| WINTER 1962. |
| HOW TO BE INSPECTED. |
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| PLEASE QUOTE REF: lead092 |
| "Excuse me, sir; do you know anything about a Commandant's Inspection?" |
| This article is addressed to Platoon Commanders, but may of course be used as a guide at higher or lower levels. |
| There are, first of all, three basic principles with regard to inspections, which must be borne in mind at all times. Firstly, the inspecting officer must only see what you want him to see; secondly, thorough preparation is essential, and thirdly, rehearsals must be carried out to ensure correct timings. |
| Now see how these principles work in practice, let us take a hypothetical case. Imagine an inspection of your barrack room is to take place on Saturday morning. |
| THE PREPARATIONS |
| The first thing to do is to go into a huddle and work out who should go special sick on Saturday, how you are going to make up the more obvious of your deficiencies, and a time plan. From now on, details should be sent out to beg, borrow or acquire deficient brooms, fire buckets, etc. As much as possible should be sent to the laundry and boots despatched to the repairers. A word about the time plan: the inspection must be taken at a slow pace so that various items of personal kit and occasional bodies may be moved from one barrack room to another. |
| At last, after a great deal of painstaking preparation, we come to the inspection itself. The uninhabited rooms should be the first to be inspected. It is advisable to have just one plug or chain missing, to allow the inspecting officer to get rid of a little anger on these inanimate objects, so it is not all reserved for your "animate objects" waiting in the barrack room. |
| FACE TO FACE |
| In the barrack room itself, the Junior Leaders should be standing by their beds. If all buttons are fastened, there is every chance of success. If spoken to, the Junior Leader should reply "Sir!" to every question. If asked to produce anything, the standard replies are either, "In for repair, Sir!" or "Laundry, Sir!" It is advisable however, for at least every third Junior Leader to have the item requested, even if it is not his own. |
| For the rest, rehearsal is the answer. With practice and experience, belts, mess tins and spare socks can be interchanged with dexterity and speed. If it can also be arranged that a few people are walking about during the inspection, practically anything can be managed. The opportunities are limitless. |
| C.O.B. |
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