The Government failed to stem the military training fatality
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ItÂ’s very disturbing to learn that yet another precious life is lost during commando training yesterday.
Why is peacetime training resulting in many deaths after so many rounds of revision to their rulebook? This should be something that is absolutely preventable with the current stringent standards of training methodology and medical examinations that Ministry of Defence currently upheld.
We have undoubtedly reached the red alert status and should be accorded the highest level of attention from the Singapore Government. How many more Singaporeans must die before they set up an independent inquiry team outside of SAF to look into the underlying causes of training fatalities? We are talking about human lives here! What we need last is media blackout by SAF at the end of each investigation.
Ministry of Defence is accountable for the well being of every person under its charge.
Comments please. -
For those pre-enlistees going for their medical check-up, please declare whatever medical problems you have irregardless. I know some really hope to get into more garang vocations that require pes A, and hide your underlying problems, so as to achieve that pes status. You might think its only going to be your problem, but you must also think who might get into hot soup should something really happen to you.
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i just went for the medical checkup weeks ago at CMPB. Do you sincerely think they are concerned about your health status? I beg to differ. The doctor than attended to me when giving numerous questions at one go, seeming that he just want to rush finish the session.
From what i heard from my friend, the docotr even skipped the step to check his privates. -
i'm pes A...but then...erm...i think one should not be too garang if one cannot tahan the training etc. if not want the thinking soldier for what? might as well revert back to the yes-sir era? u dun really "see" so much of deaths then...
sometimes its ur mind that tells u to go on but ur body says stop. each n every individual must know their limits.
on govt part, they're facilitators. its the superiors that need to undergo re-training again on physical fitness matters. garang in peace time gets u no where. -
so you'd take your reading of the institutional mentality of the SAF from the actions of that single doctor ? .....Originally posted by humjipeng:i just went for the medical checkup weeks ago at CMPB. Do you sincerely think they are concerned about your health status? I beg to differ. The doctor than attended to me when giving numerous questions at one go, seeming that he just want to rush finish the session.
From what i heard from my friend, the docotr even skipped the step to check his privates.
what happens when you go in as part of the SAF then ? ... -
Juz do what is required and needed , risking your body for a few flattering words or Applause is only done during Charity Shows.
This is Singapore , nobody decorates Heroes or their Families.
But charity makes peanuts salaries.
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You just tell them any problems you haveOriginally posted by humjipeng:i just went for the medical checkup weeks ago at CMPB. Do you sincerely think they are concerned about your health status? I beg to differ. The doctor than attended to me when giving numerous questions at one go, seeming that he just want to rush finish the session.
From what i heard from my friend, the docotr even skipped the step to check his privates.
If they still find you fit and anything happens later, they are accountable for it -
can training fatality be totally eradicated?
frankly i dont think so. -
I declared my medical condition too... The question asked was "Can you run?" Of course, I answered, "Yes." The reply which followed was... "Then you have no problem..." I almost ended my life during one of my trainings with SAF during my NSF days too... If not for the fact that my platoon sergeant was around with me (to tekang and sabo me), I probably won't be around to type all these...Originally posted by humjipeng:i just went for the medical checkup weeks ago at CMPB. Do you sincerely think they are concerned about your health status? I beg to differ. The doctor than attended to me when giving numerous questions at one go, seeming that he just want to rush finish the session.
From what i heard from my friend, the docotr even skipped the step to check his privates.
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hmm I think it's impossible to root out accidents and fatalities. Simply because this is army training... not some boy scout camp.. And ofter boy scout camps have also some accident what more its army training. I bet there are more fatalities in the US and Isreali army than in Singapore.
The thing is only voice down to each individual taking good attention to themselves. Knowing their limit and do not act hero in times of trying... I did trying to act hero at some point of my training like most people do but... just be careful... -
Depends one... There're various reasons for 'accidents'....Originally posted by banzie:hmm I think it's impossible to root out accidents and fatalities. Simply because this is army training... not some boy scout camp.. And ofter boy scout camps have also some accident what more its army training. I bet there are more fatalities in the US and Isreali army than in Singapore.
The thing is only voice down to each individual taking good attention to themselves. Knowing their limit and do not act hero in times of trying... I did trying to act hero at some point of my training like most people do but... just be careful... -
While it is true, that some may hide their ills for want of a more "garang" vocation, but really, were we ever allowed to KNOW what TRULY happened?
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I will perceive what i deem fit.Originally posted by Fatum:so you'd take your reading of the institutional mentality of the SAF from the actions of that single doctor ? .....
what happens when you go in as part of the SAF then ? ...
