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At OP’s request, edited thread title to include all military branches.
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In the Navy, it’s not that simple. You don’t just “apply to OCS”, and in fact it’s damned difficult to get into what are called “mustang” programs at all. You usually have to be an E-6 or E-7 with stellar evaluations and recommendations, which can mean waiting 10 years or more. Officers who come from the enlisted ranks in the Navy aren’t usually treated all that well by the Academy types, and Warrant Officers are downright ignored.
Also, once you hit the E-7 to E-9 ranks, you won’t want to start over as an O-1. Loss of prestige, leadership position, etc.
Well, when I tell someone they’re crazy to enlist when they can apply for OCS, and they go for an enlistment anyway, that tells me everything I need to know. He’ll experience the truth of your words, Chefguy, later on. Nothing wrong with that; he’s just a better fit as an E right now.
Former USAF officer …
As others have said, the wall between Officer and Enlisted is something with no real counterpart in civilian life. As such the OP will have a very hard time understanding just how huge that wall is.
As a small indicator, the starting pay for an Officer is over double that of an enlisted man. After about 9 years (assuming decent promotions) the enlisted man will be making what the Officer was on day 1. Meantime, the Officer’s wages will have doubled again.
A 10+year enlisted man married with kids will be issued a smaller crappier house than a newbie officer without kids.
It goes on and on.
There are programs to let enlisted climb over the wall, but the number of slots is tiny compared to the demand. If someone is qualified to be an Officer, and is temperamentally suited to taking charge of a small group at age 23, they’d be doing a very not-smart thing entering the service Enlisted.
If you’re a totally hands-on guy who would *really *rather be wrenching on a truck than managing a truck repair shop, or you’re only looking to the military as a short-term move to gain a civilian skill or as a place to sit out the impending Depression, then enlisting might make sense.
I don’t mean to rag on enlisted. The many guys & gals who worked for me over the years were super people, skilled and dedicated. But they were also very under-rewarded and over-hassled for what they did. If I was King that’d be different. But the DOD is the way it is & I wasn’t invited to change it.
One final thought, essentially independent of what I’ve written above …
The recruiting system strongly rewards those who know what they want.
If you show up with an aimless desire to join some service for no particular reason, and with no particular job in mind, well the system is going to put you in the slot they have the hardest time filling. Your interests will not be served.
If you know what you want, they will work like hell to get it for you. If they don’t, go to the recruiter in the next town.
It’s just like buying a car. If you stride in having done your homework & say “I want one of those, with these options. I have my financing and will pay $X and only $X. Now say yes or I go down the street.”
You’ll have a completely different outcome than if you shuffle in and mumble “I guess I wanna buy a car …”
The military is full of leaders at all levels. Even junior enlisted start leading the folks beneath them almost immediately. Sure that’s something they teach, and not everybody is a born Patton. But if you walk in a leader, the recruiter will work for (ie follow) you. If you walk in a follower, you’ll be led where he needs you to go for his quota.
I didn’t realize the huge difference between E and O.
Either way though, I’m not sure I’d be ready to handle the responsibility of an O right away. That said, If I enlisted as an O and got through basic and OCS I feel like they would MAKE me ready to be an officer. Is that at all true? Or do I just not have the mindset going in? I know that is most likely a loaded question, but answer as best as possible I would guess… More aimed at flyboy I guess, as I’m interested in your opinion after your last comment (not in a bad way)
Thanks a lot guys!
Well, first, you don’t enlist as an O. So I’m not sure what you mean by “If I enlisted as an O and got through basic and OCS.” There is no basic for O’s. It’s either OCS, Academy, or ROTC. All three will serve one primary purpose: to give you the tools you need to be an Officer, or wash you out. Basic is what you go through when you enlist; then end result being designated as an Airman or Seaman. Airman or Seaman will depend on what program you enter with–you can either try for a Guaranteed Job program or go in undesignated and “strike” for whatever you want after Basic (I heartily do not recommend this approach). What type of program you get will depend on your ASVAB scores and what the service wants at that particular time.
