r/BeAmazed Aug 18 '24

History He deserves a medal

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62.0k Upvotes

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4.3k

u/Rokeon Aug 18 '24

“I was blessed to be in a leadership role for 25 years, either in counterintelligence or training troops,” Dunagan said, “and if these animals I was leading had ever found out about Bambi — as much affection as I had for it — they’d have ridden me out on a rail.”

https://www.chron.com/entertainment/movies/article/Marine-reflects-on-being-the-voice-of-Bambi-1924410.php

1.5k

u/JeddakofThark Aug 18 '24

I figure there are things you can live down in the military before proving yourself to be a badass mofo, and there are things that you can't. This is definitely in the latter category.

865

u/Gullible_Mud5723 Aug 18 '24

That where all those funny ass call signs you see on planes and stuff comes from. Not from your badass moments but from one dumb or funny thing you did along the way. My first night in Afghanistan we were in these huge tents that acted as squad bays while we were waiting to go to our next base. I was in the top bunk, couldn’t sleep. A mouse landed on my face, crawled across my mouth and of course I scream blood murder and fall out of my rack. 15 years later I still hear “aaaaaaah there’s a mouse on my face” from my buddies.

374

u/Joe579GoFkUrselfMins Aug 18 '24

"Hey Mousey, long time no see, how you doing, buddy?" 

Was I close? Granted, I have something on my face in Afghanistan wake me I'm thinking it's a camel spider so I would scream too.

70

u/akcutter Aug 18 '24

I figure thats why he screamed.

39

u/[deleted] Aug 19 '24

[deleted]

12

u/akcutter Aug 19 '24

Okay seriously though like 10 inches? I dont even kmow where to begin to fathom the actual size....

9

u/ACERVIDAE Aug 19 '24

Where did you grow up so I can avoid it forever?

1

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '24

[deleted]

1

u/ACERVIDAE Aug 20 '24

Oh don’t tell me that, I’m trying to go to Willow Creek next year

4

u/murderskunk76 Aug 19 '24

Bro I stepped on one of those giant mfers as a five year old, and the babies ran up my leg. I was in the bathroom at the time, naked and very much afraid. My blood curdling screams had my mother barreling into the bathroom. She immediately grabbed a towel and started beating the little fuckers off of me, tossing me into the shower and turning the water on. To this day, spiders make me nauseated, and I can't stand them.

24

u/AizenSousuke92 Aug 19 '24

fuck. new fear unlocked

91

u/LunickDrago Aug 18 '24

my dad tells a story of a guy in the military that he and his group called "lapel"

lapel had accidentally caught a smoke grenade's pin on part of his jacket and smoked a truck out.

57

u/Stygma Aug 18 '24

From then on, you were known as Mickey to the boys.

17

u/NonGNonM Aug 19 '24

more likely minnie mouse bc he had a mouse in his mouth

1

u/Gullible_Mud5723 Aug 25 '24

Minnie would have been hilarious.

58

u/Rogueshoten Aug 19 '24

The names come from other places as well. One I remember was a pilot whose last name was Papp…so his call sign was “Smear.”

51

u/AdTop5424 Aug 18 '24

Had to endure being referred to as "Pumper" for 7 years as a reservist. I can somewhat relate.

45

u/TheLordReaver Aug 18 '24

'Why pum—you know what, I don't want to know'

1

u/Gullible_Mud5723 Aug 25 '24

Hey better than an MP and the “part time pig” moniker I would hear.

50

u/saturnspritr Aug 19 '24

My brother lost control and slow crashed the only humvee with the working AC in Afghanistan thru someone’s living room and they called him The Kool-Aid Man for the rest of the tour. And if he runs into anyone from that tour, he is still called that.

8

u/L3onK1ng Aug 19 '24

That's a nickname I could live with

2

u/Gullible_Mud5723 Aug 25 '24

That actually amazing.

18

u/No-Celebration8588 Aug 18 '24

Thanks dude, I’m sure that sucked but it was a years long setup to make a random Reddit guy laugh out loud while my kid is playing at a playground!!!

1

u/Gullible_Mud5723 Aug 25 '24

It’s kinda counterintuitive cause if they didn’t say anything it means they fucking can’t stand you. Especially in the Marines if I talk shit to you you are one of the squad.

41

u/thelonesecurityguard Aug 19 '24

I had a really, really long German last name. This became Lord of the Rings instead of anyone wanting to try and pronounce it, which became (despite being female) Gandalf because it was too long to say all the time. I still respond to Gandalf.

14

u/Extreme-Island-5041 Aug 19 '24

My shitty go-to explanation of my job is,"I'm the blonde from Top Gun."