But from your tone, are you a PRO-SAF? Some partisan for em. -
SAF is a cursed organization which boys have to go through. Well, do you think Conscription should be banished? Did SAF make you a better man? Is covering up for medical officer who accused a corporal of malingering died out of a sudden from preventing SAF's name from being tarnished? Is death preventable while serving NS? And most importantly, why are officers being paid so high as much as 6k to feed fishes in the camp? SAF should change its barbaric mentality of its officers and trainings.
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there's no such thing as a thinking solider. soldier= no need for brains, only listen to ordersOriginally posted by tiggersgd:i'm pes A...but then...erm...i think one should not be too garang if one cannot tahan the training etc. if not want the thinking soldier for what? might as well revert back to the yes-sir era? u dun really "see" so much of deaths then...
sometimes its ur mind that tells u to go on but ur body says stop. each n every individual must know their limits.
on govt part, they're facilitators. its the superiors that need to undergo re-training again on physical fitness matters. garang in peace time gets u no where. -
Any tasks of an organisation can easily be performed in simple sets of core tasks to be passed daily in work forms to comply with preset quality-time-cost standards.Originally posted by qpicanto:ItÂ’s very disturbing to learn that yet another precious life is lost during commando training yesterday.
Why is peacetime training resulting in many deaths after so many rounds of revision to their rulebook? This should be something that is absolutely preventable with the current stringent standards of training methodology and medical examinations that Ministry of Defence currently upheld.
We have undoubtedly reached the red alert status and should be accorded the highest level of attention from the Singapore Government. How many more Singaporeans must die before they set up an independent inquiry team outside of SAF to look into the underlying causes of training fatalities? We are talking about human lives here! What we need last is media blackout by SAF at the end of each investigation.
Ministry of Defence is accountable for the well being of every person under its charge.
Comments please.
There is no problem with safety monitoring at all under such hands-on training processes if Ministry of Defence is serious about preventing further accidents.
All physical training sessions can be conducted to comply with quality-time-cost standards, by prescribing core training tasks to be performed and presetting the core tasks to meet requirements.
The quality-time-cost standards will holistically be set to define relevant safety, say with each set task passing physical and prescribed safety standards.
Feedbacks obtained from each session is input in call centre processes to track such requirements. All training tasks will be accomplished to attain both physical, mental and preset safety standards thereby preventing any problems which can easily be spotted with warning signals monitored daily and weekly.
Core tasks so performed consistently and with focus by all in hands-on monitoring to reach objectives and requirements. -
Originally posted by vito_corleone:
"there's no such thing as a thinking solider. soldier= no need for brains, only listen to orders" - I hope you are just simply "clowning around" and not being serious.
there's no such thing as a thinking solider. soldier= no need for brains, only listen to orders
What good is a soldier who simply listen to orders, and do not use his brains to think the best possible way to execute the order, without himself being executed by the order being carried out in the most risky and foolish manner ?
Can Singapore - with a limited resource pool of manpower - afford to have soldiers who do not think ?
Under the present circumstances, there seems to be three weaknesses in the existing SAF :
Weakness #1
over reliance on fresh medical graduate - without any experience - wearing the rank of Captain.
There have been instances when a soldier complaining of pain in his legs were given simple X-Rays that do not pick-up hairline fractures; and sent back for normal training, only to bear the brunt of abuse from commanders who view the soldier as attempting to maligner.
After a long torturous period, the soldier was reviewed by a Private General Practitioner - who is a Reservist Doctor - and was sent to a Government runned Hospital for a CT Scan that picked up multiple hairline fractures on the bones of both legs.
The SAF Doctors were not taken to task, nor their inexperience being exposed.
The unnecessary and prolonged torturous training of the soldier would have crippled him for LIFE.
Weakness #2
Over enthusiastic SAF Instructors, who take themselves too seriously to be RAMBO Veterans, and ignore the advise of Private Doctors, and test results from Government Hospitals, and insist that their personal views of the soldier malingering is correct; and subject the soldier to continuous administrative abuses.
Weakness #3
SAF Counsellors believe in "looking after the SAF" and view the soldier's complains with skepticism.
Unfortnately, in the current incident, the trainee was no ordinary simple soldier, but a Full Lieutenant - with experience enough to know the dangers he is exposing himself to.
Could the SAF Commando training be benchmarked too closely to the US Army Special Forces training ?
A typical US Special Forces soldier will easily weigh at least 90kg, compared to the average Singaporean Asian weight of 55kg to 65kg.
Are the packs and cargo to be carried by our 65kg SAF Commando too ambitious - so as to make our SAF Commando performance equal to that of a 90kg US Special Force soldier ?
