Un-Diplomatic

Un-Diplomatic

What If Full Metal Jacket Was The Only Thing You Knew About the Military?

How Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece got me all too ready for basic training.

Un-Diplomatic
Mar 24, 2025
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I first watched Full Metal Jacket in high school, in 1999, as a way to school myself up on what basic training would be like.1 This was a time before reality TV shows about the military and the ability to “Google” anything you wanted to know. I was grasping at straws.

The films available for me to study were basically GI Jane (where Demi Moore shaves her…

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