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Pesticide20 posted:Never join the military
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Oct 3, 2017 23:55
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| # ? May 12, 2024 19:38 |
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Pesticide20 posted:Never join the military
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Oct 4, 2017 00:12
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Advise taken, thank you for saving me a lot of time.
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Oct 4, 2017 00:41
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Another GIP feel good story.
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Oct 4, 2017 00:45
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You didn't have what it takes anyways. Someone really meant for the military would have ignored us. You ain't dumb enough boy.
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Oct 4, 2017 00:57
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I should write my experience into a concise post and we can make it required reading for people thinking about joining the military.
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Oct 4, 2017 03:14
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There's no reason to hold back. Make it something you can expand into an actual biography
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Oct 4, 2017 03:23
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Syrian Lannister posted:Never join the military. At 32 in OCS you're gonna feel like a used tire full of holes. Plus above.
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Oct 5, 2017 21:29
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32 is too old for OCS anyway, 30 is the cut off Unless your prior service anyway, 30 for college option OCS
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Oct 6, 2017 01:34
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Having a pulse should be the cutoff if you're smart.
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Oct 6, 2017 02:06
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Oct 11, 2017 05:57
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Mustang posted:32 is too old for OCS anyway, 30 is the cut off I just spoke with an army recruiter earlier today and he told me the max age is actually 31, so once you turn 32 you're cut off. I asked about this specifically because I am currently 31. For reserves, the age cutoff is 35. I know people are going to say "don't join you idiot" but I'm looking into some branch's officer reserves as an option. I figured being a pilot would be cool (I got Lasik and ended up with 20/15 vision), but who knows what the gently caress I'd end up as, since apparently you get no real say in the matter. And I'm good at making terrible life decisions--what's one more? 
Dick Burglar fucked around with this message at 00:00 on Oct 14, 2017 |
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Oct 13, 2017 23:57
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Don't loving do it
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Oct 14, 2017 00:04
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Double posting but read through the post history of Mustang in the army thread and realize that you can avoid a shitload of trouble and stress by just not joining.
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Oct 14, 2017 00:05
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Dick Burglar posted:I just spoke with an army recruiter earlier today and he told me the max age is actually 31, so once you turn 32 you're cut off. I asked about this specifically because I am currently 31. For reserves, the age cutoff is 35. You're dumb as gently caress
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Oct 14, 2017 00:14
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Indeed I am. Story of my life.
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Oct 14, 2017 00:15
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Just loving do iiiiiitttttt.
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Oct 14, 2017 00:17
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Well I have likely at least a few months to sit on it, because reasons. I know the general sentiment is "don't do it," but can anyone explain to me the actual process of OCS and MOS selection and all that goes into it? Specifically for reserves, if it matters. I have a college degree so I'm past that hurdle at least. The recruiter (and I trust recruiters about as far as I can throw them) told me I would technically enlist, then be sent to OCS. After passing OCS you talk to the different branches and then you give them a wishlist of officer MOSs. Then the army picks your officer MOS regardless of your wishlist. Is this accurate? The first part, specifically "you technically enlist but then you're guaranteed to end up in OCS" bit sounds like typical recruiter shady bullshit to me.
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Oct 14, 2017 00:22
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gently caress that poo poo and go active duty enlisted Navy.
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Oct 14, 2017 01:03
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I'm an OCS officer and I can give you a run down of how it works whenever I get home You can look through my post history is this thread too, I think it's the same one I posted in. Edit: never mind, doesn't look like it
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Oct 14, 2017 01:11
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I noticed this 27) I'm worried I did _________________ and won't get a security clearance. Help! While hard drugs or patterns of addiction will disqualify you, the biggest issues are lying (DO NEVER LIE) and having a lot of debt, or some debt with no record of mitigation. Check http://www.dod.mil/dodgc/doha/industrial/ for actual cases to see why clearances were granted or denied. is that a certain problematic issue if one is considering officer training school?