Benchmarking ourselves with the best, should be taken with some degree of realistic pragmatism.
The SAF Command should seriously review the entire design plan in the way that they expect our SAF Commandos to perform during war, and if our Commandoes should be expected to physically perform in the same manner as the US or other Caucasian soldiers.
If one 65kg SAF Commando alone cannot match a US 90kg, perhaps two SAF Commandoes should be tasked to do the job, or else redesign the approach that will allow the same task to be accomplished by one SAF Commando. -
all the more we should stage a coup and aid the terrorists to bomb singapore,targeting key members of the Government.Originally posted by qpicanto:ItÂ’s very disturbing to learn that yet another precious life is lost during commando training yesterday.
Why is peacetime training resulting in many deaths after so many rounds of revision to their rulebook? This should be something that is absolutely preventable with the current stringent standards of training methodology and medical examinations that Ministry of Defence currently upheld.
We have undoubtedly reached the red alert status and should be accorded the highest level of attention from the Singapore Government. How many more Singaporeans must die before they set up an independent inquiry team outside of SAF to look into the underlying causes of training fatalities? We are talking about human lives here! What we need last is media blackout by SAF at the end of each investigation.
Ministry of Defence is accountable for the well being of every person under its charge.
Comments please.
If all this fails...a mutiny of the army will at least wake MINDEF up -
One was drowned in sea off Changi Naval Base.
One fell from a chopper while rappelling.
A commando officer drowned in a swimmimg pool. This is the biggest joke in SAF.
Many young men served NS, do their bit as part of a citizen army and move on.
However, the three men who died had one thing in common. They volunteered to be part of a small standing army.
The Mindef must be blamed for making the army life look so rewarding and challenging and glamorous. It's so cool to be part of an elite force.
Mindef can redeem itself by removing these advertisements from th media.
The army's training instructors have also failed. They must be transfered. They cannot even save a trainee in a swimming pool. -
I fully agree. I personally feel it is not constructive to throw comments and criticisms based on just what we heard.Originally posted by banzie:hmm I think it's impossible to root out accidents and fatalities. Simply because this is army training... not some boy scout camp.. And ofter boy scout camps have also some accident what more its army training. I bet there are more fatalities in the US and Isreali army than in Singapore.
The thing is only voice down to each individual taking good attention to themselves. Knowing their limit and do not act hero in times of trying... I did trying to act hero at some point of my training like most people do but... just be careful...
We could wait for the outcome of investigations, but then, cynical individuals would still choose to perceive political appropriateness or possible cover-ups. So it also boils down to the person who perceives the matter.
Being too emotional about the issue is not helpful. Reminding our love ones to take good attention and care of themselves - that's more important, and at least, that is within our most immediate control. -
It's good points you've raised and it's comforting to realise people do dissect the problem of serious medical illnesses mistaken for maligaring.Originally posted by Atobe:"there's no such thing as a thinking solider. soldier= no need for brains, only listen to orders" - I hope you are just simply "clowning around" and not being serious.
What good is a soldier who simply listen to orders, and do not use his brains to think the best possible way to execute the order, without himself being executed by the order being carried out in the most risky and foolish manner ?
Can Singapore - with a limited resource pool of manpower - afford to have soldiers who do not think ?
Under the present circumstances, there seems to be three weaknesses in the existing SAF :
Weakness #1
over reliance on fresh medical graduate - without any experience - wearing the rank of Captain.
There have been instances when a soldier complaining of pain in his legs were given simple X-Rays that do not pick-up hairline fractures; and sent back for normal training, only to bear the brunt of abuse from commanders who view the soldier as attempting to maligner.
After a long torturous period, the soldier was reviewed by a Private General Practitioner - who is a Reservist Doctor - and was sent to a Government runned Hospital for a CT Scan that picked up multiple hairline fractures on the bones of both legs.
The SAF Doctors were not taken to task, nor their inexperience being exposed.
The unnecessary and prolonged torturous training of the soldier would have crippled him for LIFE.
Weakness #2
Over enthusiastic SAF Instructors, who take themselves too seriously to be RAMBO Veterans, and ignore the advise of Private Doctors, and test results from Government Hospitals, and insist that their personal views of the soldier malingering is correct; and subject the soldier to continuous administrative abuses.
Weakness #3
SAF Counsellors believe in "looking after the SAF" and view the soldier's complains with skepticism.
Unfortnately, in the current incident, the trainee was no ordinary simple soldier, but a Full Lieutenant - with experience enough to know the dangers he is exposing himself to.
