Posted: 1/10/2004 6:54:32 PM EDT
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A friend said the army was following up on the ranger beret thing by renumbering the MOSes. The idea, as rumor has it, is that the officers will feel better because the men they are supervising will have the same general number block as the officers, only a higher number (like in the Corps). He said the enlisted numbers were being changed to be like the officers, not the other way around. True? |
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Basically, the rationale is that every career field will have the same number, officer and enlisted. Example: Combat Engineer used to be a 12B, Engineer Officer was a 21A. Now, an officer is still a 21A, but an enlisted Combat Engineer is a 21B. Makes sense, but it still smacks of someone needing to have something to write in thier OER support form... Not sure if it's implemented across the force, yet, but it does look interesting. Some of those career fields in maintenance are going to have to go to double-letters in the designators, I think... And, no, I don't know why they bother. I just wonder how much it's going to cost to change all the damn references... I sometimes wonder how these people pass the urinalysis tests. |
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There are other concerns, but most are indeed poltical. I can assure you that Officers can care less what the number is, as long as the Soldier is the right number for the job and that soldier does his job. As the Army changes, the MOS's also haven't chaged completely to fit. For instance As an Aviation Officer I was a 15T to begin with. That was because I was a maintenance test pilot, and maintenance functions were handled by Transportation Corps aviators before Aviation became it's own branch. The Mohawk guys were 15M because they were MI before. As Aviation tried to ditch the links to the past branches to become it's own combat arms branch, they changed my number to 15D. It had nothing to do with anything. It also didn't change anything except on some paperwork I had to fill out during PCSs etc. Later they changed it again to 15J, as they needed more numbers for newer airfarmes, and wanted to push all the test pilots into one number that would then have an identifier for the airframe we were test pilots in. Go knows what it is now. The enlisted guys all were originally Transportation. Which is why half of the courses are still taught at the Trans Center at Ft Eustis, VA. They just don't have any facility to move to, and over half of FEVA is aviation, so it'd be a waste of space anyway. They were 67 & 68 series MOS (which is in the Transportation Corps numbering range). Obviously for the same rationale of Aviation being it's own branch, they now think it's time to change their number to the branch that is actually managing their careers. It's not a big deal. Most people don't have a clue how the MOS numbering system really works, and very few of my personel ever had an idea that I even had an "MOS" number myself. They're like National Stock Numbers. The numbers run in a certain way for several reasons, but no one really cares what the numbers are as long as what you get is what you ordered. The change in numbers will only streamline or effect things at the Departemnt of the Army level. There may be a very valid reason that at the level of the Pentagon that they need them to make sense to folks that only look at numbers and shift assets around the world. Knowing that aviation is only "15" could conceivably make sense if you're looking at AV MOSs, then you only need to look at "15" instead of having to break down the officers for "15", and the enlisted in "67" and "68". Since the identifiers overlap in all three, there is a possibility of confusion. A single MOS results in just needing to find the identifier letter. A 15B will only be a 15B, a 15Y will only be a 15Y and not a 67Y or mistakenly a 68Y. The only place it impacts is the VERY high level. Certainly not the troop level. Anyone at the troop level (i.e. not working at the actual office in the Pentagon who's handling this), will have no idea why they are doing this anymore than knowing why all those other changes like this get made. As far as making "officers feel better", that comment shows a great deal of ignorance about what goes on in the real Army. Ross |