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Thread: My son just left to see Navy recruiter.

  1. #21
    Abducted by Aliens Borderland's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Stephanie B View Post
    Allow me to be blunt:

    Recruiters are flesh-peddlers. Their job is to ship warm bodies to the RTC. As soon as a future squid raises their right hand and signs, the recruiter's job is over.

    If it's not written down in the enlistment contract, the recruiter's assurances are tissues of lies and worth even less.

    (One fine evening, I was the OOD in port. I was standing on the quarterdeck, in my summer whites, long glass held behind my back, as a very large and very drunk sailor told me in no uncertain terms how his recruiter had lied to him and that the Navy was full of shit. I figured that if push came to shove, I could get in one or two good swings before he tore my head off. But I digress.)

    If your son's goal is to be an operator of some flavor, the Navy is not the place to go. If he bilges out of BUDS (and something like 80% do), he stands a good chance of being sent to the Fleet as an unrated seaman or fireman. The difference there is whether he's using a chipping hammer topside or in the bilges. I am not making this shit up. Then his path would be to strike for hospital corpsman, which may be a very slim reed to grasp from a ship's crew. I'd guess the odds of doing that to be one in a very large number.

    If he wants to be an operator, as much as it pains me to write these words, he should go into a branch where carrying a gun is a major career path. The Army has the infantry, the Rangers, Special Forces, paratroopers, and maybe other things where getting shot at is part of the job description.. If he wants to make a career of it, he can stay in those fields or even go warrant helo driver. The Marines have similar pathways, but since the Crotch is smaller, they can be more difficult to get into.

    This is a standard Navy scraper/chipping hammer:

    Attachment 56685

    If he goes into the Navy, the chances are that he will become intimately familiar with using one.
    That's how I remember it except I never saw one of those and never went to sea. I should have but like I previously posted, the Navy had other plans and trained me to fill a rate of their choosing. I had nothing to say about it.

    I think a large number of SEAL's go into the program from other rates after enlistment. The SEAL I knew was in another rate when he went into the program. The SO rate didn't come along until 2006.
    In the P-F basket of deplorables.

  2. #22
    My son left high school with a two year vo-tech certification for auto body repair. When he decided he wanted to go into the service the Navy offered him the best deal guaranteed E-3 out of boot camp, a slot in an 'A' scjhool for aviation airframe repair school (what ever they actually called it).

    He jumped on it and went in. He was most of theway through boot when they 'caught' the mistake - his recruiter had listed the vo-tech certification as a degree or some such shit. They told him he could get out or go to the fleet and strike for an aviation rate. I told him to come home. He didn't taqke my advice - 'I have good test scores' they said I could do it from the fleet' and ended up building bombs on the Constellation.

    Other son took the Airborne Ranger guarantee, was doing fine until some NCO spotted his patch of psoriasis at health and hygiene inspection and made him go to the doctor, my son was 23 at the time and had gotten a waiver for the psoriasis after submitting all his medical records. The doctor who saw him said I don't give a shit what waiver they gave you, your being discharged.

    At least the Army didn't play hi-jinks with his guarantee. I would not trust the Navy. Myself, I worked with enough Air Force Combat Controllers that if I had to do it again that is what I'd try to get.

  3. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by JohnO View Post
    I got to talk to my son for a few minutes after his recruiter visit. He had to run off to work. Shortly after he arrived he texted to say he got to the gun store on time because he is headed to the range. He is either testing new AR builds or fixes on customer guns.

    A few things he told me about the visit with the recruiter.
    He thought the guy was laid back and not pushy at all. The recruiter told both my son and the former Marine he went with that statistically neither one would make it into Naval Spec. War. He told me when he left the office he asked his friend if that statistic comment make you want it even more? Sounded like there were a bunch of Hell Yeahs from both of them. He said the recruiter told them it was their job to prove him wrong.

    My son is approximately 5' 7.5" and 150 Lbs. The recruiter told my son he was in the statistical sweet spot of the body type that makes it through the SEAL pipeline. I asked my son about his friend the former Marine. I never met him. My son said he is 2% over the weight limit for his height 5' 10" and added he has been doing too much drinking since he separated from the Corps. He added that his friend is down 15 Lbs in the last month. The two of them met at 06:00 this morning to hike and run together.

    My son said he was given a code to unlock and take a practice ASVAB online.

    I'm sure I'll get some more details tonight when he gets home from work.

    Here he is at a training event 2 weeks ago.
    I dont know how the Navy works but in my earlier post the kid who is going through para rescue training he got that in his contract. He went to a special boot camp for the AF special forces group and went straight from boot camp to the first school then to the second school and now starting third school.

    This kid grew up mountain climbing in some pretty adverse conditions. Hes eating these classes like candy. He told his dad some of the super conditioned jocks didnt make it.

    I figure its the difference between a jock and the mental conditioning to forge ahead in the most adverse of conditions. I think PJs have an 80% attrition rate.
    I'll wager you a PF dollar™ 😎
    The lunatics are running the asylum

  4. #24
    Member Wake27's Avatar
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    I agree with all of the comments about considering the Army. Everyone knows the SEALs because they get all of the publicity. That’s good for recruiting, maybe not good for other things. If that’s what he really wants, he needs to be a fish. I wanted to be a SEAL until I saw some of BUD/S in person. I was a lifeguard in Coronado at the time and a good swimmer, but didn’t love the water that much. I also was worried about the options if I failed.