Being an Airman or Seaman is hard work, as LSLGuy said. He’s AF, but the same pretty much applies to the lowest rung on the pole for all services–they get the shittiest jobs out there. They’re taking out trash, scraping paint off the hull, buffing floors, manning a post at oh-dark thirty on Christmas. It’s a slow grind to work your way up from there, and you have to excel at these crap jobs in order to either put in a package to wind up as an O, or to make it to a senior enlisted position. I watch shows like Carrier and see the disaffected E’s they portray and it’s largely because they come in just like you–not really knowing what they want. A recruiter’s wet dream. They get jammed into some shitty job and realize that it’s not what they signed up for, and worse yet, they have no goal in mind to pull them through the misery that is the junior E’s life.
I know it’s hard because you have no experience with any of this, so you have no idea what we’re talking about. But you’re almost done with college, and it’s a transition in your life where you need to be making more mature decisions, whether it’s going into the military or entering the work force. You know you have the teaching gig going on, you know you can fall back on that, but you also know it’s not really what you want to be doing with your life. But it seems to me like you’re unwilling to really commit to something like the military at this point–really look into what it has to offer, talk to recruiters, figure out a path for yourself and commit to it. It’s hard, but it’s a step you have to take to be an O, or a successful E. You don’t think you’re ready–well, that’s fine, but you need to think about what you want and move from there.
For the OP: Here is a thread on the process to becoming a US military pilot. Few questions about joining the Air Force/Navy to become a pilot - In My Humble Opinion - Straight Dope Message Board
Flyboy88, myself & and several other knowledgable folks contributed. From your writing I’d wager you’re not temperamentally suited for that role, but you will find some interesting background info about the topics we’ve touched on here.
Given where yuo are in you college career, OCS/OTS is the only option for yuo.
Those programs, regardless ofservice, *will *teach you to be an officer. Or you’ll fail & end up enlisted for a few years. It takes 3 months and you’re fed, housed and paid. In other words, there’s not much downside. If you’re interested at all, grab this bull by the balls & start learning more about what’s available.
Regardless of the military thing, you also need to be spending some effort getting to understand yourself, your interests, and your aptitudes. Knowledge leads to decisions, which leads to action. The alternative is an indefinite wallow powered by ignorance.
Good post, and I have no quarrel with anything you say here.
One thing I think was worth mentioning which hasn’t been mentioned yet… Other than the “mustangs” (senior enlisteds who receive commissions) I met in my time in the Navy (and they were pretty few in number), all of the Navy/Marine officers (both line and staff corps) I worked with who had prior enlisted service earned their commissions in one of several ways:
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Finished their enlistments honorably, then went to college and either did NROTC/Marine Platoon Leaders Class in college, or joined the service after college graduation with the commitment to send them to OCS (i.e., were recruited as officer candidates), or
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finished their enlistments, went to college, went to grad school/law school/med school (etc.), then joined the appropriate Navy staff corps or Marine OCS/guaranteed law option, or
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were selected as enlisteds for a Naval Academy appointment (the Secretary of the Navy has 170 Academy appointments he can give out to Navy/Marine enlisteds).
Since Superfreaknduper is finishing college, about the only option available to him if he wanted to be an officer with prior enlisted service would be to do an enlistment, finish, then do the grad school/professional school route if he wanted to ultimately be a Navy staff corps officer or Marine judge advocate. There are advantages/disadvantages to that career path, but that’s a bit of a digression.
I’m not aware of any Navy/Marine programs which take promising junior enlisteds with college degrees and give them a shot to go to OCS and earn a commission, and I never worked with or met any Navy/Marine officers during my time in the Navy who earned a commission in that way. I don’t know if there’s any such career path in any of the other services. (I have an uncle who was a career Army officer who was selected for OCS when he was a sergeant (IIRC), but he was a Vietnam era enlisted who then went into aviation and flew helos until he retired. The Army even sent him to college on the government’s dime, which was a pretty sweet deal. Not sure they’re doing that anymore, though).
