughout. What little free time you have goes to your family. And after all that, once you’ve earned the privilege to take the Badge Test, you must score at least 95% on the written exam (which is rather generous, all things considered) and generally be perceived a good fit by the leaders of the Tomb. But even earning the Tomb Badge is only a temporary privilege. You have to spend nine successful months at the Tomb for the right to wear it permanently throughout your Army career. And even if a soldier earns permanent wear of the Guard, Tomb of the Unknown Soldier Identification Badge, that privilege can be revoked for a significant disciplinary issue or severe lapse in character. If a soldier moves on with their career and eventually retires and gets convicted of a heinous crime—or even something as garden variety as a DUI—their Tomb Badge can be revoked. Why do all this? Why go through all this? Why is the culture and practice of the Tomb Guard so insanely anal retentive and absurdly extreme? Because it’s not about you. None of this is about you. The spirit of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is about honoring those unidentified service members. Because perfection will never be enough in doing so, perfection becomes the minimum. The leaders of the Tomb don’t want soldiers who are there to earn the Tomb Badge or because they believe it’ll help their careers or even because they’re just looking for a challenge. They want soldiers who are so resolutely committed the actual purpose of The Tomb so thoroughly that it seems embedded in their DNA. It’s no small wonder that even though any soldier in The Old Guard can volunteer for the training process, so few raise their hands. I didn’t raise mine. Nor did most of the soldiers in my infantry company. We knew what to expect, and we had too much respect for the process to volunteer for it without unconditional commitment. So, am I surprised that young man stopped mid-walk and broke his exacting choreography to yell from deep within his gut at Pete Hegseth and the accompanying group to remain silent and respectful on the grounds of the Tomb? No, of course not. His entire life right now is about honoring the Tomb and those unidentified soldiers. That is his sole purpose. My genuine surprise is that even Pete Hegseth—patron dudebro of drunken fratboy bombast—failed to do the bare minimum in that sacred space. For all his clownish nonsense, I would have expected even Hegseth and his group to respect the Tomb. Apparently, they didn’t think the standards of etiquette applied to them. There are hundreds of thousands of children who visit the Tomb annually and remain silent and respectful on those grounds out of no more than basic instinct that this is not the place to misbehave, and yet the sitting Secretary of Defense was unable to meet that standard. When you visit the Tomb, there are literal signs reminding witnesses to be silent and respectful, but even so, just the atmosphere of that space carries enough implication to be on one’s best behavior. The vast majority of folks don’t need a sign to remind them; you can just feel it. And for those who somehow think Hegseth and his group were singled out by the Tomb Guard for laughing and carrying on, you can search online and find *many* videos of Tomb Guards reprimanding people over the years for being loud and disrespectful. The only difference in those videos are that they’re clearly aloof tourists and unknowing kids, not the Secretary of Defense who should know better. Then again, maybe we really are talking about an aloof tourist here. ---- Link to full essay available here for easier sharing: charlotteclymer.substack.com…