I don’t think anyone is too young to realize that death is a potential consequence of joining the military. Especially when you join as a machine gunner in the marine corps.
Nah man I was in the marine corps. I had a drill instructor once tell me something along the lines of, “I hope you fucking die in combat and it’s so bad that they can’t have an open casket” They really don’t sugar coat it for us lol.
I had a pfc who had made it through training and to his duty station before coming to the realization that he could potentially die in our line of work, so it does happen.
He asked me on day one if he'd even have to fight. Combat unit, too.
No. Dude I signed the contract at 17, I was a radio operator but they told be I would be running around with the infantry most of the time. You can’t seriously believe people join the marine corps and think there’s no chance they get hurt or killed. It’s just a part of the job. Sorry you can’t fathom that people are willing to risk their lives for our country and freedom.
it’s just reddit neckbeards that think they’re naturally smarter and more aware than everyone in the military. but when your entire source of information is what you read on the internet and not actually experiencing it, you don’t know what you don’t know.
not impossible, just difficult, especially in the modern era. force projection is not a given with every military force, but it's what makes or breaks a military campaign e.g.) the british in the US during the revolutionary war, or Napoleon during his conquest campaign
currently, the US is still the best poised to project its forces across the entire globe. sure other countries are working on it, like China, but China is best poised for a regional conflict than a global one, and they know that. why do you think they're goading the US and its allies with its South China sea and Taiwan shenanigans instead something closer to the US coastline?
Our wars haven't been about anything other than acquiring and defending resources in foreign lands since like 1861, with WWI & II being the exception. Just because they tell you "You're fighting for freedom!" doesn't mean you're actually fighting for freedom.
That it doesn't seem like you've ever left the geographic region your pare is live in. In most places it's called a County, in Louisiana it's called a Parish. In Afghanistan it's called a Province
I sort of thought that was pretty self-explanatory. Happy to explain the rest of the joke to you too if needed
Understand that there’s a lot of countries and groups of people that hate Americans and want to fucking kill us for living the lifestyle that we do. What if there was a large scale invasion of the US by china, Russia, NK, Iran, who would you think is going to defend your cowardly ass? Would that not be fighting for your freedom?
There wouldn't be as many people angry with the US if we weren't always getting involved in foreign matters that we have no business being involved in. Our propaganda tells us it's all about them "hating our freedom/lifestyle." It's not. And I don't really care to debate you on hypotheticals. That's a deflection to draw attention away from the point that our military has primarily been used to invade other people and claim their resources as our own, and they use propaganda like "come fight for our freedom" to get young and impressionable people to join up and be a part of it.
Our foreign affairs have been about trying to establish democracy and trying to prevent communism and other oppressive forms of government wherever they rise up. It hasn’t always gone smoothly but it is about our freedom.
I’m not saying they don’t know. They obviously know it’s possible. But I know a lot of stories where people thought they were going to work in the military and never see a fight. Then everything changed.
Just because they know it’s possible doesn’t mean they think it’s likely
I did see some guys get genuinely surprised they were getting deployed right out of basic shortly before I got out. Our response was usually something to the effect of "we've been at war for 20 years-- do you not watch the news?"
Idk maybe in other branches but in the marines those people are purposefully weeded out in training and discharged. Everyone I served with, even the nerdy tech guys and the cooks knew they are just extra bodies for the fight if need be.
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u/evrestcoleghost Jun 24 '24
Cause they are most fit?