Who serves

[Peter1469]

Who serves

An interesting article that shows the majority of people who enlist come from military families.

It is just another bit of proof that the vast majority of the US population has no connection to our armed forces.

The sergeant in charge of one of the busiest Army recruiting centers in Colorado, Sergeant First Class Dustin Comes, joined the Army, in part, because his father served. Now two of his four children say they want to serve, too. And he will not be surprised if the other two make the same decision once they are a little older.

“Hey, if that’s what your calling is, I encourage it, absolutely,” said Sergeant Comes, who wore a dagger-shaped patch on his camouflage uniform, signifying that he had been in combat.

Enlisting, he said, enabled him to build a good life where, despite yearlong deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, he felt proud of his work, got generous benefits, never worried about being laid off, and earned enough that his wife could stay home to raise their children.

“Show me a better deal for the common person,” he said.

Soldiers like him are increasingly making the United States military a family business. The men and women who sign up overwhelmingly come from counties in the South and a scattering of communities at the gates of military bases like Colorado Springs, which sits next to Fort Carson and several Air Force installations, and where the tradition of military service is deeply ingrained.

[nathanbforrest45]

My father was wounded in WW2 while serving in the Army in the South Pacific, I was in the Navy, two brothers were in the Army and one in the Marines

[Peter1469]

My father was wounded in WW2 while serving in the Army in the South Pacific, I was in the Navy, two brothers were in the Army and one in the Marines

My father was in the Army but doing research for NASA so he missed Nam. My uncles were in the Navy in Nam.

I went to basic in 1987 with an airborne infantry contract and knew I was going to get a war. And I did. Twice.

[Ethereal]

I didn't come from a "military family" in the way it's normally understood, although my family history has LOTS of people who served in the military dating all the way back to the American revolution. My grandfathers served in the military, but it was never part of their identity. They never talked about it. And I always thought that was really cool of them.

[Peter1469]

I didn't come from a "military family" in the way it's normally understood, although my family history has LOTS of people who served in the military dating all the way back to the American revolution. My grandfathers served in the military, but it was never part of their identity. They never talked about it. And I always thought that was really cool of them.

I don't think talking about it was part of the study. Even if you don't raise your kid to join the military, your military bearing and what others say about you is going to affect you.

Most kids don't have that.

[Tahuyaman]

Several of my family members spent a few years in the military, but none other than me made the military a career.


Does this study consider a military family to be a family who had any member spend any amount of time in the military?

[Peter1469]

Several of my family members spent a few years in the military, but none other than me made the military a career.


Does this study consider a military family to be a family who had any member spend any amount of time in the military?

I would guess yes.

I think they were just looking for any connect to the military.

[nathanbforrest45]

I have at least one relative who served in the Civil War, on the wrong side!!!! He was from Indiana and served as a Union soldier. From then until WW2 I don't think anyone in my family served in the military. I have another relative who was chased out of Italy by the Mafia, don't know if that counts or not.

[Peter1469]

I have at least one relative who served in the Civil War, on the wrong side!!!! He was from Indiana and served as a Union soldier. From then until WW2 I don't think anyone in my family served in the military. I have another relative who was chased out of Italy by the Mafia, don't know if that counts or not.

I had family on my mom's side that fought in the Revolution and Civil War. My father's side didn't get here until ~1890.

[Standing Wolf]

I think it really only takes one family member spending time in the Service to make it a military family...setting the stage, as it were, for others to do the same.

My father was drafted into the Army during the Korean War and served as a medic. He didn't appreciate his military experience and counselled me against joining - which I did anyway, in '72. He and his brother, who I guess liked it a bit better and served for a couple of enlistments, were undoubtedly the first members of that side of the family to serve in any military in many generations, as the family was Old Order Amish. I had a great-great-grandfather on my maternal side who served in the U.S. Army in the Civil War, but that side of the family were largely members of another "peace" church, the Brethren, so on that side I was pretty much it after him, except for a collateral ancestor who served out West in the cavalry late in the Nineteenth Century.

I would guess that my own having served for as long as I did while my oldest three were growing up must have had some positive effect on their views of the military. My third oldest of four sons has spent most of the last 23 years in the Army, first as an enlisted tank mechanic, then as a Warrant Officer and Blackhawk pilot, and now as a doctor in the Army Medical Corps. My oldest son probably would have joined at some point, as well - he has a first responder sort of mentality, having been a firefighter and an EMT - but he had a liver transplant when he was twelve, which sort of put the kibosh on joining the military.

Had I listened to my old man and not joined - let his negative military experience affect my decision - I think the chances of one of my own kids joining the military would almost certainly have been less. It may just take one family member's experience, shared in a positive way, to jump-start, so to speak, a military family into being.