Agreed! My last jacket review consisted of an O-6 who was trying to convince me to travel like that, so I could make rank. Thanks, but no thanks. I’m good with being a local “deadbeat” O5.
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In which a TACRON CO wants some respect
- Thread starter nittany03
- Start date
Back in 2006-ish, I applied for and picked up a billet in a det unit. Oh boy, Lakehurst, just a few more minutes past Willow Grove, I thought. Upon further reading, found out it was not that det, it was the other det, the one in Pt Mugu. California. Had heard of the place, frankly zero idea where it was beyond somewhere in California. Imagined Whidbey Island transplanted to Northern CA with Redwood trees off the approach end.
I was able to use my day job travel to cover all of my quarterly drill weekend travel, thank goodness. Would have been expensive otherwise. It was a great tour, there’s an incredibly good surf break on the base. Glad I did it.
The realization that this would be the competition for command and O-6+ is a large part of what drove me to retire. I'd rather take that time to become a better techie in the hopes of more than an extra $10-15K on my pension for another 5-10 years of work which would potentially stagnate my civ career.
I once worked with a 1300 O-5 who made a Navy Reserve career out of basically nothing. Smart guy, great officer, interesting story. And coiner of the immortal quote: "If Navy Reserve Commander is a good enough rank for James Bond and Magnum, P.I., it's a good enough rank for me!"
I got that beat. One of the O-5s in my last command lived in Kazakhstan. Came back CONUS twice a year to knock out admin and drills and medical.
She and her Mr Man were both FSOs for State and she was a USNR Russia/Stans FAO to boot, so I guess it worked all around but still.
There have been some reserve astronauts. Not sure if they did correspondence courses while in orbit.
Actually, I think none of them spent long duration on ISS.
That is a good one. Oh course, that one trip was probably as much about seeing family and such. Some of us did the overseas thing only to meet requirements. We had several international commuters in my NAVEUR Reserve unit in London. Most from around Europe. Longest European commute was from Warsaw. I remember the oil exec from Nigeria going to a map to see which one of use came furthest, him or me from AZ. How I got into the London commute is kind of a long story, but it convinced me not to go back to commuting to San Diego after I left NAVEUR.
Before I retired I briefly crossed paths with the only Navy Reserve FAO to specialize in relations with the Vatican. Seeing as I never worked at EUCOM, you can guess how well Big Navy was making use of that skillset.
Let me guess... you were in or supporting CENTCOM at the time?
Staff Weenie. NAVEUR was in London since IKE until it moved to Naples in early 2000s, I think. Makes sense. We thought they would shut down London every year the budget came around. The Admiral's NATO hat was Commander Allied Southern Forces, Europe. He spent most his time in Naples anyway. Plenty of aviators on staff. I worked in N31. Had two F-18 dudes, a VP guy and VQ guy on the active side. I had 3 more aviators on the reserve side. Lots more brown shoes scattered about. The N3 was a former A-7 skipper and CO of NAS Cecil Field. The Admiral was a light attack guy. There are still some jobs in London but I doubt anything for a brown shoe. It was a pretty good time. Even the staff work wasn't too bad since tje Balkans were hot and I only had to put up with it for 3-6 days at a time.
Let’s not conflate TACRON with TOCRON. I’m a TOCRON SELRES and their issues are significant, but not as bad as the silly TACRON souls. I don’t think OP-T COs from VP (who were OP VP DHs, so 50/50 emotionally stunted ??♂️) are helping TBH. Getting choked out for Officer manning from PERS is making it worse as they push off Active side requirements onto the Reserve side
Yeah, that's how she made it sound. She'd bring their daughter with her to go see relatives, etc. Since the unit supported the Navy NMCC desk, including Ukraine CAT manning, having a Russian-speaking FAO on call came in very handy. She was (is) a super sharp cookie, hope the Navy finds a way to keep her on the ladder. Knowing the Navy, though, she'll probably wind up on a 12-month Port Ops mob to Gitmo or some damned thing.
I repped NAVEUR at a big EUCOM exercise called Agile Lion back in the 90s. Scenario was a developing Chernobyl style incident at a former Soviet Nuke plant in one of the former Soviet Republics. We exercised non combatant technical and humanitarian responses and as the region became destabilized by the incident, security. We had two SWO and Sub nuke officers assigned to humanitarian duties and a SWO whos day job was as a law professor in a European university and had extensive political experience in the Baltics assigned to some port duty. Half way through the exercise we got hem assigned to duties more relevant to their experience.
Met an MA2 while going through "Narmy" school at Ft Jackson. Noticed his last name, asked him if it was Afghan. He said yeah, his parents took off when the Soviets came in, he was born in the US but spoke fluent Pashto. Obviously, he was on his way to Arifjan, probably going to write speeding tickets.
You put in for them! My second reserve tour was with a unit that supported NATO out of Northwood, which was about 40 mins by Tube and train from downtown London. We stayed right off Baker Street in Marylebone, about 200 feet from Sherlock Holmes' 'house'. In addition to that we supported a conference in Lisbon while I was there, my first AT after coming home from Iraq. It did not suck.
I've got a myriad of ones from my mobs, fortunately two of the most egregious cases ended up exactly where they should have been from the beginning after GO/FO's got involved but there was A LOT of wasted talent that was used to feed the big green machine and its insatiable appetite for warm bodies.
Sometimes things do work out though, I met guy similar to yours also born to Afghan parents indocing at a civilian agency. He happened to be an officer in the 82nd when 9/11 happened, the Green Berets quickly grabbed him and put in to good use for a while.