View Full Version : Enlistment Duration? What before/after?
I am planning on going MOS of 0311/Active Duty.
My question is after, MCRT/SOI, what do I do? wait for deployment orders and just train? and if and when/after I am deployed, and serve a Tour of 6 to 8 months. What is the process after?
After returning from deployment overseas you train more? or do you get stationed state side and get a civilian job? or am I getting this all wrong?
What I meant to ask is say you do the first 6 months of your 4 year contract training in MCRT then SOI. And then you do deployment to Iraq or whatever combat zone youre required in, 6 to 8 months...That is a total of 1 year maybe more, the other 3 years??
what is the remainder is my real question? just training more? and going home to a barracks?
For a 4 year active duty enlistee?
I know you spend the first 6 months in between MCRT/SOI
Then a possible deployment to Iraq/Afghan 6 to 8 months.
Once I return do I?
Stay on base?
Do I go and get a job?
Go to school?
rvillac2
11-11-08, 11:52 PM
Fill in your profile and read the rules of the site.
I have done all that is required.
Okay, you have a really distorted view on what being in the military is. And it's hard for me to understand that at your age your knowledge of the military is so...unknowledgeable.
Now, since you asked the question 4 or 5 times in that post I'm going to assume that it's hard for you to write out what you're trying to ask. I think you need to sit down and have a talk with an active duty Marine (like your recruiter if you have one yet) and find out what life as an active duty Marine is like.
I'd like to give you a simple answer but I feel like you need way more than just that.
0231Marine
11-12-08, 07:00 AM
Ok, so the Barney style answer to this (which you most definitely need) is that while you're enlisted for those 4 years, the Marine Corps is your full time job.
Yes, the first 6 months or so will be comprised of you going to Boot Camp and the SOI if you have an 03XX MOS. Following SOI, you'll recieve orders to your first fleet unit. That unit may deploy while you're there and it may not. With the new president coming on deck in January, the Operational Tempo may change drastically (and I fear it will) and you will see less units going to Iraq and more to Afghanistan. However, there still needs to be units that go other places in the world so not every unit goes to the sand box. While you're in garrison, wherever that may be, you will train every day because that's what Marines do. They train so that when the time comes to put rounds down range, you're not thinking about what you need to do, you just do it.
Following a deployment, you'll get a couple weeks of leave to see your family or just relax. Then you'll come back to your unit and start training again. The more rank you pick up, you'll start to make the transition from the PFC who has to learn everything and gets screamed at all the time to the Cpl or Sgt who is giving the orders and teaching his new Marines about combat and tactics. You'll become the trainer instead of the dumbass boot who knows nothing.
There is time for college in there if you make time for it. I used to hear excusses all the time from my Marines why they couldn't complete their required MCI's for promotion or why they didn't want to take college classes. Well the real reason is because they would rather sit in the barracks on a Friday or Saturday and get **** faced than actually do something productive with their lives. That's fine if you want to be a LCpl for your 4 years in but try to complete some college while you're in. Every base has an education center that provides you all the materials you need to succeed. Not using them is a waste.
0231Marine, thank you for taking the time to answer me, I apologize for my scrambled question, I will rephrase it.
My view is distorted since the recruiter I spoken to decided it was better to go around my questions and try to fool me with what I assume what works with his younger possible enlistees.
I felt lied to, and I feared I would never get a straight answer from any other recruiter since this was the second one I saw after the first being the worst.
I am 23 years old, I am not the 18 to 20 year old average enlistee/recruit, those sort of things don't attend/attract me as opposed to the younger wave which they direct those statements/fantasies towards.
At the age I am at, I don't have the luxury to be suckered into false fantasies created by this recruiter. Doing a 4 year contract means I will be washed back into the world at 27 years of age, and start over again oppose to a 18 year getting out at 21.
I asked the Recruiter what a Marines life was like after MCRT/SOI, and I quote him, "man crazy ****ing fun things, like sneaking out to bars, bringing girls into camp" etc with misleading information. He never once mentioned the strict training, and deployments after deployments.
From my research and understanding of what you clarified 0231Marine.
A enlistees 4 years goes by in the order of;
MCRT/SOI being 6 months, after this (from research) a month of training in the desert at 29 palms or aka Mojave Viper? After this you enter a First Fleet Unit? Spend your enlisted days, weeks, months (or more) of training with your unit. Then receive orders for deployment if you are activated, which is a high possibility for a 0311.
As a Marine I would have to serve 6 to 8 months in a country/war zone and then I am given orders to return home? Once returned home, I am given 6 months of relief (from what I gather from my research), then all over again training starts (Plus new possible deployment orders). During this I can attend college courses or classes at a center (i believe there is a difference?) on camp for educational purposes?
I would like to serve 2 years Active duty, fulfill my obligation of ToD. I am not looking for the easy way to things, that is not what being a US Marine is about, from what I learned about the Corps.