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Oct 14, 2017 03:22
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Dick Burglar posted:I just spoke with an army recruiter earlier today and he told me the max age is actually 31, so once you turn 32 you're cut off. I asked about this specifically because I am currently 31. For reserves, the age cutoff is 35. You realize the people saying "don't join you idiot" usually have very good reasons for saying so? Under the "Total Force" concept, the reserves and NG (across all services) no longer get the old hand-me-downs like in decades past...the ANG flew F-106s almost into the 1990s, but nowadays Virginia has an ANG fighter wing that actually flies F-22s. The tradeoff is that they have a relatively equal share of deployments. So just because you're looking at the reserves doesn't mean you're going to pull a GWB and stay home...if it's any kind of operational career field, you're going downrange. And it's going to gently caress with your civilian job/family life. Here's a fun mental exercise: USAF fighter pilots approaching the end of their commitments are being offered a retention bonus of up to $455,000. Taking the full amount carries a pilot into military retirement (which pays usually a 50% pension starting immediately, it doesn't wait until you're 65), paying out $35k per year over 13 years (again, that's a BONUS on top of base pay, flight pay, COLA, housing and subsistence allowances). The previous max was 432k at 25k/year...and as you can tell, it didn't work. Retention numbers were still awful, and the AF is still at "crisis levels" of manning. Now, how bad must things be for a fighter pilot, who is guaranteed to get laid in at least 75% of bars across the country and earning 7 figures in roughly 8 years of having one of the coolest goddamned jobs in the entire world, to turn down almost half a million dollars and a federal pension at the halfway point?
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Oct 14, 2017 04:58
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I used to smoke weed, admitted it and it's in my record. Was asked about it during my OCS board and here I am. Don't lie about it and give good answers. For the OCS contract: do good on your PT test, as close to 300 as you can get. You're competing with other people for your contract and being fit is important, especially if you become a combat arms officer. You're going to go before a board of your recruiting battalions most senior officers, so a lieutenant colonel or major and some captains. They're going to ask you a bunch of questions for 30 minutes to an hour to determine if they think you'd be a good officer. You pass your board, enlist and sign your OCS contract and then you get a ship date. You go to the same exact basic training that everyone else that enlists go to. Your drill sergeants will be able to identify you as an officer candidate based off your MOS, 09S. As long as you perform well they probably won't bother you at all, maybe put you in leadership positions like being platoon guide or something. If you're either weak or an idiot then they will make your life hell because there's way they ever want to work for an officer like that. Immediately after basic training you go to OCS. Depending on how many people show up, you may have to class up to start the next class. This basically means the people with the highest PT scores get in the class until there aren't any slots left. Theoretically you could be waiting a very long time before classing up but this is unlikely. These days there probably aren't many classes that get to maximum capacity. The main events that get people recycled or dropped from OCS are land nav, leadership positions, squad lanes, and the history test. Fail an event once and you retest, fail twice and you recycle to the next class. Fail a third time and you're dropped from OCS. Branching: OCS gets whatever slots are currently needed to be filled by the Army. They are different for every class. You pick your branch by order of merit, so being number one in your class means you get first pick. If you class up immediately upon getting to OCS you're looking at about 6 months straight of living and breathing nothing but the Army 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I personally didn't think it was hard but you will have no freedom and you probably won't get much sleep. In OCS you're basically responsible for making sure all the legwork of your training happens. Candidates in leadership positions actually have quite a bit to do on top of what they're already doing for the course requirements. Once you graduate and commission you immediately leave to go to get your branch training. To branch aviation as an active duty candidate is possible but you won't have the time to put in the leg work to meet all the additional requirements for aviation. Particularly if you branch infantry or armor, you will find yourself in many physically and mentally unpleasant situations. Often both at the same time. It's not super hard but it definitely sucks nonetheless. If you're weak or can't run you will immediately be considered a poo poo bag and that's a hole that's difficult to dig yourself out of. I don't at all regret joining but I definitely don't want to do this for 20 years. You're going to be putting in a lot of hours and be given more work than you realistically have time to accomplish. Social events aren't going to be optional for you. Well, technically they are but it's not a good idea to miss too many. Good work is going to be rewarded with more work while your shitbag counterpart skates by doing jack poo poo because no one would even trust him with the simplest of tasks and he's stuck there until he does something bad enough to get him kicked out, which probably isn't going to happen.
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Oct 14, 2017 05:32
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Go national guard infantry and die a really dumb, preventable death. OCS has good chow though. At least I think it was OCS. A few blocks from Ranger HQ in Benning, right?
