In December of 69, I was in AIT at Fort Lewis, WA. We were going from class to class with our web gear on and at every station we would take it off and put it on (over and over).

One guy got tired of this, and he said under his breath. “put it on, take it off, put it on, take it off” and the Drill Sergeant overheard him. The Drill Sergeant asked, “who said that?” and no one said a thing. So he made us go on all fours. We were there for about 5 or 6 minutes and he asked again, and out of nowhere we all said, “Merry Christmas Drill Sergeant” and for a few minutes the Drill Sergeant didn’t know what to do.

Then he said “Get up” and he walked away. This is what I remember about AIT training.