Freedomain Radio

A few points:

Everyone who enlists (Privates through Sergeants are enlisted) signs a contract for 8 years of service.  Now, you can sign up and say you only want to do 2 but then you can be recalled at any time for any reason in the remaining 6 years.  Officers are commissioned, as opposed to enlisted, and are on the hook for 20 years.  Any time you are on duty or get recalled, stop-loss (which is something you agree to in the enlistment contract...it is not super small arcane fine print but simply states you may be extended "...according to the needs of the Army...") can be initiated.  

Stop-losses are indefinite so once one is initiated you are in the Army until the Army decides to release you; i.e. you are not "stop-loss"ed for a year and then once its up you get out...you are kept on duty and not let go until the military no longer needs you.  Pick a critically short MOS (military occupational specialty= infantry, artillery, armor, finance, intelligence, etc.) career field for a 2 year enlistment and you could conceivably spend decades in the military.   Especially now since the are calling the GWOT simply "The Long War" or "Our Childrens' Childrens' war."  Our children do not seem to want to fight it so if you become one of the few who does then they will hang onto you.  I have a buddy that was on his last year of a re-enlistment contract in 2001...they stop-lossed him after 9/11 and he has not been able to get out since because he was in a critically short MOS.

Also, if you are a soldier and not pregnant then you will go to Iraq or Afghanistan or both.  If you are a male soldier then whatever job you picked, unless it is highly critical like medics, translators, or combat arms then you will be converted to an infantryman.  All those civilian employees (which outnumber the soldiers) are there to take the place of those people who signed contracts to enlist as water treatment specialists, cooks, paper-pushers, etc. and can now walk the streets and carry a rifle.

The wish list is just that...if you choose somewhere and they need you there then they will send you.  I requested Korea but got sent to Hawai'i...go figure?  Also, let's say you request Hawai'i and they send you there.  Well, that is your home base and the Army has fulfilled is promise to station you where you wanted to be.  The Catch-22 is that if your unit from Hawai'i is in Iraq or Afghanistan then you are going there too...there will just be an empty room in Hawai'i assigned to you until you get back.  Being in a combat zone/war is a deployment...that is simply when a unit is "temporarily" sent to another location to prosecute the war.  You are still considered "stationed" at that unit's home base.

Also, the on-duty educational benefits are "at the commander's discretion."  So, if he/she thinks that your schooling will interfere with your duty then they do not have to sign off on you getting a red cent.  If they believe that the schooling will help you as a soldier and pertains to your duties then they can sign off on up to 100% of tuition.  For example, let's say I'm a humvee mechanic and I decide I want to take some auto body or repair classes at a local community college:

1) The commander has to like me enough to let me take advantage of this benefit.  This is a possible benefit not an automatic one that the army offers.  Basically, everyone in your chain of command up to company commander has to support your taking some classes.  If your chain-of-command considers you a "shitbag" then you might as well not even bother asking for this benefit or if you are the FNG.

2) There can be no operational events that interfere with your class schedule (once the commander signs off on the tuition assistance he/she has to allow you enough time off of duty to attend the classes).  This is the main reason most people never get to take advantage of this...commanders do not want to give you the time off or they have an unwritten understanding with you that if they sign it you will not let your duites slip.  I did this once...I got a B in the class simply because of my absences, I would have had an A.  The commander told me he would sign for my tuition assistance if I "understood" that duty comes first even though the paperwork he signed was an contract between him and I that I would receive enough time off of duty to complete the class.  If you take the classes and also have to perform all your normal duties and wind up failing the classes guess what?  You have to reimburse the army and the commander can use it as a reason to disallow you from taking advantage of this benefit ever again.

3)  So you are a mechanic and take auto body, the commander may agree to sign off on 100% reimbursement or 0%.  It is the commander's decision not a case of black and white, check the box.  If he likes you or wants to reward you they may pay up to 75% or non-MOS related schooling like Literature of Victorian England.  So if you want to be a professional photographer and your commander likes you then you may get 75% of it paid for but that's it.

4) The big catch...the schooling that the army pays for (with other's money) must be approved by the local education center.  Every base has an education center where units can hold classes, do refresher training etc.  The ed center also keeps track of individual soldiers non-military education and military education.  It also hosts classrooms for local institutions so soldiers do not have to commute to class off base.  The approval requirement also includes online colleges.  So if you get stationed somewhere whose local colleges do not have the course you want and the U. of Phoenix does not have them either then you are SOL.

It doesn't sound so great once you get into the guts of the thing. 

Great conversation Stef and guest

I saw too many of my (past) friends lives ruined by the military.  It really is a soul crushing machine.

