Section 8.
Dismissed.
Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.
Posted on 05/23/2010 9:06:13 PM PDT by ErnstStavroBlofeld
Nearly every airman has forgotten to salute, missed a meeting, showed up for work late or flubbed a test.
By and large, those moments strike fear in airmen’s hearts — and for good reason.
A little thing, or a seemingly little thing, can kill a career as much as a big thing. You don’t have to commit a crime to get kicked out of the service. You can be handed your walking papers for simply being in an overmanned career field or flunking the PT test.
And in these times when the Air Force is looking to get rid of 6,000 active-duty airmen, it doesn’t hurt to know what can trip you up — innocuous or not.
The list of potential pitfalls comes mostly from the rank and file. The Air Force doesn’t keep an official list of reasons why airmen separate — either voluntarily or involuntarily, a spokeswoman told Air Force Times.
“Currently we have no means to track the different, varied separation reasons,” Elizabeth Gosselin wrote in an e-mail.
The number of airmen who left the service in fiscal 2009 totaled 2,246, up from 2,234 in fiscal 2008. The number for the first seven months of fiscal 2010 is 1,145.
A tough civilian job market triggered the drawdown, announced in early April by Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz. High unemployment plus job security equals high retention. Now, the Air Force is faced with doing its own layoffs.
Schwartz and his force management advisers figure a three-pronged plan — the active-duty cuts along with the delayed commissioning of hundreds of ROTC cadets and severely curtailed recruitment goals — will bring the service back to its congressionally mandated end strength of 332,200.
(Excerpt) Read more at jaxobserver.com ...
Give me a 341 Airman!
The article mentions an “unwillingness to cross train”. Brother, if you aren’t open to learning new skills, you’re living on borrowed time. The only skill that matters is the ability to learn new skills.
Give me a 341 Airman!
Who are they?
Peace is good. Peacetime military sucks.
Anything can get you booted. For officers it is probably worse. The competition is ruthless and encouraged. If you are seen as a threat to anyone you will be gotten some how.
I agree with you. It also applies to the civilian world.
Air Force Form 341 is something you carried around while you were in training. If you failed to salute an officer or otherwise screwed up, you had to hand over an AF 341 form that identified you as the offender. Sorry, failure to salute just reminded me of that from long ago.
They also write up 341s for good things.
Regardless, I had to change underpants. Basic really sucked. Did basic in a pickle suit back in the day when you were allowed to smoke if no-one screwed up that day.
/johnny
My current tasking is porting C++ written over the last 18 years on SPARC Solaris to build under g++ 4.4 on X86 Linux. The project is a mix of C/C++/FORTRAN/Ada, UNIX, Motif/X11. The "new world" will move some of this to GTK for GUI. Some will migrate to web based approaches with Windows workstations and browsers on the client end, Linux and Apache web servers on the server side. Thankfully, the new targets are already "old hat" for me.
***Air Force Form 341 is something you carried around while you were in training.**
If I remember, they were carried folded thin and with one edge folded over the pocket edge, but covered by the pocket flap.
If you screwed up the offended officer or Sgt could reach up under the flap, grab one and pull it out on you. If he reached under your pocket flap AND THERE WAS NOT ONE THERE, you REALLY WERE IN DEEP DO-DO.
USAF 1966-1969
What no BASIC?
Thanks. I was way off asking who “they” are.
Ha! Things were mot quite that strict when I went through BMTS in 1990. We just had to have 3 of them filled out and ready to hand over at any time.
Only time I got one pulled was when they showed up at the door with a bogus TI badge and I didn't let them in.
That is one test I did pass. The TI showed up at 2am when I was on dorm guard. He pressed his id against the window, but would mot take his thumb off the photo of him. I did have to give up a 341 for not saluting the squadron commander at tech school... in my defense, it was in Denver in the middle of a snow storm outside the dorm.
Who would join the military while this regime is in power? I joined while President Carter was in the White House, and that was bad enough, but I never sensed that he didn’t like his own country. I get that vibe 24/7/365 from these people.
Do they still use the form?
In the Army, our Drill Instructors would just make you drop and give him 20....or more. (push ups).
Section 8.
Dismissed.
All the branches today are easily meeting recruitment quotas. In fact, they're turning people away who want to serve and showing the door to many already serving. The days of the military being the last guaranteed "fall back" job are over.
You ask who would join? Many are people who just want a job. The whole demographic of the military is changing. Where it used to be 18-19 year olds, fresh out of high school who wanted to serve and earn money for college are now competing for limited slots with 22-25, 27, 30 and up to 34 year olds --many who have already earned college degrees, enlisting just for the guaranteed paycheck.
And if you get in trouble these days, you're not going on restriction, going to the brig, getting extra duty, busting rust, etc. You're getting kicked out. Every day the military is looking more and more like a civilian employer.
Went through BMT in the summer of 1995. I remember it like it was yesterday.
341 pulled during a non-duty dorm inspection for tightly laced combat boots. They’re supposed to be loosely laced in case of a fire.
Nothing like filling sandbag weights in the hot San Antonio sun as punishment. I probably lost 10lbs that day and had an endless stream of water pouring off my salt stained cap.
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