Since I was a Navy JAG, let me add one other thing…
“Military discipline” is a lot different from civilian life. There are things you can do as a civilian, like sleep late and blow off work for a few hours, which won’t get you anything more than a stern lecture from the boss, or maybe just fired from your job. In the military, such acts could earn you a court martial and possible punitive discharge. Even if you weren’t court martialled for that kind of behavior, going to Captain’s Mast/non-judicial punishment isn’t fun, and it risks earning you a reputation as a poor performer, and your superiors may decide that their duty to their country is to make your life miserable from that point on.
Meaning you no disrespect, Superfreaknduper, but you sound like a lot of sailors and Marines that I represented at courts martial as a Navy JAG. Nice kids, but a bit immature, and not knowing exactly what they wanted to do with their lives. Unfortunately, those are exactly the kind of kids who screw up (more from inattention, laziness, and/or negligence than outright malice), find themselves at the wrong end of a court martial for some strictly military offense like unauthorized absence or failure to follow orders, and wind up earning a punitive discharge and time in a brig.
There’s no shame in taking a few years after college to see a bit of life and figure out what you want to do with it. If, indeed, you decide in a year or two that by Gawd, you want to be a military officer, you can approach an officer recruiter with some degree of confidence and a clear idea of what you want to do.
Good luck!
Cheers,
bcg
Does failure to complete OCS/OTS mean a commitment to serve as an enlisted? (I’ve been away from the Navy for a while now, and have had no need to keep up with this kind of thing.)
I seem to recall from when I was in, that when push came to shove, if you washed out of OCS the likelihood was that you’d probably get an entry level separation, an uncharacterized discharge for the convenience of the government, and maybe Uncle Sam would wish you luck as a civilian. But as I say, I’ve been away for a while…
Cheers,
bcg
Here’s another relevant thread: Tell Me About the Air Force. - In My Humble Opinion - Straight Dope Message Board
I’m really out of my element here, but I was aware of several enlisted soldiers in the Army who had bachelors degrees and “put in their packet” for OCS. I’m not sure what the packet entails, but it you didn’t have to finish your enlistment if you were accepted. Quite a few more put in a packet to be a warrant officer, but I don’t think the OP is leaning towards that route.
Furthermore, there were a whole lot of flyers and pamphlets going around about the “Green to Gold” program, which allowed qualified enlisted to go to college, enroll in ROTC and become officers, regardless of the time left in their enlistment.
I’m not sure if this helps the OP, but I’d be surprised if there weren’t similar programs in the Navy or Air Force. I can’t imagine the military forcing enlisted men and women, otherwise qualified to be officers, to finish their enlistment before they go to OCS. The Army at least seemed to have a philosophy of “promote from within” whenever possible.
– DrCube, not even close to an officer.
It’s been many years for me as well. Doubtless the rules have changed since I was in. And gosh knows there are probably 10 failure categories in the regs with 10 different outcomes.
But I didn’t want to put out the impression that OCS was a no-obligation program just in case it isn’t now. Better to be a bit pessimistic.
I’m sort of aware of “Green to Gold”; my son-in-law is hoping that he’ll eventually get to be an Army officer that way. Unfortunately, right now he’s having trouble getting the Army to transfer him from the Reserves to the Regular Army, and not because he’s a bad soldier, either (unless he and my daughter are hiding something from me, and I don’t get the feeling they are).
You could well be right about there being such a program in the Navy (I’ve been out a long time). Come to think of it, Former CNO the late Admiral Jeremy Boorda was such a sailor:
The Wikipedia article does say that Boorda reinstated a program (“Seaman to Admiral”) similar to the one in which he earned his commission. And here’s the Navy’s website on the program: https://www.sta-21.navy.mil/
The U of Oklahoma also has a website on enlisted to officer commissioning programs: Navy
Since that program didn’t exist when I was a Navy JAG, that explains why I never met an officer from that commissioning source. Good to know that the OP has these kinds of options.
One thing to note is that it’s probably very competitive and difficult to get into these programs, with a fairly large number of applicants for a very few slots. Not that I want to discourage the OP from trying to go this route, but it does help to be realistic about these things.