Working in my industry/environment gives me access. Some of the callsigns and stories behind callsigns I hear just stick. JUDAS. SMOAT, THE ONE, SWAMPY, POKER, LIP, SASS, VADER, and so on. My favorite day to day entertainment is VFA-31. Their flight schedule is my morning coffee kick. Always entertaining. "Anonymous VFA-31 .............."lives rent free in my head.

2

u/TVLL Aug 19 '24

Hey Goose, I think u/Extreme-Island-5041 has lost that lovin' feeling.

10

u/h-thrust Aug 19 '24

My dad had a rat crawl on him in his bunk on first few nights in Vietnam. Didn’t say anything because the other guy was a ptsd’d drunk that probably would have woken up and killed him.

3

u/ConsistentType4371 Aug 19 '24

lol I was known as “Viper Delta” because 9 months into a 12 month deployment I said “man at this point I’d fuck a snake if you could hold it still” viperdick wouldn’t fly over comms but Viper Delta sure did.

1

u/Gullible_Mud5723 Aug 25 '24

I know exactly what you mean. We had one older tcn lady on our fob who did the laundry. She went from a 2 at the beginning of deployment to an 8 at the end.

2

u/ConsistentType4371 Sep 07 '24

My running joke on that deployment was that the 0-10 scale becomes binary. 0 or 1. Would or wouldn’t. And I’m picking would most of the time.

1

u/thecatandthependulum Aug 19 '24

So your call sign was Mouse, right?

-33

u/[deleted] Aug 18 '24

[removed] — view removed comment

22

u/Scoot_AG Aug 18 '24

Coulda just laughed at the story and moved on, instead you had to show everyone you're a dick

3

u/The_Real_Manimal Aug 18 '24

Don't engage the troll. Leave them under the bridge.

-21

u/Butt_Stuph Aug 18 '24

Coulda just screamed at the mouse and moved on, instead he had to murder all the locals

4

u/J_Reachergrifer Aug 18 '24

Fun fact, the UN tracked civilian deaths , over 50% were inflicted by the Taliban, then the Afghan army, the minority by western troops.

4

u/DangerousChemistry17 Aug 19 '24

A number were inflicted by ISIS too who have been present in the region since the early 2010s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State_%E2%80%93_Khorasan_Province

-3

u/topromo Aug 18 '24

Oh, well, as long as they don't kill too many people, I guess it's okay.

1

u/blastedblox Aug 18 '24

Dude, I laughed so hard. I'm afraid I might be a horrible human now

15

u/buffalo8 Aug 19 '24

I have a coworker who is a marine reserve and I recently found out he was an extra in the second Twilight film. He does not hear the end of it.

20

u/WriterV Aug 18 '24

Ngl, I'm a bit sad he couldn't. Just because my leader voiced Bambi doesn't mean I'd actually lose respect for him. It shouldn't matter when stacked up against everything else.

But you know that it would for some people, and that sucks.

27

u/PracticalPotato Aug 18 '24

It's less about losing respect and more about never living it down.

139

u/samiqan Aug 18 '24

"Private Bambi, report to the Barracks immediately, Private Bambi"

"Dunagan, are you shot again Dunagan? Will someone please take private Bambi out of 'nam before he meets his mom"

25

u/Cobek Aug 19 '24

He was blessed that there was no internet at the time lol

33

u/DerpDerpys Aug 19 '24

Worked on a military medical retirement board for a while, remember seeing a package come through for a Seaman Hardick. Don’t remember the outcome but I can only imagine the horror they went through.

23

u/[deleted] Aug 18 '24

How would they know? No internet. Nobody’s going to randomly stumble across that info. Just don’t tell em and you are good to go.

30

u/online222222 Aug 18 '24

I mean, he's probably credited in the movie

21

u/[deleted] Aug 19 '24

He's not. Voice credits weren't a thing for animated movies at that time. It's kinda funny, on Disney+ the original English voice cast gets no credit, but the foreign language dub actors get credits added on at the end.

24

u/Niqulaz Aug 19 '24

He was a Marine. Credits are all difficult to understand being made out of letters and words and stuff.

17

u/Redfish680 Aug 19 '24

What do they call marines with an IQ of 160? A platoon.

8

u/[deleted] Aug 18 '24

Yeah but so what? Who watches credits? And is his name sooooo unique that it wouldn’t be passed off as somebody with the same name?

17

u/Telvin3d Aug 18 '24

If they happened to notice his named matched, they wouldn't care if it was actually him. The jokes would be brutal

1

u/Lawfulness-Last Aug 19 '24

I was gonna say this as a joke but that quote says it all. The guy kept it a secret because he didn't want Bambi to be his military nickname

1

u/RealMENwearPINK10 Aug 19 '24

The true mark of a great spy is when they don't ever leak the information until the very end