If you like to blow **** up I say go for it. Looks like you have everything you need to become a lifelong middle level officer.

Obviously I just meant the peacekeeping work the British Army does there - poor example Ill admit.

Jay,

Good luck to you sir and godspeed.

LOL at Iraq/Afghanistan counter battery fire. Insurgent indirect fire consists of a couple of ******s with a 60mm mortar without a sight set up on a concrete sidewalk hanging rounds. The Arty guys in Iraq/Afghanistan aren't really launching any rounds down range. FO's hang out with the Infantry and it's just as risky for them as it is for the grunts.

Isn't being in the Army safer than being a crab fisherman? Hell, I bet being in the Army is safer than living in Detroit. (I'm joking, though actually it's not that far off)

US fatalities in Iraq are around 50-100 a month out of about 300,000 total soldiers (including contractors, not including support). That's something like 360 per 100,000 per year. Detroit has about 50 homicides per 100,000 per year.

Factor in the low probability of actually being deployed into combat and the army is really not that big of a life risk. Buying a motorcycle or sexing sluts with no condom are probably worse.

something i have thought about doing after uni too i live about 1 min walk from deepcut barracks fwiw and pirbright is up the road.....just dont turn into one of the low life squaddie **** on a night out. About the actual job in this day and age i think the death risk is probably overstated in this day and age but i guess if your going to do it for the next 20 years or w/e then the percentages start to look a bit bleak...if you've seen ross kemp in Afghanistan theres a good example of this when they work out their likelihood of getting killed after 8 tours or something. Just realized cant really help with your actual question but i bet intelligence/engineer corps would probably be pretty fun for a poker player.

bonne chance

> does Iraq/Afghanistan have much of this technology?

What Falcon said. I was planning to join signals or infantry en route to intelligence so just developed a distaste for artillery (plus it's noisy and boring IMO) so that "fact" amused me.

REMFs made me lol (rear echelon mother ******). It has been a while since I heard that.

I too blew out my knee in ROTC and my millitary career was over. I wanted to be a sniper or a para until I figured out how lethal that is. Then, finance sounded more appealing.

Be mentally prepared to do what you don't want as you may get forced into it. Don't worry about getting stuck in Infantry as they typically want guys who want it and won't get someone killed. They really don't want the Rambo types, but the guys that won't crack under pressure and will actually lead. Leading men in combat is not easy.

Yeah, I think I just had a few bad misconceptions about the infantry before due to uninformed people telling me to steer well clear.

Atm Im reading a book called 3 Para, which has just described the Para selection process. One portion of which involves an exercise called 'milling' where two guys with boxing gloves have to punch each other in the face as hard as they can for 60 seconds with no defense allowed! Sounds fun...!

Brilliant show, just finished watching it. Illustrates what is actually going on over there excellently (rather than the usual media crap).

Dont want to turn this into a Dids-blog type thread, but I need to vent

I received a phone call today from the Brigadier overseeing my application to the army. A medical issue has been raised - I have a fairly mild skin disease (Seborrhoeic eczema) on my face and hairline. It is easily treated and barely even noticeable since I moisturize regularly. Even if I didn't moisturize at all the worst that would happen is a bit of dry skin on my face and mild discomfort. However army doctors have a hard-on for skin problems (something like 75% of all lost man hours are due to skin complaints) and this could possibly be cause for them to declare me unfit for medical service. The most annoying thing is they wont give me a medical and make a decision until I go in for the selection board (could be 6 months away or more). So basically I have to prepare and train my ass off when it could all be for nothing. Sigh.

At least I'm getting my lazy ass into shape I guess.....

Dude that blows. How did they find out?

They have to have medical records from my doctor so they saw I had a prescription for dermatitis cream on there. The Navy are a little slacker on these things, or so I hear, so if I get rejected on these grounds by the army I may try the Navy instead.

Try to get it into as good a condition as possible before the medical LDO and other than that concentrate on the stuff you can control - being physically and mentally ready.

My selection board had a huge hardon for team playerness (looks like the British army do too) so don't try too hard to stand out as the one genius in the group for the co-operative tasks. If you're a good candidate they'll overlook some of the small stuff (in my case being a slightly husky 16 year old that they needed to trust would grow into army fitness)

Good advice and this is what I had come to the conclusion is the best way to proceed. I can make it completely unnoticeable if I use my cream and moisturize 2-3 times a day. If it flared up on tour or during training they would be pretty loathe to discharge me since they would have already invested soo much in me (according to the guys at a British Army forum). If I do get turned down for it I can always challenge it (some doctors have a bigger problem with it than others). If that doesn't pan out I'm just going to tell myself it was for the best and Id have probably got myself killed anyway

Hi Jay,

95%+ of regular recruits think Officers are pieces of ****.

Being an Officer you will be a representative of the Army, attending functions etc. and promoting it actively.

Your sense of 30+ people looking up to you/repsecting you is very incorrect.

My brother was in the Royal Engineers and I had planned Officer Training (or at least entertaining the idea of doing so) and has just left - this is how I know this.

Pretty sure this isn't true. Of course there is banter and grumbling about Officers but most (speaking to a cousin and a couple of mates in the army) regulars generally respect the good officers and despise the ****ty ones.

I know England is full of queers, but "Sorry Leftentant I can't storm that hill I've got a pimple!"????

Imagine you have bad eczema or whatever on your body. It hasn't been treated or moisturized in weeks because you don't have access to any creams when you are in the midde of the desert. Now you have to pull on full body armour over your chapped and flaky skin in 50 degree heat and run around all day with guys shooting at you.

I thought it was ridiculous at first aswell, but after someone explained it to me like this I can see where they are coming from.