Mindhunter by Mark Olshaker John Douglas Read Free Book Online Page B

cracking as I went down. I’d had cartilage taken out of my knee from foot ball, just like Joe Namath, but he must have had a better lawyer. They held up the decision on me for a while, but eventually I was informed that Uncle Sam did, indeed, want me. Rather than take my chances in the Army, I quickly signed up for the Air Force, even though it meant a four-year hitch, figuring there were better educa tional opportunities there. Maybe that was just what I needed. I sure as hell hadn’t made much of educational oppor tunities in New York or Montana.
    There was another reason for going for the Air Force at that point. This was 1966 and Vietnam was escalating. I wasn’t terribly political, generally considering myself a Kennedy Democrat because of my father, who was an official of the Long Island printers’ union. But the notion of having my ass shot off in support of a cause I under stood only vaguely wasn’t all that appealing. I’d remem bered an Air Force mechanic once telling me that they were the only service in which the officers—the pilots—went into combat while the enlisted men stayed back to support them. Having no inten tion of becoming a pilot, that sounded okay to me.
    I was sent to Amarillo, Texas, for basic training. Our flight (what an Air Force training class is called) of fifty was about evenly divided between New Yorkers like myself and southern boys from Louisiana. The drill instructor was always on the northerners’ asses, and most of the time I thought it was justified. I tended to hang around with the southern ers, whom I found more likable and far less obnoxious than my fellow New Yorkers.
    For a lot of young men, basic training is a stressful experience. With all the discipline I’d experienced from coaches in team contact sports, and as much of a jerk-off as I’d acknowledged to myself I’d been the last several years, I found the DI’s rap almost a joke. I could see through all his head trips and psych jobs, and I was already in good physical condition, so basic training was kind of a snap for me. I qualified quickly as an expert marksman on the M16, which was probably a carryover from the aim I’d developed as a high school pitcher. Up until the Air Force, the only riflery experience I’d had was shooting out streetlamps with a BB gun as a young teen.
    During basic training I was developing another sort of badass reputation. Pumped up from lifting weights and with my head shaved close, I became known as "the Russian Bear." A guy in another flight had a similar reputation, and someone got the bright idea that it would be good for base morale if we boxed each other.
    The bout was a big event on base. We were very evenly matched, and each of us refused to give an inch. We ended up beating the holy hell out of each other, and I got my nose broken for the third time (the first two having come during high school football).
    For whatever it was worth, I ended up third out of the fifty in my flight. After basic training, I was given a battery of tests and told I was well qualified for radio-intercept school. But radio-intercept school was filled and I didn’t feel like waiting around until the next class began, so they made me a clerk typist—even though I couldn’t type. There was an opening in Personnel at Cannon Air Force Base, about a hundred miles away outside of Clovis, New Mexico.
    So that’s where I ended up, spending all day long pecking out DD214s—mili tary discharge papers—with two fingers, working for this idiot sergeant and saying to myself,
I have to get out of here.
    Again, here’s where my luck comes in. Right next door to Personnel was Special Services. When I say this, most people think of Special Forces, like the Green Berets. But this was Special Services, specifically, Special Services—Athletics. With my background, that seemed an excellent way to defend my country in its time of need.
    I start snooping around, listening at the door, and I hear one of the guys