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Not sure where you get your info from, but to clarify, all ranks E-1 through E-9 are enlisted. That is (Air Force) Airman through Master Sergeant. All ranks above that are officer, O-1 through 0-9 or whatever. The Army may still be doing 2 year enlistments, but the standard across the services is usually 4 years or 6 years if you want. Officers are only obligated for the same terms, 4 to 6 years, or whatever will repay their college tuition, unless they are pilots which typically have extended obligations of 8 to 10 years. After anyone's active duty is served, there is still a 2 to 4 year inactive duty obligation to serve if called upon which typically does not pass a total of 8 years from enlistment. Stop loss is a program that will affect some servicemen that is basically called a "backdoor draft" because it extends enlistees past their terms of service. I have not heard of this being done to officers. As stated above, educational benefits while on active duty are largely a joke. You are best off signing up for the GIBill when you join, then seperating when your term is up and then using the benefit.

Great conversation Stef, fighting for every soul.

Tyler,

Yes officers generally have to sign for 4 or six.  However, their commission lasts for twenty years.  They may leave the military with not much ado after their initial hitch is up but from the date they are commissioned until twenty years later they may be called up. They must formally renounce their commission after leaving, which most do not do, in order to get off the hook.  There was a '60 Minutes' (Dec. 5, 2004 if this blog is correct) story about this a few years ago, it talked mainly about enlisted people being recalled but also told stories of officers who had been out of the military a decade or more and got called up.  One of my brother's old college buddies got called up last year and he was commissioned in 1990 and left the Army in 1996...he never resigned his commission.

I signed up for the navy when I was 17 and it was an absolute nightmare. That bit about changing your duty station on a whim is so true. I was told that if I got the highest score of all the students in my a-school (training for specific job) then I would get the first choice of available locations. So I did, made my selection and then all of the sudden just a day before I was to leave they changed my orders and sent me where they wanted to anyway. There was not even a war at this time (mid 90's). I knew almost immediately that I had made a mistake. I was constrantly rebelling going on restriction and given extra duties. I felt totally trapped and pleaded with them to let me out but to no avail. Eventually they kicked me out and sent me to the brig (jail) on completely false charges for 4 months. Military justice is= your guilty til proven innocent. It was definitely like shifting to another abusive family as Stef put it, only in this case the abuse was not neglect as with my foo but hyper nosiness. They want to know everything that your doing whether you are at work or on leave and the whole culture promotes this disgusting conformity to total bullshit.  I could never bring myself to play the game and they knew it and hated me for it. I still occasionally have nightmares that I am still in and they lost my discharge paperwork and they won't let me out. I really hope that guy definitely does not join, The recruiters sell a heap of horseshit, minnimizing negative things imbellishing positives. I just wanted to travel and had no money but there are other ways that I could have done that other than subjecting myself to the military on the taxpayers dime. 

 I just listened to the conversation and wanted to give some input.

I was on my own at 17 due to the death of both my parents by the time I was in 11th grade.  Anyhow I managed to finish high school even though I ended up being 'homeless'.  Well the only home I knew sat locked and empty after my last parent passed.  The point I want to get at is... that at that time I had wanted to go to school for art.  I did manage to start the community college and waitress - well cocktail waitress mostly, along with getting the usual grants and loans to help pay for the classes.  Well...life took its turns and I ended up getting all lost and mis-directed by well-meaning people.  Like the pastor who suggested I go to medical school to become a nurse - not having a clue that - that was not my thing, not my strong point.  Somehow art got further and further away from me, though it continually lurked deep down inside.  Turns out years later (when I was 30) actively started to take control of my life in a positive direction I started to teach myself art.  I think the two biggest things for me was the justifying the cost of supplies and justifying my potential ability.   I wish I had been given such good advice when I was at that prime age of soaking in skill and knowledge. 

One thing about being in the position of being 17 looking ahead at life and limited or limitless options - however you're able to look at it...  Today we have the net and you can learn and market yourself waaayyy better than those of us facing 17 over 20 years ago.  The potential for opportunity is so much greater these days.  Broken spirits are hard to mend.  The brokenness of my own life has been a great hurdle for me to overcome and something I'm still working on.  So if one could choose a path for positive potential or potential harm....choosing the positive potential is clearly the happier and more rewarding path - at least from my perspective.

And a side note... if a person has a car/license/insurance... pizza places seem like they are always hiring and delivery people can make between 10 to 15 bucks/hr.  Rent is the kicker or I should say location... I have some suggestions for people on this as well, but probably better in another thread somewhere.  And that is to do with the unwanted fixer upper houses that go for anywhere between 4 to 20 grand for a livable location.  I could almost write a book on it, well, maybe a chapter...stuff I wish I knew way back when. :)

hope some of this made sense...it's late...that's my excuse :)

peace out