But, is there a possibility of a Active Duty Marine after 2 years of enlistment (Active Duty Service)/deployments, to switch to the reserves to finish of the reminder of his last 2 years of his contract?
I only ask this, since I read at http://www.nypdrecruit.com/NYPD_military_benefits.aspx, a 2 year full time active duty service allows the candidate to be considered for hiring.
Since I am interested in Law Enforcement after the Marine Corps, that is why I ask if you could switch to reserves from Active to pursue employment in NYPD.
I know the Marine Corps wants commitment. This is when I started to think about it, 4 years would deny me from seeking my other Goal, which is with Law Enforcement (NYPD). But I wanted to do my research and made sure it was thoroughly done. I hit dead-end walls, bias information on sites (from others in Military backgrounds), misinformation from USMC recruiters and so on.
I hope I am understood.
But I just like to thank you all for taking the time to helping this lost soul.
-Jeran
rvillac2
11-13-08, 12:47 AM
2 years active duty and then out? Nope. If you're just doing this to get into the PD, seek another route.
Besides your initial training, there is no set schedule for training cycles and deployments that you can depend on. Let me break it down so a 23 yr old can understand it.
You enter the Corps and immediately go to boot camp followed by SOI. After SOI, you are sent to a fleet unit depending on your MOS. Once you hit the fleet, how you spend your time is dictated by your unit and it's operational schedule. In the SIMPLEST SCENARIO, you will be in garrison (on base) and work 0700 to 1700. During these hours, you would be training, going to classes, or unit PTing. Before and after these hours, you're living in bachelor quarters mostly free to do whatever you want. You would also have weekend liberty, Friday 1700 to Monday 0700 which is when you would have time to go into town, party, read, exercise, etc. During liberty, you could be restricted to base or within a prescribed limit distance away from the base. If you go on leave, vacation to civilians, you can travel further.
This is an OVERSIMPLIFICATION. The schedule is changed depending on the training schedule, the mood of the CO, and the mood of the 1st Sgt, etc. Your liberty could be cancelled. You could be put on extra duty and several dozen other things could happen that would interrupt this dream schedule.
Your regiment's operational tempo will dictate the deployments. As a battalion, you will train up for deployment, go to Mojave Viper, and then go to war. Once you return, your unit will grant you leave and you can go home, but you'll return and do it all over again after your leave is up.
I'm tired of typing. If this is still not clear to you, ask more specific questions.
The Marine Corps is not way for me to get into PD. I just considered it to be more honorable to have Military background if you were to go PD, that's my opinion.
There's college, easiest way for PD (Skipping Military), but of course there's the Experience and family you make/Gain in the Corps that's beyond all, the main reason for me.
I thank you two for your descriptions/taking the time to do so, rvillac2 and 0231Marine. I just wanted to know what I am getting into (as in contract/commitment) and I don't want to be miserable as I have read others Marine's testimonies (Mostly PoGs).
I believe the reserves is a better option for a person like me.
But once again thank you for your answers.
-Jeran
From the prospective of an FMF infantryman. You go through initial training (boot camp, SOI) then hit the fleet. The unit you go to will be just gearing up for deployment. You may not be sent to Iraq or Afganistan but you are going somewhere. It may be a full year from when you hit the fleet until you get sent overseas. The entire time before deployment you are training for war. Upon return from deployment. The old salts will move on to other units or get out and a fresh batch of boots will arrive and you will start back into training for war. This sort of training cycle will get you at least two deployments overseas and the entire time, even deployed time you are continuously working on combat skills. This is why you qualify on the range every year and go through the gas chamber every year and swim qual every year and take two PFT's every year and spend at least half of every month in the field and and and etc. Out of the FMF Marines, such as recruiters and drill instructors, are still required to keep up on their warfighting skills but their mission does not include deployments. They have probably got a couple deployments under their belt already.
I can see the picture you have in your head... go to boot camp, go to SOI, go to combat, done. It just doesn't work that way. If it did work that way every Marine would be a PFC with 2 years of service.
Thank you as well Sgt. Quinn.
The picture in my head was that I figured with the United States Marine Corps you can have flexibility like the Army, I was mistaken. I take it this is only with the option as a Reservist in the Marine Corps, I can pursue other interest.
Everything has been made clear as water.
Thank you all.
lol thanks Jeran, you made my morning.
There are other places that we Marines deploy to not just Iraq and Afgan. For example since I'm in Okinawa Japan we can goto Phillipines, Korea, Other parts of the Island ect ect. They usually pull us early on some deployments so that we don't earn our ribbon/medal that we deserve for being there.
What a job? When you take the oath you are a Marine 24/7! Take pride in that! Seriously you need to talk to your recruiter if you think this is what "plaing Marine" is all about. And another thing it is MCRD (Marine Corps Recruit Depot) Not MCRT get it right. What do you suppose the T stood for? Trumps perhaps?