Originally Posted by
PasserOGas
From what I can tell the marines attract a different sort of officer. (Understatement of the year.)
That being said I don't think DOD really cares about individual marines (short of those who gave the ultimate). Honestly, how many divorces, troubled dependent children, alcoholics, suicides, etc do the service chiefs really "care" about? It makes them look bad, sure but I never get the impression that they go home worrying about it. I can tell you of guys who went to the boss pleading to not deploy because their wife was ready to leave them and they were ordered out the door, despite having other options. The ORI was coming to town after all and they weren't on "the list"...
I think the point of this though is to say you hate the flag because you look suscpisously at our government and it's leaders is way off base. I think one needs to realize that there are many people in our government who care more about themselves than "the flag" and being upset about that or pointing it out isn't unpatriotic. More towards UnderOvuer than to you.
Maybe that is part of the difference - in at least the way that you and I look at thing then. I don't care what big DOD does. It never affected me anymore than the big pictures politics. I can't influence at that level and world security and world economics filter down and affect my daily lives in ways but I'm not focused and them. What affected me on a daily basis was how my immediate superiors and how my immediate subordinates were affected and I was tried hard to do the best for those I led and I felt at all times (even in my one terrible dysfunctional gun squadron) that I was being taken of on a personal level.
Big DOD (service chiefs since you used them as an example) don't generally care about the individual because they are removed from them. They in turn take care of their immediates and it is suppose to filter down. I want them to make sure that the mechanisms are in place for those problems to be taken care of - and for the problems you listed there are numerous facilities and programs in place to care for the service member.
I remember being in charge of determining the 'list' for deployment. I was also surprised for the million and one reasons people came up with NOT being able to deploy. It is always easy to question the decisions, especially if you are able to sit back without all of the information.
...say you hate the flag because you look suscpisously at our government and it's leaders is way off base.
I sure hope that last statement is more about another poster than myself.
I certainly had my issues with the way things were run, but overall - I definitely think that I had a better experience on active duty than a few others posters on APC and it is NOT indicative of a majority of the people that I came across during my time.