Cheers,
bcg
It’s very possible that there is a clause saying that “you have to serve as a seaman if you wash out of OCS” in the accession paperwork, which is then rarely enforced in favor of just letting them go with an administrative separation (unless the service in question decides there’s some really good reason to retain the washout as an enlisted).
If nothing else, it might give the OCs/OTs some motivation if they think their choices are “graduate and be commissioned” or “wash toilets as an E-1 while having NCOs yell at me for three years” (or however long the accession paperwork says).
You are absolutely correct though: better to expect the worst and be pleasantly surprised.
Cheers,
bcg
Such programs exist, but for anyone with any inkling of being an Officer, I don’t recommend that route. There’s nothing wrong with it, but I think you’ll find that most O’s will steer people away from that. It’s needlessy circuitous. Those programs are more there for the competitive E’s that rise to the top and want something more. If you enlist with that specific goal in mind, and are that motivated to be amongst that cream, and actually carry out that plan and get selected, well, why didn’t you just put in for Officer at the outset? It doesn’t make any sense to me.
Those programs are out there, and they’re good things, but they serve a necessary twofold purpose for the services: they put good E’s on to Officers, and they draw in other E’s who either don’t get selected, or who enjoy the E lifestyle and don’t want to become an Officer. So out of every ten guys that enlist with intentions of taking advantage of those programs, only a fraction will attain that goal. At least, that’s my take on those programs.
The thing is that the OP isn’t sure he’s motivated for that. The problem, as I see it, is that I’m not 100% convinced he’s motivated enough to finish an enlistment honorably, either.
There is a tradition in this country of young (wo)men joining the services in order to “toughen up” and “mature”. That does work for some enlistees (hell, maybe most), but as a JAG I had a hell of a lot of clients charged with UA and orders violations who wound up getting bad conduct discharges because once they were in they decided that the Navy wasn’t the adventure that the recruiting literature and commercials had led them to believe, and really, really wished they’d made a different career choice.
[My favorite: the seaman apprentice who was looking at brig time and a BCD for unauthorized absence. He had a long list of petty offenses (mostly orders violations and minor UAs, and had been through about a metric ton of Captain’s masts before the CO finally got tired and decided he wanted my client “out of my Navy” (CO’s tend to be very possessive of the Navy). My client wanted to fight the BCD, claiming he could straighten up and be a good sailor if only the Navy wouldn’t be so insistent on putting him onboard a ship. “If they just gave me a nice shore job…” sigh ]
Cheers,
bcg
AFAIK, for a civvie coming into the program and attriting via fail or DOR, you’ll get separated and sent home (I believe technically, while in OCS, you are an E-5 Officer Candidate). Basically, if the Navy has not paid you in any way before entering OCS, they won’t tie you to anything. If they’ve paid your college or something like that, you’ll likely be sent to Great Lakes for some training and a two-year stint.
This will be in your contract that you sign before entering OCS. Look for it, know what’s in there, read the fine print, yadda yadda yadda.
One more thing about being enlisted versus O thing: when I was in the AF I did combat rescue. As enlisted men were we got treated a lot better than other enlisted, especially maintainers. Even after that I still wish I was an officer instead.
Don’t have a ton of time to comment right now.
However, I am currently an E5 in the Army Reserves.
5 Years on Active Duty at Fort Campbell, 2 years in Iraq . . Amazing experiences, PM if you really want to know more.
I am now, however, very active in ivaw.org.
Yeah, you’re right. I would certainly advise against enlisting if the OP really wants to be an officer. I just wanted to point out that if he wanted to enlist, the options are there (at least in the Army) to change his mind and try to become an officer in the middle of his enlistment.
I just mentioned Green to Gold because I wanted to refute the idea that one HAS to finish an enlistment before becoming an officer. Obviously if the OP is finishing up college now, Green to Gold won’t be available. But he could still put in a packet for OCS.
On preview: Dryfreeze, that’s a very interesting site. I also spent two years in Iraq. I’ll be checking that out later.