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Oct 14, 2017 09:22
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Active duty infantry you loving pussy
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Oct 14, 2017 10:35
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Nostalgia4Murder posted:Active duty infantry you loving pussy
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Oct 14, 2017 12:07
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Dick Burglar posted:
It would be helpful to know why you are considering it, what you hope to gain, what your life situation is right now, etc before someone can give decent advice aside from a knee-jerk "never join" and a dumb and/or sadistic "DO IT NOW"
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Oct 14, 2017 14:27
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It sounds like he wants a part-time job. GO BE A DOOR GREETER AT WALMART.
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Oct 14, 2017 18:58
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mlmp08 posted:It would be helpful to know why you are considering it, what you hope to gain, what your life situation is right now, etc before someone can give decent advice aside from a knee-jerk "never join" and a dumb and/or sadistic "DO IT NOW" I'm 31 now and I have wanted to do something in the military since I was a teenager, but things always seemed to fall through. I completed paramedic school at end of 2016 and decided it wasn't really what I wanted to do, and I didn't think I'd be able to do firefighter or LEO for reasons. I decided to aim for med school instead, and that way I could join the reserves as a mil doc. I was disappointed that I'd be unable to do anything as a first responder, though, because I really liked the general idea, just not as a paramedic. But now I've come to realize that I don't want to be in school til I'm 40. So I'm working on getting on the LEO path instead. As a result I won't be able to go in as a mil doc obviously, so I'm exploring the option of going in as an officer of some other sort instead.
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Oct 14, 2017 20:47
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 Enjoy being a Security Forces officer, supervising the enlistees who scored high enough to join the AF but not high enough to hand out towels at the gym.
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Oct 14, 2017 20:50
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Dick Burglar posted:I'm 31 now and I have wanted to do something in the military since I was a teenager, but things always seemed to fall through. I completed paramedic school at end of 2016 and decided it wasn't really what I wanted to do, and I didn't think I'd be able to do firefighter or LEO for reasons. I decided to aim for med school instead, and that way I could join the reserves as a mil doc. I was disappointed that I'd be unable to do anything as a first responder, though, because I really liked the general idea, just not as a paramedic. But now I've come to realize that I don't want to be in school til I'm 40. So I'm working on getting on the LEO path instead. As a result I won't be able to go in as a mil doc obviously, so I'm exploring the option of going in as an officer of some other sort instead. Do you think law enforcement officer is equivalent to military officer
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Oct 15, 2017 00:14
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Dick Burglar posted:I'm 31 now and I have wanted to do something in the military since I was a teenager, but things always seemed to fall through. I completed paramedic school at end of 2016 and decided it wasn't really what I wanted to do, and I didn't think I'd be able to do firefighter or LEO for reasons. I decided to aim for med school instead, and that way I could join the reserves as a mil doc. I was disappointed that I'd be unable to do anything as a first responder, though, because I really liked the general idea, just not as a paramedic. But now I've come to realize that I don't want to be in school til I'm 40. So I'm working on getting on the LEO path instead. As a result I won't be able to go in as a mil doc obviously, so I'm exploring the option of going in as an officer of some other sort instead. Huh. Kind of hard to get a read on that and what you're after, which seems to be your problem in general: you're not quite sure what you're after. Being a guard officer might not be the worst in your case. When you said you didn't think you could do firefighter or LEO for "reasons," did you just mean recreational drug use in your past? Cause if you meant physical capability reasons, you don't want to be an officer in the Army and probably not one in the military writ large. The military understands that people get hurt and older as they are in longer, but they're not keen on 2LT broke-dick showing up. Also, if you're unmarried and you would like to become married, and you go active, you're in for a real trip. A lot of bases are located in places where you can find plenty of dates, but not a whole helluva lot of marriage prospects. And a person in their thirties is less likely to just go along with military life than someone who's been acclimatized to it since their 20s.
