Military Service Can Help Young People Confront Their Worst Fear

J. Michael Sharman

The motto of the state college where I got my bachelor’s degree was “pro Deo, domo, patria.” Most young people I know still agree with that lofty goal and want, more than anything else, to be able to have their lives make a difference “for God, home, and country.” They just don’t know how they are going to get the tools or the opportunity to do so.

The second semester of the senior year is “senioritis” season, and many graduating high school seniors feel like they are being crushed under the weight of the great big questions being piled upon them about what they going to do with the rest of their lives, or even next year.

I never had a senior year – I dropped out after the 8^th grade -- but enlistment openings created by an unpopular war allowed me, as a married 17 year-old middle-school dropout with a one year-old son, to enlist and get my GED and GI Bill. Without the GED and the GI Bill, I never would have gotten my undergraduate degree, which got me into law school, and eventually led to my post-law school L.L.M.

The educational opportunities were good for me way back then, but it seems as though they are even better today.

The Virginia National Guard, for example, will give a soldier/student $9,700 per year of private college tuition assistance or pay 100% of the tuition at a state college. [1]

The Army and Navy will pay up to $65,000 on the principal amount (not interest) of a student loan[2] for active duty personnel, and the Virginia National Guard or one of the Reserve units, such as the Coast Guard Reserve, will pay off up to $20,000 of the loan amount for reservists.[3]

All of the active duty military services are currently meeting or exceeding their recruiting goals[4], but there are still some serious enlistment bonuses being offered right now, up to $40,000.[5] But just like bonuses paid to athletes, the enlistment bonus is paid out over time as milestones are accomplished, and the higher the skill level, the higher the bonus.

For example, the $40,000 bonus for a sailor to become a Navy SEAL is paid incrementally as each stage of the training is achieved: up to $18,000 is paid after finishing Special Warfare Combatant-Craft Crewman school; $7,000 more when Diver school is done;  $5,000 when Explosive Ordinance Disposal is over and then when the final SEAL training is completed, the sailor gets the last $10,000 to complete the $40,000 total bonus.

            The Coast Guard Reserve will give any enlistee a $6,000 bonus,[6] and the Army will give each enlistee who wants to be a military cook a $15,000 bonus.[7]

            Even though the Marines are at 108% of their overall recruiting goals[8] they have a shortage of Combat Correspondents and are paying $4,000 bonuses to fill those spots. All you future writers of the Great American Novel, keep in mind that Hemingway began his writing career on the battlefield, too.[9]

All those bonuses are great, but military service is unquestionably dangerous. It is an inescapably stark fact that 3,142 U.S military personnel have died in Iraq since 2003.

Consider, though, this incredible comparison: In the same period of time from 2003 to now, the body count on American college campuses from homicides[10] and alcohol-related accidental deaths was 7,744.[11]

            For many young people, though, the most frightening thought to them is not whether they will get blown up by terrorists in Iraq or will be killed as a result of college binge-drinking, their greatest fear is that they will live out their lives in boring tedium without ever having accomplished anything significant for God, home or country.

            A tour in the military may be one way that many of them can confront that fear.

By J. Michael Sharman Click here for bio and archived articles