6 ms·

Your perspective is not very unique, there are a lot of veterans due to high churn. It is my experience that there is very little crossover between the militar

by woodman 11y ago

Your perspective is not very unique, there are a lot of veterans due to high churn. It is my experience that there is very little crossover between the military and police. Of the hundred-something guys in my last company, only two went on to law enforcement. A few years ago I had a nonmilitary friend go through one of the country's top police academies, and his stories aligned with my experiences - there weren't a lot of veterans in his class. The local PD has 120 officers, of that only two are veterans (neither of them were combat arms). I have my theories about why this is, but that is another discussion. So the whole narrative, where police militarization is due to veteran hires, rings pretty hollow for me. What we are seeing here is the result of an end-justifies-the-means mentality. The military has the same mentality, but this is very deliberately tempered by a focus on honor and duty - something that law enforcement lacks by comparison.

fapjacks 11y ago
That's interesting. What was your MOS? In the infantry, we had a much higher ratio of police officers, and I was in a few different units which had higher ratios than yours. In my last company alone we had -- roughly estimating here -- fifteen or twenty law enforcement officers of various kinds.
- woodman 11y ago
  0331, infantry machine gunner. We saw a lot of combat in Fallujah, which might have taken the starch out of most. There is also the timing to consider, 01 to 05 were interesting years for the military - a very large injection of middle and upper middle class folks.
  - fapjacks 11y ago
    Maybe there are more police officers are in the Army than the Marines. It is definitely a significant demographic in line units in the Army guard and reserves. FWIW we had the opposite happen: When I joined in 2000, there were a lot of college kids and middleupper-middle class people. After the wars started, it was basically people coming off of active duty to serve the rest of their 8 years (four active, four guard/reserve), poor people that couldn't afford college otherwise (myself included) and law enforcement. There was an enormous shift, and a kind of unspoken understanding before Iraq that anybody that didn't want to be in combat needed to get out. And so they found ways -- like PT tests and paperwork (and I suppose drug tests and DUIs) -- to get out.
    - woodman 11y ago
      I knew that the cultures were different, but I never would have guessed that the Army had post-9/11 recruit quality problems - especially for combat arms. When the fourth 9/11 anniversary rolled around the USMC leadership was sweating bullets and pulling out all the stops for retention, because the enlisted pool was the best it had been in living memory. Everybody knows that bootcamp is designed to provide a common experience and rebuild recruits, standardizing to the military's brand of discipline and morality - like interchangeable-parts from the industrial revolution. I've wondered what distance that influence would cover in one's life, because so far it is still holding up in interesting ways. I've talked to guys I hadn't heard from in ten years, and despite differences in profession and family situation, a pretty strong pattern has emerged in uncommon political/philosophical thought. So maybe the influence is much more local. Maybe some soldiers become cops because their drill instructors withheld affection :)
      - fapjacks 11y ago
        Heh, "withheld affection"... I'm going to use that. I should say there wasn't so much a problem with recruit quality, as the people I mentioned were just as good at soldiering as the others, but it was certainly different. Most of the men in my family were in the Marine Corps at some point, and I worked with Marines on my second and fourth tours, so I have a little bit of insight into what you mean about the culture difference. Also I should say I always enjoyed working with Marines. And with respect to your other point, I think military service is so valuable for individuals that I strongly support conscription. I believe only good things could come of requiring every person to go serve in the military (or Peace Corps or something) for two years when they turn 18. If we did that, I think the problems we're facing as a nation would see some positive change within a single generation, and I'm confident enough in that statement that I am sure you feel the same way. For all the things I hated about the Army, the physical and psychological tools they equipped me with have helped enrich my life in so many ways. Every time I think about my feelings about this, I picture that scene from Starship Troopers when the guy wheels his chair out from the desk and he's missing a leg and has a prosthetic arm, but he shakes Johnny's hand and says "Good for you. The infantry made me the man I am today"[0] and that's how I personally feel about it. I mean, I have all my fingers and toes, but I feel like that guy. Including the tragedy, I wouldn't trade the experience for anything. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoPTPe33PQY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoPTPe33PQY

by woodman 11y ago

fapjacks 11y ago

That's interesting. What was your MOS? In the infantry, we had a much higher ratio of police officers, and I was in a few different units which had higher ratios than yours. In my last company alone we had -- roughly estimating here -- fifteen or twenty law enforcement officers of various kinds.

woodman 11y ago
0331, infantry machine gunner. We saw a lot of combat in Fallujah, which might have taken the starch out of most. There is also the timing to consider, 01 to 05 were interesting years for the military - a very large injection of middle and upper middle class folks.
- fapjacks 11y ago
  Maybe there are more police officers are in the Army than the Marines. It is definitely a significant demographic in line units in the Army guard and reserves. FWIW we had the opposite happen: When I joined in 2000, there were a lot of college kids and middleupper-middle class people. After the wars started, it was basically people coming off of active duty to serve the rest of their 8 years (four active, four guard/reserve), poor people that couldn't afford college otherwise (myself included) and law enforcement. There was an enormous shift, and a kind of unspoken understanding before Iraq that anybody that didn't want to be in combat needed to get out. And so they found ways -- like PT tests and paperwork (and I suppose drug tests and DUIs) -- to get out.
  - woodman 11y ago
    I knew that the cultures were different, but I never would have guessed that the Army had post-9/11 recruit quality problems - especially for combat arms. When the fourth 9/11 anniversary rolled around the USMC leadership was sweating bullets and pulling out all the stops for retention, because the enlisted pool was the best it had been in living memory. Everybody knows that bootcamp is designed to provide a common experience and rebuild recruits, standardizing to the military's brand of discipline and morality - like interchangeable-parts from the industrial revolution. I've wondered what distance that influence would cover in one's life, because so far it is still holding up in interesting ways. I've talked to guys I hadn't heard from in ten years, and despite differences in profession and family situation, a pretty strong pattern has emerged in uncommon political/philosophical thought. So maybe the influence is much more local. Maybe some soldiers become cops because their drill instructors withheld affection :)
    - fapjacks 11y ago
      Heh, "withheld affection"... I'm going to use that. I should say there wasn't so much a problem with recruit quality, as the people I mentioned were just as good at soldiering as the others, but it was certainly different. Most of the men in my family were in the Marine Corps at some point, and I worked with Marines on my second and fourth tours, so I have a little bit of insight into what you mean about the culture difference. Also I should say I always enjoyed working with Marines. And with respect to your other point, I think military service is so valuable for individuals that I strongly support conscription. I believe only good things could come of requiring every person to go serve in the military (or Peace Corps or something) for two years when they turn 18. If we did that, I think the problems we're facing as a nation would see some positive change within a single generation, and I'm confident enough in that statement that I am sure you feel the same way. For all the things I hated about the Army, the physical and psychological tools they equipped me with have helped enrich my life in so many ways. Every time I think about my feelings about this, I picture that scene from Starship Troopers when the guy wheels his chair out from the desk and he's missing a leg and has a prosthetic arm, but he shakes Johnny's hand and says "Good for you. The infantry made me the man I am today"[0] and that's how I personally feel about it. I mean, I have all my fingers and toes, but I feel like that guy. Including the tragedy, I wouldn't trade the experience for anything. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoPTPe33PQY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoPTPe33PQY