A question for those in the armed forces.

We seem to have a good sampling of military personnel (Past or present) or their family here. So, I have a question. First, let me state that this is just to get a better understanding of the people in the armed forces. I have the utmost respect and admiration for the job they are doing.

In World War II and Vietnam a person was either drafted or enlisted. For Gulf war I it was volunteer as well as for this time.

My question is this: Why did you or your family member enlist?

I understand there is a sense of duty, a calling to help, money for college (that was the push when I was growing up), respect from others.

My second question is a corollary to the first. Except for those that joined up during the wars, did they expect to be involved in armed conflict, or did they just assume they would be seeing the scenic vistas of Bismark, North Dakota for there terms of service?

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My dad joined for the money, the college, and a way out of town... had to support that new bride of his...

my brother joined for the money, the challenge, the adventure, and for a way out of town.

I joined for the first time for the money, cause i was bored, cause my girlfriend told me she 'just wanted to take it slow', and to get out of town. i joined the 2nd time because i couldn't find a decent job and because the military was all i really knew.

my pops never really saw much real action... even now he's activated reserve, and working as a Chaplain at Ft. Riley, Kansas.

my brother was in Bosnia (a couple times), spent a year in Korea, and spent 10 months in Iraq. He joined right when the first Persian Gulf war was going on, so i think it's safe to say that he knew he would be involved in a war at some point.

I spent 4 months in Haiti, 2 months in SW Asia last year, and 3 more months in SW Asia this year. I think i knew that i would prob'ly be deployed at some point, especially since our drill sergeants told us as much when we were in basic training. The funny thing is, you train so much that eventually you start looking forward to going and doing it for real. Sure you don't want to spend a whole year of your life deployed, but there's definitely a sense of, 'o.k. we've drilled this a hundred times, let's see if we could do it for real'

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I'll let me hubby answer the question on why he joined himself, but I'll answer the second. When he enlisted, it was for five years. We assumed based on historical timeframes and the length of time he joined for that there would be a war/conflict of some kind while he was in. That's one reason I didn't want him to do any of the "cool" front line type jobs, but with the war we're in now, the job doesn't necessarily correlate to the danger involved the way it used to anyway.

My brother joined in October of 2001. He joined because of Sept. 11(he grew up in NY). There were other reasons involved, but that was the main one.

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