re: New military recruit jobs when signing up?

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How well does "fueling airplanes" translate to a real world job in civilian life?

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True. No airplanes in civilian life.

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There are no slots this month, but there are in 60 days. Or in the fall. Etc.

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Hey, if they would have told me that, I would have been fine waiting. But they kept telling me I had to pick something else right then and sign now. I even asked the guy if I could go back into the waiting area and think about it for a little bit while they were processing some of the others and he told me no.

A lot of time they'll say this shite because they need to fill certain MOS's to meet quota for the year. I would tell him to talk to other recruiters and feel them out so see if he can get what he wants in his contract. Unless it's in writing, it never happened.

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Recruiters are as slimy as car salesmen.

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They have quotas to fill and will sell you a line of bull to get them.

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My advice from all of my family members who served is to not go if you don’t get the job you want.

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Absolutely this. You can shop around. I'd say retake the ASVAB if you didn't score high enough the first time. There are some highly competitive positions in all branches that are lucrative outside the military and have better paths for advancement.

Now if homeboy just wants to be a crayon eating grunt, and the recruiter is saying there's no more slots for grunts? I'd call bull on that.

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I've talked to a former army recruiter and said extremely unlikely- but he can switch services. I've read conflicting things about that.

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Tell him to walk into an Army recruiting office and ask for an "Option 40" Contract. This will be infantry with a slot in jump and Ranger school. Accept nothing less.

Tell the Marine recruiter to go eat some crayons. If they don't have an assigned MOS and he's already "fake" sworn in, screw that. He will be sent wherever they need to fill a hole.

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A lot of time they'll say this shite because they need to fill certain MOS's to meet quota for the year. I would tell him to talk to other recruiters and feel them out so see if he can get what he wants in his contract. Unless it's in writing, it never happened.

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Good advice. Like I said, my recruiter even tried sneaking the wrong MOS onto my paperwork. He figured I wouldn’t bother actually reading it and would just sign whatever piece of paper he pushed in my face. And when I noticed it was wrong he even lied and claimed it was no big deal and they could “fix it later.” That’s total bullshite and I knew it. If I’d have signed that paper I’d have had to go in as the MOS he chose, Bradley turret mechanic, go though the training for that MOS and the only way to “fix it later” would be for me to have to go back and go though training for the MOS I actually wanted, 19Kilo, all over again. Essentially, if id have not read the paper, I’d have gone through 8 weeks of basic and like 3 months of AIT for the wrong MOS. And the only fix to get into the MOS I actually wanted would be to go all the way back and go through 22 weeks of 19Kilo OSUT. And that’s if I could even get a 19Kilo slot which was far from guaranteed.

That piece of shite recruiter was willing to make me do all that just so he could get a little extra bonus for signing me up as a Bradley turret mechanic instead of a tanker.

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How well does "fueling airplanes" translate to a real world job in civilian life?


Sounds like 4 wasted years.

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i was 77F which is now 92F which is fueling operations. At least in the army there are lots of different variants. You can be a fueler for helicopters, to tanks to long distance fuel operations(this is what I did) to essentially being a gas man where you drive around and fill up things.

depending on what you end up doing(can be multiple things) it 100% translates to civilian life. plenty of jobs to understand how to fuel helicopters and other planes.

I learned to set up large pumping operations, piping, generators etc. pretty sure that translates pretty well, especially when you start having to understand pump curves, hydraulics etc.

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I've talked to a former army recruiter and said extremely unlikely- but he can switch services. I've read conflicting things about that.

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I was ready to leave during high school because I wanted to get a jump on training and get basic done the summer before senior year. They were going to let me do it, but when I got to MEPS, they wouldn't do the Option 40 infantry/airborne/Ranger selection contract for that. They wanted to give me 88M instead (truck driver). The recruiter pressured me saying it'd be fine, and I did exactly what your son has already done--signed the original contract after drug test, etc. and swear-in. I was even buddies with everyone at the station, but he was still going to frick me over.

I thought about it and told the recruiter I decided I didn't want to risk it, and that I wanted to wait until after senior year and get the Option 40 contract that I wanted.

They brought me back to MEPs and they gave me the one I wanted. Guaranteed slot shipping to Ft. Benning for infantry, a slot in airborne school and a slot in ranger selection.

That initial contract they make you do before shipping means nothing unless you actually ship. Another example--buddy of mine signed an Army contract at MEPs and didn't ship, missed ship date and joined the Coast Guard afterward.

You can absolutely change branches of service, as I did it. Went from La Nat'l Guard to USN. Had to go to bootcamp again and also new school for my job. It wasn't the easiest process but so glad I did it. I ended up shore based in Hawaii for 6 years. Had the time of my life.