Posted: 1/12/2013 10:18:03 PM EDT
| Thinking of enlisting, what are y'alls thoughts? |
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I did 5.5yrs Regular Army before transitioning to the NG. My belief is that the NG is to the Army as O'Douls is to beer... You get the same craptastic taste of a low quality beer, but you get none of the buzz.
In the NG, you get a hair cut, get in uniform, and drive to where ever the hell you drill once a month, and you'll likely spend most of your weekends taking care of the boring administrative tasks the Army requires. You'll do PT tests, complete maintenance forms for vehicles, maybe sit through a counseling session, and then sit through some death by powerpoint training on subjects like suicide prevention and sexual harassment. There are parts of Army life I miss, but I'm walking away from the NG this month because I see no reason to continue. |
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Go active. The guard guys I have had to work with here have not impressed me. Don't get me wrong, there are good guys in the guard, but they're certainly not the majority and certainly not in the same percentage that you'd find high speeds on active duty. It's not a good environment for new soldiers to grow up in compared to active duty. Although I realize at your age you probably have a family/job/house and enlisting onto active duty is probably not the best option for your family.
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| I was in from 1975 to 1984, worked full time in it for awhile, it was all right, got my fasination with military life out of my system without having to go full time at it. Also, the guard back then was much different than today, I was in an armor unit, in the time I was in, drove tanks, M113's M577's trucks etc. |
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There's more to the decision (Guard vs Active). Do you want to get out of town for years or months? Are you looking for fulltime "work" or just serving? You want to go overseas as a duty station? Family?
Guard is a good deal if you want to actually use the education benefits right now...the benefits do vary from State to State. CT offers a tuition waiver for a State college. There's a bit to it...get face to face with some people....no, not the recruiter lol My general life advice is to lock in a 20 year retirement...somewhere. When 20 somethings are working at Walmart and are likely not going to college, my advice is to do 20+ Guard and lock in some benefits and retirement pay. There are charts, but you could make 750-3000/month (ballpark) in retirement based on rank, number of deployments, time in service, etc. If you can, do it. |
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Quoted:
I did 5.5yrs Regular Army before transitioning to the NG. My belief is that the NG is to the Army as O'Douls is to beer... You get the same craptastic taste of a low quality beer, but you get none of the buzz. In the NG, you get a hair cut, get in uniform, and drive to where ever the hell you drill once a month, and you'll likely spend most of your weekends taking care of the boring administrative tasks the Army requires. You'll do PT tests, complete maintenance forms for vehicles, maybe sit through a counseling session, and then sit through some death by powerpoint training on subjects like suicide prevention and sexual harassment. There are parts of Army life I miss, but I'm walking away from the NG this month because I see no reason to continue. This |
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Quoted:
I did 5.5yrs Regular Army before transitioning to the NG. My belief is that the NG is to the Army as O'Douls is to beer... You get the same craptastic taste of a low quality beer, but you get none of the buzz. In the NG, you get a hair cut, get in uniform, and drive to where ever the hell you drill once a month, and you'll likely spend most of your weekends taking care of the boring administrative tasks the Army requires. You'll do PT tests, complete maintenance forms for vehicles, maybe sit through a counseling session, and then sit through some death by powerpoint training on subjects like suicide prevention and sexual harassment. There are parts of Army life I miss, but I'm walking away from the NG this month because I see no reason to continue. Where in MO are you? What is your MOS? My BN is in the field at leasr 8 drills per year. We are doing the second half of our rocket live fire in February. Come out to Fort Chaffee and give us a look before giving up on the guard. We also have a Paladin BN and a BSB that spend about the same amount of time in the field. |
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I would do active first, then go guard. Once you go guard there is a chance you will get stuck there.
You might like the military so much you want to do it full time. In the guard if you are enlisted the state has to release you to go active duty (after you give them at least six months), and then you have to get the active duty folks to pick you up. If you are an officer, you have to get the state to release you. then you have to be a Captain and career course qualified before you can apply to go active duty, and then you have to face a selection board. Or you can join the guard, go through ROTC, and possibly do well enough to get a commission in the regular Army. Most states are broke right now. If you want fun schools like Airborne, Air Assault, Pathfinder or Ranger most states aren't paying for them. |