    If he wants to talk Army, I’m happy to give my perspective and can probably give slightly better insight than some lame online article from Business Insider.

    Final note, part of me feels like a piece of shit for talking when I don’t have a Trident, but it doesn’t take being on a Team to look up the news about SEALs over the past few years. All SOF have problem children, but they have had a lot of issues in recent history that really makes me wonder about their culture.


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  5. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by UNK View Post

    This kid grew up mountain climbing in some pretty adverse conditions. Hes eating these classes like candy. He told his dad some of the super conditioned jocks didnt make it.
    I've never served, but in a previous career that was adjacent to some stuff, I observed people with outdoor experience (boy scouts in troops that did real camping, rich kids into mountaineering, people into orienteering) had a lot less trouble in some of 'hard' schools. Totally agree with that.

    Maybe it's mental toughness, but I think may be just experience; when you've already mastered land navigation you don't need to learn it while you're starving and tired and being yelled at in Ranger school or whatever.

    It's probably too late to give "go spend years doing technical climbing for fun" as advice.

  6. #26
    Abducted by Aliens Borderland's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dan Lehr View Post
    My son left high school with a two year vo-tech certification for auto body repair. When he decided he wanted to go into the service the Navy offered him the best deal guaranteed E-3 out of boot camp, a slot in an 'A' scjhool for aviation airframe repair school (what ever they actually called it).

    He jumped on it and went in. He was most of theway through boot when they 'caught' the mistake - his recruiter had listed the vo-tech certification as a degree or some such shit. They told him he could get out or go to the fleet and strike for an aviation rate. I told him to come home. He didn't taqke my advice - 'I have good test scores' they said I could do it from the fleet' and ended up building bombs on the Constellation.

    Other son took the Airborne Ranger guarantee, was doing fine until some NCO spotted his patch of psoriasis at health and hygiene inspection and made him go to the doctor, my son was 23 at the time and had gotten a waiver for the psoriasis after submitting all his medical records. The doctor who saw him said I don't give a shit what waiver they gave you, your being discharged.

    At least the Army didn't play hi-jinks with his guarantee. I would not trust the Navy. Myself, I worked with enough Air Force Combat Controllers that if I had to do it again that is what I'd try to get.
    I have a feeling that most who would suggest you can get a "guarantee" from the Navy have never actually been in the Navy.
    In the P-F basket of deplorables.

  7. #27
    One other thing I would say about the army vs the other services in terms of recruiters is the army recruiters are hungry. They have slots to fill and are willing to make drug deals to make it happen. I shopped around with my brother when he was looking to get in and the air force could have given a flying fuck. We were almost an annoyance. The marine recruiter was all about gung ho dick measuring contests, but could never give us a straight answer without some sort of qualifier. The best deal you could get out of that guy was 0311 e2 with vague mentions of recon or marsoc being a future possibility. Yeah... Good luck with that. My brother wasn't interested in the Navy whatsoever so we never talked to them. The army recruiters had him a guaranteed ranger contract going in as an E3 within a few days of taking to him. I don't know if he was hurting on numbers or what but the dude had a fire under his ass to make shit happen. For a lot of jobs there are large bonuses available as well but those have some strings attached which make them easy to lose if you aren't careful. If he gets one, best advice is to stick it in a savings account until he's clear of that enlistment because there are plenty of circumstances where that bonus can be recouped.

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  8. #28
    The Marine Corps does not really have a direct accession pipeline for either Recon or MARSOC, they both essentially start selecting and screening for personnel once they are at ITB in the case of Recon, or have either reenlisted or extended your initial contract in the case of MARSOC. If you want to be in a SOF community only then I do not recommend the USMC as that route. there are no guarantees.... I lost my Amphibious Reconnaissance School seat coming out of ITB in 2002 due to a temporary medical issue, pink eye, that half my ITB class came down with. I was quarantined on camp Gieger and missed my pick up date for ARS in VA Beach, ended up with orders to a rifle company in 3/7 stationed in 29 palms CA for my first duty station instead. First deployment was the invasion of Iraq, then started doing the War thing for a while and never wanted to take time out to go back and try again to get into recon, Which was just being used as another rifle BN in Iraq anyways..... I was always "Too Senior" to be able to screen for MARSOC once that was stood up....So yeah, Ranger option contract still look's to be the best way to go to me.....

  9. #29
    Hokey / Ancient JAD's Avatar
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    I hire a lot of Navy folks. On purpose.
    Ignore Alien Orders

  10. #30
    Site Supporter Coyotesfan97's Avatar
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    I have a friend/coworker whose oldest son went Army with the Ranger contract. He did a lot of work getting ready for it physically and mentally. He had a lot of former Army mentors who were able to tell what to expect and how to get through training. He’s a tabbed Ranger now who’s about to go on his first deployment.

    His youngest son is following in his brother’s footsteps. He’s about to leave for boot camp with the same Ranger contract. His goal is going to the same battalion his brother is in. As they like to say RLTW!
    Just a dog chauffeur that used to hold the dumb end of the leash.

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