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Oct 15, 2017 12:22
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Godholio posted:
I don't want to do security forces/MP. Military "police" and civilian law enforcement are completely different things. NUKES CURE NORKS posted:Do you think law enforcement officer is equivalent to military officer No? I mentioned that to explain why I only want to do reserves, and what I want to do outside of the reserves. mlmp08 posted:Huh. Kind of hard to get a read on that and what you're after, which seems to be your problem in general: you're not quite sure what you're after. Being a guard officer might not be the worst in your case. When you said you didn't think you could do firefighter or LEO for "reasons," did you just mean recreational drug use in your past? Cause if you meant physical capability reasons, you don't want to be an officer in the Army and probably not one in the military writ large. The military understands that people get hurt and older as they are in longer, but they're not keen on 2LT broke-dick showing up. The reason is I have a mark on my record, yes, but not drug use. I'm trying to get it overturned at the moment, which is why I said I have some time (this is an oversimplification). I am physically fine. I've got a long-term girlfriend. The reason I probably sound non-committal about any specific MOS is because my understanding is that you can't really pick for yourself. I have preferences, but I have no idea if they'll even be options. But yes, you are correct that I have struggled to find a career. Dick Burglar fucked around with this message at 16:23 on Oct 15, 2017 |
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Oct 15, 2017 16:20
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Ok, I just read all of your posts in here. WHAT are you actually trying to become? WHAT are you actually trying to get out of the military? These are questions that will shape what information we can give you so you can avoid the biggest mistake of your life either by joining for reasons unsupported by reality, or by pointing you in the right direction so you actually get what you want out of the system. The recruiter cannot be trusted on hooking you up in any way, shape, or form.
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Oct 15, 2017 17:07
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The job of the recruiter is to sell you tomorrow's winning lottery ticket. In that you'll walk out confident that you're winning the lotto tomorrow. But you probably aren't. But you might be. But you probably aren't.
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Oct 15, 2017 17:29
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Godholio posted:Ok, I just read all of your posts in here. I am under no illusions that the recruiter is in it for anything other than himself. However, I didn't know much of anything, including whether it was even possible to join when you're over 30, so I figured I could at least start there and get better information elsewhere after I confirmed it was possible. That's why I came here to ask questions rather than blindly believe everything the recruiter told me. What am I trying to become? Are we talking about specific MOSs? If so, I'm looking at aviation officer or aeromedical evac officer. I think aviation is pretty self-explanatory and I understand if you roll your eyes at it. As for aeromedical evac officer: while I am not super sold on civilian paramedicine work, military medicine is quite different, and being a part of that system appeals to me. I wouldn't be playing Air Force PJ or anything, but coordinating medevacs and the likes appeals to the part of me that wants to do something with medicine. It seems to be closer to what I envisioned when I went to paramedic school. What am I trying to get out of the military? Preferably some valuable training and experience. If I became an aviation officer I'd be trained as a helicopter pilot, which would transfer well if I also work as an LEO, as I could work as a police helicopter pilot. Or really any civilian helicopter pilot job if LEO doesn't work out. Aero evac officer would be good for transferring to civilian air ambulance work which is also not the same as ground-based civilian paramedicine. That could also probably transfer to other kinds of medical or transportation jobs--I need to learn more about the MOS.
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Oct 15, 2017 19:49
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Getting your aviation license without joining the military means you aren't tied to a contract and you aren't risking getting sent to some shithole for nine months or longer and you can follow your hopes and dreams of flying helicopters for a police department a lot quicker. I'd wager that at least 80% of people have some type of "plan" before they join and when they finish their service obligation nothing worked out the way they intended.
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Oct 15, 2017 19:53
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You aren't going to get either of those jobs out of OCS. Aviation maybe if by some stroke of luck you're able to get an aviation physical and all the other paperwork required done while you're there but that is extremely unlikely. Armor, Infantry, Field Artillery, Engineer, Transportation, Quartermaster, Adjutant General, Air Defense Artillery, Military Police, Signal, Military intelligence are the branches you need to be looking at from OCS. You will have a combat arms branch in your top 3 regardless of whether you want to or not.
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Oct 15, 2017 19:59
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So how do you get those jobs, then? Also going by the goarmy.com site, infantry and armor aren't even listed as reserve options.
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Oct 15, 2017 20:10
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| # ? May 12, 2024 19:38 |
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enlist for combat arms and then go warrant officer.
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Oct 15, 2017 20:12
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