#career military

[chuck-glisson]

"Veterans for Trump", is like "Firemen for Arsonists",

and I "Say" that, as a RETIRED CAREER MILITARY MAN!

[kandyzee]

Fiona was a top athlete, breaking records in track but had to drop out of high school.

Lip was a genius, always told he was gonna be the one to make it but dropped out of college.

Ian was in ROTC for years and trying to get into West Point but had any chance of enlisting ruined.

The 3 eldest gallagher siblings are gifted kids/ dedicated to a goal, but never live up to it, and it kills me every time.

[phoenixyfriend]

Something something """canon""" age difference, modern AU where Rex actually is a decade younger than Anakin

And for Reasons, 34yo Anakin and 39yo Padme have decided to invite this Hot Young 24yo Who Just Exited The Military into their bed for a quick romp that turns into something of a longterm relationship that is sortakinda sugaring

………….just realized this makes Rex only [checks math] twelve or thirteen years older than the twins.

Which is very funny to me. These tweens are so unimpressed by the GI Bill college guy their parents are wooing. Is this supposed to be their new babysitter? A nanny? Wait, he's your boyfriend??? EW.

Such a weird age difference to have with your sorta stepkids

[puretopia]

first few days going cute, only JUST learnt that infants can interact with pets ;-;;; also currently in the progress of making a 'club for the creatives' so that Heidi can host pretend art courses at the church!!

[akookminsupporter]

The members of the BTS originally planned to greet in front of the unit. However, due to concerns over congestion, they will reportedly quietly celebrate Jin's discharge somewhere in Seoul.

After being discharged from the military, Jin will start individual activities. First, he will attend 2024 Festa. He will also hold a hug event with 1,000 ARMY. He is planning to release a solo album in the second half of the year.

Source: Dispatch.

[shreksflamingknob69]

do you remember when sherlock was like “if you’d be murdered, in your very last second, what would you say?” and john’s like “please, god, let me live.” and sherlock goes “oh, use your imagination” and then john says “i don’t have to.”

you remember that?

yeah so do i and it breaks my heart more than it should

[voluptuarian]

I love trying to do historical research, you want an answer to a simple question like "could Jews serve in the British army in the 1880s" and you get back

Jews in the American Revolution

Jews in the American Civil War

Jews in World War I

Jews who fought for Nazi Germany

Thanks, that absolutely covers the time period and country I specifically asked for, couldn't have done it without you

[em-kgm]

ATLAS

[ante--meridiem]

"that's a good thing to think about in your career: when you want to have children" that's easy I know the answer it's abso-fucking-lutely never

[blade-that-was-broken]

Your Soldier On AU gives me brainworms! While re reading it I suddenly remembered this video clip of soldiers graduating and that they're NOT allowed to move at all unless someone taps them (usually family)

So I then imagine Soldier JD just standing there surrounded by people having family reunions while he just.... silently accepts that no one will show up.

To make it less sad, Delta (who probably graduated with him) decided to be the one to tap him out and give him a big hug. (He deserves it)

He knew no one was coming.

He really knew it but that didn’t stop his heart from wishing, having that tiny little wishful thinking that someone would find him. That someone would appear out of nowhere and come up to him.

It wouldn’t happen.

He should have expected it.

He hadn’t seen any of his brothers in years.

He wasn’t able to find any of his brothers. He thought perhaps, on his own, he could search and find them. But he is no detective and well, he was never as smart as Clay or as intuitive as Floyd or as charming as Bruce. He tried not to think about what kind of person Branch would be. A person he would probably never get to know.

Here he was in the very last moment. After this, he didn’t have anyone left.

There was nothing else.

John Dory stood in line with his graduating class, staring straight ahead, letting his eyes blur a little. He didn’t pay attention to the family members that were bringing their loved ones into a tight embrace. He couldn’t watch. He knew he’d be standing like this for the entire length of the ceremony.

He didn’t have anyone. There was no one left. He hadn’t had anyone in years. It was okay, he figured this would be the end anyways.

He closed his eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath before opening them again. He blinked blankly, finding one of his classmates stand in front of him. Most of the others had been tapped out, with their families, her included. She stood in front of him and it room everything he had not to let his face scrunch up in confusion.

“I’ve got you Dory,” she promised, seriously.

