Whoever saiid that war is hell was probably someone who expected to be able to go to war, and still be able to get a good night’s sleep out of the deal. Any person who expects to be able to fight to that extend, and be able to sleep a fully refreshing eight hours, must have been told a story by their recruiter. It is pretty obvious to any new person going into the military that sleep is a precious luxury that they can enjoy a whole lot more of after they have retired and gone home. For the time that they are on active duty, sleeping just does not happen to the extent that a human body ideally desires, which is probably among the reasons why the military tends to recruit young people who can shrug it off.
While burning the candle at both ends is not a very healthy practice, it is a whole lot healthier to be conditioned to the lack of sleep from months or years of training, than it is to suddenly have a lack of sleep thrust upon you. As someone once said, a person performs as they train. So the unfortunate soldier just has to grin and bear it when their eyelids want to droop, and when the constant cycle of “hurry up and wait” carries on for hours and hours.
Really, it is a very good thing that the military keeps a watchful (if a wary) eye on the world. After all, a sleeping military would find it very hard to protect anyone, let alone go on an aggressive campaign of conquest or a preemptive strike. Since being alert as much as possible is pretty much what the military is all about, hibernating is just not an option. After all, the enemy is probably doing the same thing, and watching to see whose eyes are going to droop first. And drooping can have some seriously dire consequences.