Could the SAF Commando training be benchmarked too closely to the US Army Special Forces training ?
A typical US Special Forces soldier will easily weigh at least 90kg, compared to the average Singaporean Asian weight of 55kg to 65kg.
Are the packs and cargo to be carried by our 65kg SAF Commando too ambitious - so as to make our SAF Commando performance equal to that of a 90kg US Special Force soldier ?
Benchmarking ourselves with the best, should be taken with some degree of realistic pragmatism.
The SAF Command should seriously review the entire design plan in the way that they expect our SAF Commandos to perform during war, and if our Commandoes should be expected to physically perform in the same manner as the US or other Caucasian soldiers.
If one 65kg SAF Commando alone cannot match a US 90kg, perhaps two SAF Commandoes should be tasked to do the job, or else redesign the approach that will allow the same task to be accomplished by one SAF Commando.
Our MOs simply lack the experience needed to correctly diagnose a patient, or alternatively seek other forms of medical advice. It's much like being confused between knowing what you should do, and what you can do.
It is indirectly written that an MO must be able to weed out the 'chao keng' from the genuine cases. But with a line equivalent to people queueing up for 4D, time pressure becomes a problem. Coupled by the fact that the status of men are determined by them, and it ultimately impacts their units, it creates 2 kinds of MOs: The 'chao keng' catcher or the 'welfare MO'.
As the name inplies, one simply signs off 'Att A' for every soldier with minor injuries or illness and believes everyone reporting sick is out to con the SAF. The other prefers to err on the side of caution and cover his backside, prefering to reflect an 'ATT B' status.
As a result, our own system is helping neither correctly assess the true nature of the soldier inbetween. -
Originally posted by BillyBong:
It was comforting to note from my discussion with the SAF Reservist Doctor - in Private Practice - that he was simply baffled at the attitude of the current SAF Doctors, who seemed to be more concerned with filtering out malingers, then discovering if the problem is due to real medical issues - physical or psychological.
It's good points you've raised and it's comforting to realise people do dissect the problem of serious medical illnesses mistaken for maligaring.
Our MOs simply lack the experience needed to correctly diagnose a patient, or alternatively seek other forms of medical advice. It's much like being confused between knowing what you should do, and what you can do.
It is indirectly written that an MO must be able to weed out the 'chao keng' from the genuine cases. But with a line equivalent to people queueing up for 4D, time pressure becomes a problem. Coupled by the fact that the status of men are determined by them, and it ultimately impacts their units, it creates 2 kinds of MOs: The 'chao keng' catcher or the 'welfare MO'.
As the name inplies, one simply signs off 'Att A' for every soldier with minor injuries or illness and believes everyone reporting sick is out to con the SAF. The other prefers to err on the side of caution and cover his backside, prefering to reflect an 'ATT B' status.
As a result, our own system is helping neither correctly assess the true nature of the soldier inbetween.
It is unfortunate that despite spending many years as an under-graduate and in housemanship before graduating, our young SAF Doctors - graduating at an average age of 26 years - are still unable to be circumspect in discerning real medical situations from malingering.
This will beg the question often asked - why should a Medical graduate be given the commissioned rank of Captain, while an Engineering or Architectural or other Professional Degree holder do not enjoy such rank advancement ?
The professional medical reputation of the SAF seems to be advanced by those in the Reserve while in Private Practice, and also supported by the Public Medical Service.
This SAF Medical Reputation is sitting on fragile ground with young medical graduates acting as SAF Doctors, who wrongly believe too seriously of their own capability upon attaining the given rank of Captain. -
The local print media is very quiet about it.
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As for the issue of blaming the govt for SAF fatalities, i think it's unfair to lump the sole blame and lay it on their doorstep.
As with the dunking incident, the procedures and SAF doctrines were there. The oversealous trainers simply IGNORED them. Afterwards, they even tried to cover up their negligence. So really, it is the individuals on the ground who shoudl deservedly be punished for such gung-ho acts that contravene the safety directives.
As with Lt Lin who drowned, it was the trainers who failed to be observant, an almost carbon copy of the drowning incident involving the specialist going for SOF selection. Despite the numerous pairs of eyes deployed on the training site, not one noticed that the trainee had gone under and it was in fact the conducting officer, after perfoming a headcount, who realised one person was missing.
Were the necessary precautions taken during the training? Definitely. What was the real cause?
HUMAN FACTOR.
The fact is, anyone can flood the training doctrine with a myriad of directives to follow. It's really whether the trainers follow dilligently, or blatantly disregard them. -
SAF has the most outdated technology and IT solutions. But they have the most updated death cases every year.