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2. Schmedlap says, in response to
Madhu:
Dang. Sorry, Madhu. I was doing a mass delete of spam comments and accidentally deleted yours. I don't suppose you remember what you typed?
It wasn't important
Not important. Just good luck on whatever you end up doing. And thanks for helping me to understand some of this stuff a little better. I definitely had a very unsophisticated (and still do) understanding of anything to do with military affairs before I fell into this corner of the internets. Typical cable news junkie that kind of idolized people in the military - which is just strange given my personality and the fact that there are a fair number of physicians at my work that have been in the military. And you know what? They are just people like everyone else! Good, decent, kind and hard-working people, but human nonetheless.
Maybe Yingling and Finel have a point: civ-mil relations are messed up. If someone as generally empirically-minded as me (hey, in my day job!) can get so emotionally caught up in the issues, well, that's just not healthy is it?
Nobody knows. If you want to shoot motherfuckers in the face or supervise that ocurring, even doing the Q and getting on an ODA is no guarantee of that happening. It wasn't during the surge in Iraq, in Sunni country, and sure isn't today, in Afghanistan. The question you need to ask yourself is, do you want to deal with the egregious ass-kissery and politics of the O world, where how you make somebody feel is more important than what you actually accomplish, or "perception is reality." Then again, being a former O, you may be comfortable with that bullshit, and swim in it like the fish swims in the sea and the guerilla swims in the population.
What you do need to do is set up an RSS feed already, goddamit.
5. Schmedlap says, in response to
B:
One of the reasons that declined the career course was so that I would still be a junior CPT eligible for SFAS if I went back in. But, I don't think I have the patience to be a student/candidate in an extended try-out session. Even as a hyper-motivated 2LT, I wasn't able to avoid pissing matches with the RIs. Had I failed that and been forced to repeat it as a CPT and combat vet, I'm sure either an RI, or I, would have been killed by blunt force trauma to the skull.
I don't share your view of being an Officer. I didn't need to play the game you referred to and I have Two stacks of paper to prove it. One, letters of reprimand. Two, glowing OERs.
As for an RSS feed, in case you didn't notice, I can't even get the damn enter button to add line breaks in this comment box.
Go enjoy your summer and then come back and keep engaging. While you might be sick of the extraneous crap, you're thoughts help me sort out what I think and how to articulate it. As far as playing Army goes, I would think that you have a 24 month window left for bringing the pain before we start to transition to advising. Iron sharpens Iron.
You may not share the philosophy that leads to officers playing that game I described, but you're obviously aware of its prevalence. Maybe as a 2LT-CPT you were able to get by with LORs and glowing OERs, but are you going to be happy watching your colleagues and supervisors playing that game? What happens when the LORs build up as does your reputation as "that fucking guy," and you get shunted to the side to do some bullshit fobbit staff job while your game-playing colleagues get to command troops in the field? In the long run, you've got what, six years in on Active Duty? Another go will get you up to ten, at which point you might as well just go to retirement. Do you want to spend ten years watching incompetent asskissing weasels shoot past you while you're stuck at O-4? Do you want to expose yourself to the temptation to compromise yourself IOT keep up and mitigate the damage that they're causing?
Sorry if I seem dismissive of officers. From my observations, about 30% of the junior ones are good, and maybe 15% of the field-grades. Don't know enough about the ones above that to judge, but I can extrapolate. The senior enlisted have their own issues, such as a prevalence of E-8/9's whose contribution to combat deployments is hanging out in front of a FOB chow hall like trapdoor spiders and poincing on dudes with unsat reflective belts, but behind every one of those guys is an officer enabler.
Come on, dude, there's gotta be a template for an RSS feed out there somewhere. Line breaks are not essential, but the current system where I have to go to the site manually is about as user-friendly as a concertina condom.
8. Schmedlap says, in response to
B:
You may not share the philosophy that leads to officers playing that game I described, but you're obviously aware of its prevalence.
I'm aware of the prevalance of the rumor. If it's true, then I guess I was just really fortunate in that I did not end up in units where it occurred.
... are you going to be happy watching your colleagues and supervisors playing that game? What happens when the LORs build up as does your reputation as "that fucking guy," and you get shunted to the side to do some bullshit fobbit staff job while your game-playing colleagues get to command troops in the field?
If I were really concerned about that, then I wouldn't consider going back. And I'm not concerned about it. I suspect our experiences are significantly different if you think that is a concern. That particularly goes for the rest of your post. If that is your impression of the Officer Corps, then you must have been stuck in some shitty units. Or maybe you're having a bad day. I don't know.
The RSS thing is deceptively simple. Making it work on this site... what a nutroll. I'm only an amateur geek.
Hey, your mileage may vary. The unit I spent practically my entire time in was, relative to the rest of the Army, in a good way. Seeing the envy in the eyes of the poor CF guys who were reduced to four-MRAP convoys and/or being locked down on base in their mandatory gloves, reflective belts, eyepro etc., almost made up for the knowledge that we were running on maybe 25% capacity, and 75% was a big waste. It's possible that you were very fortunate in regards to time and place, or just have a very positive outlook, in which case, mashallah!
10. Schmedlap says, in response to
B:
Yeah, I spent all my time in patrol bases, far from the BS. I suppose that helps.
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This is - belatedly - in response to the original post.
Schmedlap, I don't know you and you don't know me (always a great way to start a dialogue, or a monologue for that matter, right?). That said, you seem pretty into milblogging and haven't relinquished your interests in things military, studies in business and law notwithstanding. So I'm guessing that yes, you'll return to the military. Which wouldn't, IMO, from many perspectives, be a bad thing.
My (distinctly non-profound) $.02.
ADTS
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