Delta Dawn was bound to be a masterful soldier, practically at the top of her class. She had the patience and the discipline and the strength. She was smart, tough and was great with a plan. No one would have expected her to befriend the bland, average and slightly scrappy idiot who had no where else to go. John didn’t know how it happened either. It just kind of did.

It would be no surprise if they were stationed together in the same place. They made each other better, somehow, and people noticed.

He hoped they were stationed in the same place.

She wasn’t supposed to be a soldier, her parents wanted her to follow her father’s footsteps as a politician but she was gone before they could blink.

Taking another breath, he was forced to have his vision full of her slate blue gray eyes and red hair pulled back under her cap. She stared at him, serious but still soft. She was tough as nails that one, tougher even, but for some reason John would probably never understand, she had a soft spot for him. Who was he to judge? He had a soft spot for her too. He’d probably do just about almost anything for her.

“I’ve got you John Dory,” she repeated, giving his shoulder a quick tap before grabbing his hand and pulling him in a tight hug. “It’s forever now, Dory,” she whispered.

John’s eyes filled with tears as he wrapped his arms back around her, squeezing tight. He knew Delta’s sister was nearby, probably the presence by his side that seemed to brush up against him.

“I know I’m not them,” Delta continued, right into the crook of his neck. “But you aren’t getting rid of me, Dory. During service and after. You can count on it.”

He took a breath.

“You can count on me, Dawn,” John Dory promised, quietly. “You can count on me.”

[rainintheevening]

Does anyone else plan out a whole story, get the timeline all right, match up the world events, write a bunch if stuff for it, and then one person's opinion on a character's age makes you question everything???

[commsroom]

a pretty major aspect of wolf 359's worldbuilding that i think about sometimes is that goddard futuristics is the megacorporation, like. jacobi says, "goddard's done some good stuff", citing the development of solar energy and investments in water purification, eco-friendly fertilizers, global internet access, etc. and... i mean, yes. obviously, objectively, all good things that i wish we also had. but also all goddard-owned and beholden to their interests. that line is in response to eiffel saying "yeah, i'm sure the team retreats where you got to burn down the rainforest were amazing" - like, it's about efficiency, not environmentalism; the good parts are a byproduct.

the same thing applies to the inaccessibility of goddard's other developments - AI development is so under wraps that even maxwell, working for the "best" AI research lab in the country, was unaware of the existence of "full-minded" AI until she was recruited by goddard. and part of why she was recruited was her disagreement with the board for ethical AI development. goddard has made some incredible advancements in the field of biotech, but like... do you think those things are accessible to the average person? these life-saving medical developments and disability aids exist, but who actually gets them? cutter is financially blackmailing eiffel by paying for anne's medical bills, education, etc. - his control over all of these things gives him potential leverage over just about anyone.

and then you have just, like, the fact that goddard is involved in so many things - space exploration, air travel, utilities, the military, medicine, agriculture, probably just everyday goods... it's bad enough in real life if you're trying to avoid a few major corporations; there are going to be so many things in their day-to-day lives that they never even realized were goddard-made until they get back to earth and start seeing it everywhere. and goddard futuristics started out as the wright-goddard aeronautics company; the wright brothers are already in like, every textbook ever - imagine how that's taught in a world where so many major developments are consolidated under this one narrative? gabriel urbina made an off-hand comment once about how, yes, NASA exists in the world of wolf 359, but you have to wonder who has better funding - the US government, or goddard futuristics?

[compacflt]

Would you ever consider writing about a different path Ice and Mav could take, one where they choose to leave the Navy and pursue a more open relationship and civilian life? Thinking it would be easier but maybe the sacrifice to their careers brings its own challenges?

(hi, jan 2024 me here, this was an ask that I answered when it was sent in in May 2023 & didn't post because I felt I actually answered it fictionally in the "icedad" one-shot the week after [and you can obviously see how these thoughts affected the writing of other pieces like "tremors & aftershocks"], but I still mostly agree with this take [though it's a little overgeneralizing] & I think it sums up a lot of my final "meta" modern-military-theory thoughts on ice & mav & their relationship, so im posting it now before I post the compacflt masterpoast)

see,… the thing is, i just… can’t see that happening!! i have no idea how to write that!!! Maybe i really do have a lack of imagination. But i can’t see that happening for a number of reasons. So short answer, no.

