To the OP. I was in almost the exact situation as you. I spent 3/4 of my Army time in the Infantry and the last of my 21 years in special operations. My only goal through out was the pay for flight school and fly for an airline. It's really the reason I stayed in, until I had enough cash to pay for everything. My dad was a Captain at a major and the short story is that as I was about to start college and flight school at the end of my senior year, the airline went bad and I had to do something. For me, it was join the Army.

I finally saved enough to pay for all of my flight school and time building for my commercial. I ETS'd at 14 years, finished flight school, got a job flying skydiver's and ended up flying for Comair. Well, we all know what happened there and I ended up going back in the Army. Yes, I did try to get hired elsewhere and I did. It was with Mesaba but the class date never happened because they didn't get the aircraft they were supposed to back in 2008. So I reinlisted, deployed some more and then came back this year. You can do it. You sound like you have a passion for it so it is without a doubt possible.

As far as Rick's opinion on college for all of those jobs. Yes, it is a good idea to have a degree and there's no disputing that. It is, however, not necessary depending on your background and it hasn't stopped me from any of the jobs you mentioned.