Lasting Friendships
Tightening Bonds Between Members
“The first time we went [to Germany], the rear gunner thought he ought to go before he got on the plane,’ Ben Cecil, a wireless operator, remembered. ‘First time it was only him. But we went on the raid and came back and thought, “Oh, perhaps that [urinating on the tailwheel assembly] had something to do with it [i.e. returning safely].” After that we always did it” (MacKenzie 2015, 395).
There is no denying that members of the military experience the worst behaviors that mankind is capable of; however, it is through these shared experiences that service members are able to create deep bonds with one another. Out of these bonds, superstitions that arise from an individual may be passed on and shared with the group. As is important in all types of folk groups, the informal communication about the values, rules, and beliefs help strengthen the group identity and indoctrinate new members into the culture of the group (Sims and Stephens 2011).
To illustrate the importance that service members place on group membership, it became a superstitious belief among pilot crews that the addition of a new member or a whole new crew was bad luck. This is because, “Ever since being brought together late in their training, the five or seven members of a bomber crew had been operating as a unit both in the air and on the ground. They had grown to recognize each other’s strengths and weaknesses, quirks and habits, and thereby had developed a significant degree of mutual trust” (MacKenzie 2015, 395). Understandably, the close bonds developed between members of the group would be disrupted by “spare members” joining and was considered an unwilling risk to the safety of the folk group. This same thinking also applied to journalists or flight surgeons or anybody else not on the regular crew who wished to join the flight (Wallrich 1960, 14).
Another example lies in a tale from my veteran neighbor Mike. He recalls creating an effigy of an officer he served with, who may have been a little over zealous about his career. Mike explained how he took a Woody Doll and had a uniform made for him with the officer’s nametag on it. He laughed as he told how he took that doll on every mission and how fellow members of the crew would look at the doll and say, “Hey I know that guy!”. From Mike’s point of view, the doll provided a measure of humor in a very non-humorous situation (Personal Interview 2018). As Sims and Stephens discuss, humor provides a way for people to cope with uncomfortable situations (2011c). Thus, Mike’s creation enabled each member of the group a way to express their feelings and shared experience of working with said officer, thereby tightening the bond between members.
A similar thing occurred with the Thud pilots of Vietnam. In the face of likely death, some pilots were overly positive, prompting jokes about, “the definition of the ultimate optimist: an F-105 pilot who quits smoking because he is afraid of dying from lung cancer, or the one who buys the large economy-size toothpaste tube” (MacKenzie 2017, 784). These types of jokes provided members of the military a way to share their fears and anxieties about the circumstances of their profession with other members, enabling them to reinforce their group identity.
From the film Hot Shots!, a pilot nicknamed Dead Meat exemplifies the "ultimate optimist".
Finally, while certain superstitions and rituals that develop among service members may be against regulations, most of them are supported by the upper echelon because they recognize how these behaviors work to create unit cohesion and increase mission success. For instance, a superstition that emerged among World War II bomber crews dictated that, “if caught in a radar-directed searchlight beam, they could escape by activating the IFF (Identification Friend or Foe) set” (MacKenzie 2015, 398). While analysts proved that the belief in this practice was not only false, but could potentially be used by the enemy to target them, the behavior had such a strong influence on the success of missions that it was allowed to continue (MacKenzie 2015, 398). Similarly, an officer in charge of designing a new badge for aviation members was careful to create it with, “12 feathers rather than 13” (MacKenzie 2015, 399). By tolerating superstitious behaviors during times of war that would otherwise be prohibited, those in command legitimize the beliefs, attitudes, and values of their soldiers.
These superstitions and ritual behaviors become part of the tradition within the group because as Sims and Stephens assert, “a group repeats something because it matters to the group; if it isn’t meaningful, it won’t be repeated, and if it isn’t repeated, it won’t become a tradition” (2011a, 71). In this way, military members are able to continue behaviors that strengthen their internal bond with one another and establish the folklore that forges unique group identities.
RAF 12 Feathered Aviation Badge
For a further look into the depth in which military members develop bonds with one another, check out the articles below:
1. A look at a veteran’s transition to civilian life.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/national/2014/04/19/ugh-i-miss-it/
2. Soldier’s describe in their own words the friendships created while deployed.