Long answer (and it’s long):

1. lame reason to start out, but it, uh, it’s canon that ice ends up at O-10 and mav ends up at O-6. not saying that im beholden to canon obviously (my mav ends up at O-7 and my ice ends up alive) but I do base my characterizations of them on the implications of the political struggles of both their careers so… taking away ice’s fourth star is basically starting from square one wrt my characterization of him. which is a lot of work. i could start from the beginning with a top gun 1986 ice who knows he’s gay—that would be a fun AU (i think other people than me have definitely done that better, though—I’m a one-trick pony). So if that’s what you mean then disregard the rest of this post. but if what you mean is a divergence from my existing work (i.e. homophobic/rank-climbing ice&mav) then… yeah, can’t see that happening, for further reasons below.

2. wrt my characterization of him: it’s based on a broad historical overview of armed service officers and the expectations of their careers. in my view, high-ranking officers aren’t after power—or maybe they started their careers wanting power, but somewhere down the line, it just becomes an expectation. if you do everything right and follow all the rules, you are expected by the institution to lead, whether you want to or not. That’s just the pipeline. at some point you start losing agency. which is what I mean when I keep saying ice doesn’t have a choice in advancing his career (besides the meta fact that this is fanfiction and canon demands that he have 4 stars lol)—high ranking military officers are continually and continually groomed for bigger and better positions; and the longer they spend in the military, the harder it is to leave that lifestyle for something else. And with ice’s canonical (and characteristically INTEGRAL, as I mentioned a week or so ago) refusal to rebel against the wishes of the navy as an institution, plus this historical expectation to lead placed upon the shoulders of excelling officers, I really do think ice is destined for four stars & nothing less, even if it gives him chronic depression. It’s his highest priority not because he wants it to be, but because…it just is. that’s how the institutionalized system of advancement in the military works. it just is. it has to be.

3. I mentioned in this post that I can’t ever see a foot in the door with them talking about their relationship unless maverick dies and is resurrected, and I feel the exact same way about them & their retirement plans. There’s a lot that ice and mav don’t talk about: the biggest one is obviously Goose’s death, the foundation of their relationship; but also their love for each other obv, what they did to rooster, AND their careers, which have to end at some point. Them talking about everything is totally inevitable, it was gonna have to happen eventually before they died, and I think one foot in the door MIGHT have been them eventually talking about retirement (someone sent in a prompt asking for this exactly & i am brainstorming it furiously) but before the Navy FORCES them to retire… i think they would studiously avoid talking about it. For a couple reasons: a) what does retiring with each other mean? living in the same house until they die together? hard to do if you’re just good friends. talking about retirement is tantamount to talking about Them. and b) what are they gonna do outside the navy? Ice has a lot of options, as I mentioned in the slider one-shot—general/flag officers are SUPER sought after in leadership/intelligentsia/management positions post service, so maybe if he were offered a crazy cool civilian position somewhere in San Diego in like the 2000s he would quit the navy for it… but what about maverick? I have no idea what a non-navy mav would do. Civilian airline pilot? Hoo boy. I think he’d hate that. I could maybe see emergency helicopter pilot, lol, or race car driver (i just watched days of thunder can you tell?) but none of the above offers the institutionalized honor the navy does (that, as a reminder, he *killed people* to obtain in the first place). I suggested his test piloting expertise would make him an attractive technical advising candidate to A&D companies like Boeing, LockMart, GD, etc. so that might be one option. But it might have been kind of a touchy subject for him before he racked up the expertise he’d need for those high-level civilian positions… the navy was kinda his only option. So they wouldn’t talk about it because it might hurt his feelings.

4. The biggest reason: again… open rebellion like rocking the boat by quitting the navy to be in an open long-term gay relationship, in upper mil brass ranks, and even retired upper mil brass ranks, just… isn’t done. And REALLY wasn’t done in the 2000s, when i think the scenario in this ask is positioned. And it’s not like “oh but whatever who cares about the navy, ice and mav are in love, they deserve to be happy no matter what, they should do what they want, fuck the navy…” no. Ice and Mav care about the navy. Clearly. Canonically. By necessity. The military requires cohesion and on some level repression of individuality & personal expression to FUNCTION, even when you’re retired. Yes, maverick certainly strains against that repression (which is why you Could spin top gun as an anti-military franchise if you were desperate enough), but he rebels through his ACTIONS (stupid plane maneuvers) not through his personal IDENTITY. his personal identity (headstrong overtly masculine white male pilot, whether gay or straight who cares) is NEVER challenged throughout the franchise (i.e. no one really challenges his masculinity specifically) & his personal identity does not POSE a challenge to the navy. Both he and ice in their outward-facing personal identities really fit in quite neatly to the navy’s overarching identity & contribute to the navy’s cohesion in a way that is favorable to both their careers and the establishment. Lack of imagination or not… i can’t see a universe in which Ice and mav would actively WANT to rock the boat and wreck the navy’s cohesion and their reputations for an open relationship and definitively rebellious personal identities, with the obvious caveat being Maverick’s death recontextualizing both their priorities (yes we’re in love AND we’ve finally proven ourselves to be ultra-capable officers regardless of our sexuality so no one has a license to judge us anymore etc.).

