In the book I’m reading (The Unforgiving Minute by Craig Mullaney) reference is made to a couple of Army sergeants who were “former marines”. I have two questions about this:
How common is it for Army people to be ex-Marines and vice versa
What are the mechanics of making the switch? Do you resign from the Marines and then re-enlist in the Army? Or, perhaps, you get an inter-service transfer? Is that even possible?
Upon making the switch, is your rank retained? Are there always corresponding ranks between services?
WRT #2: My son, who is soon to be finished with his service in the Marine Corps, toyed with the idea of joining the Army afterwards. So, in many cases it isn’t a “switch” done while they are in one branch of the service.
To offer more support for NinetyWt’s comment: I know of a couple people who finished one term of service with one service, and then signed up with another one. (The one that comes to mind most, now, is George Wahlen, who served, first as a Navy corpsman, then assigned to the Marines (as is the normal source of Marine corpsmen), then served with the Army during both the Korean and Vietnam Wars.) When I got out of the Navy, I was approached by National Guard recruiters - which would have ended up with me serving first in the Navy, then in the Army.
As for conserving rank/seniority: from my experience, it’s a bit of a case-by-case scenario. The time in service will always count, for both pay and pension purposes. The authority and rank are a bit more flexible. Prior service will be considered, but it’s not a guarantee of rank.
Payscale is always comparable between the services: E-1 through E-9, they’re all the same pay scale. The authority given to any given rank, however, is going to be very flexible thing even within a single branch of the military: an E-4 nuke will have almost no authority over sailors below him/her. An E-4 Bosun’s Mate is going to be generally considered to be in authority over several lower ranked sailors within the division, and for working parties may be in charge of as many as ten to twelve sailors.
In many cases, yes. In basic, there was a guy who was in the Navy in my platoon. I believe that Marines wouldn’t have to take Basic since they’ve already been to Boot Camp.
Awhile back, a high school friend of mine served proudly in the Marines but then got married and had better career opportunities. He was then in the Reserves for awhile after his initial hitch, and then was out entirely. After 9-11 he joined the Army National Guard in Virginia, where he lives, as the benefits were better than if he’d renewed his Marine Reserve status. He ended up doing a tour of duty in Iraq and hated it.
Lots of guys do this when they leave active duty. The local reserve unit is Marine, or Army or Whatever and there is some sort of procedure to move from one branch to another. I have had a couple of active duty NCOs who were Marines, so it is not unheard of.
How it works is a mystery to me as officers rarely change branch.
The Army has training specifically for members of the other services to go to the Army. It’s called the Warrior Transition Course. Other than that, I can’t address the specific questions of the OP.
Throughout my service in both branches, I met plenty of Veterans who’d served in more than one branch. And, yes, there is such a thing as an ex-Marine. Again, a colloquialism doesn’t constitute a fact.
In my last unit in the Army, one of the senior NCO’s was in the USMC for his first enlistment. He was a bit confused about the Army’s use of the term Marine MOS. When I showed him the real definition, he thought his confusion was kind of funny. The Army has a number of sea-going vessels and there are MOS designated for those assigned to such vessels, thus marine as in water-borne.