And also, they’re not enlisted seamen. Nor are they mediocre officers who have the luxury of fading into obscurity. Things are different when you’re that high in the ranks, and when your job publicly matters more. sorry, but even post DADT (probably until about biden’s election), an open relationship would end their careers. They might not be fired, but they’d never be promoted again. Too much of a liability getting subordinates to still respect them, from the higher-ups’ perspective, especially if there are other qualified candidates who fit the navy’s core identity better. Like—sorry. This is such a jaded oversimplification. But if you rock the boat like that (i.e. break the service’s united front to be individualistic in a way that does not match the service’s overarching identity), from the perspective of your officer peers, you simply are a bad officer. Being an open individual in a job where you are required to fit in and represent your service is not your job. You are not doing your job well. Straight-up. Even if you’re retired. I met US Army 4-star gen. David Petraeus (retired obv) in February—he led the successful-ish surge in iraq and Afghanistan in the mid-2000s—and he’s STILL a laughingstock for his disastrous affair with his biographer a decade ago, even after he retired from AD service. That’s what people remember him for, not the fact that he was one of our only successful commanders in any of our Middle East campaigns.

Something like that might be one of ice and mav’s worst fears—being known for their affair/scandal instead of the institutionalized honor they’ve fought and killed for. That kind of thing just Isn’t Done. It's bad taste. You have to keep it quiet. If you’re an officer representing the service, you have to represent it well & according to the service’s preconceived identity, even in retirement. (see, for another shitty example of "not fitting in" even in retirement, Lt. gen. Mike Flynn [his whole scandal is actually kinda geopolitically relevant to my fic if you squint lol] whom everyone fucking hates)

To summarize: i hope I’m not mischaracterizing your ask when i reframe it like this—would you ever write ice and mav without the institutionalized pressure to advance in rank and conform to institutional norms?

and yes, I would (and will if you ask—it looks like this: ice & mav meet & fall in love & it’s boring and fine. end of story), but I guarantee you someone else already has. I’m all about interrogation of institutional norms here. And i think until maverick dies & comes back from the dead, there is absolutely no *REALISTIC* incentive for ice & mav to leave the navy and/or have an open relationship. Like it’s just not possible. Idk how else to say it.

[akookminsupporter]

I think some time ago I made a post wondering if the guys would change after being in the army. I remembered what Jimin said in one of the last Wlives they did before enlisting, that Hobi had changed a bit or his personality had calmed down a bit. I remember Tae, I think, said that Jin, on the other hand, hadn't changed much and it was easy to believe him because of the times Jin made comments on Weverse or posts in general. But this interview definitely confirmed that Jin hasn't changed at all, and honestly, I love that he didn’t. Something else that was lovely to read is the genuine love and respect he has for his fans and the dedication he has to giving us the best of him. This interview was really enjoyable to read.

—————

When you’re in the army, there’s a lot of restrictions in place, and none of the stuff you have is your own, which isn’t always easy. But once I was onstage, I had my fans in front of me, my own mic and in-ears, and everything about it felt just the way I remembered. It felt like I was home. Everyone imagines what it’d be like to be a superstar, hearing people cheer them on onstage. I already know what that feels like, and it’s something I can recover with time, but when I was in the army, I couldn’t feel it. So when I got back, it was like, This is it—heart racing, the nervous excitement, the roar of the crowd.

[shallowseeker]

Reason 687,456 why Cas was The Angel's Angel

and a surprisingly good political strongman in Heaven:

[nellasbookplanet]

Getting into andromeda after spending the last few weeks replaying the original ME trilogy is so funny, I feel like I've stepped from a hardcore military sci-fi straight into a young adult adventure coming of age story