Quote:
Originally Posted by driveway
This is a euphemism for "volunteered to kill people."
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Usually those guys are filtered out fairly early in the recruit training process, the army and navy and airforce don't want psycho's they want soldiers that will execute their duty and have the ability to function in a stressful environment, people who's one attribute is that they really want to know what it feels like to kill a person are usually worthless and nearly untrainable.
You my friend have watched too many movies like full metal jacket and platoon and are somehow equating it to real life.
Most people volunteer to serve out of a sense of patriotism, or duty, or a yearning for a adventurous life, or they have nowhere else to go and their future prospects are bleak.
I don't think that throughout my short time in the forces where I met and trained with people on both sides of the border, and with special forces up here, Airbourne, that I met someone that was just itching to kill people, you know put that bayonet into somebodies guts and slowly twist it while staring them in the eyes.
You could also state, that in this day and age, soldiers volunteer to die, chances are within the term of your enlistment if your in a combat arms position that your going somewhere that bullets are flying for real. In my day it was a much smaller chance unless you stupidly volunteered to be a peace keeper which most of us did.
Believe me when I tell you, most soldiers and especially at the NCO levels don't want to go to war, these are the guys that are praying that diplomacy works or nothing is going to come out of the blue, they don't really want to fight, however they will fight and they will absolutely kill to get the fighting done.
I'm not saying that there aren't loose cannons out there that slipped in and would thrill kill if they got the chance, there are people who's heads are a little too loose on the swivel in the Armed Services.
Are Special Forces different? Absolutely, like I've said repeatedly they have an ego that would match Maverick from Top Gun without the homo erotic volleyball games, but they aren't trained to hold territory, or do peace keeping. They are trained to scout, eliminate targets and blow things up, but a special forces member can't be a psycho, they have to be highly intelligent and adaptable and fiercely determined, not just killer. Does a Sniper enjoy killing people? I don't believe that case, but Snipers track their kill, sometime for days, and they have to dehumanize what they're shooting, so the stories are about amazing shots, or long hunts, but I don't see too many stories about snipers talking in terms of the actual kill as much as the actual process.
Serving in the Military is one of very few jobs where you have to make sure that your will is up to date before you go on a road trip, its one of the very few jobs where when you say goodbye at the airport it really could be goodbye. Its one of the very few jobs where pain isn't a stress headache from a deadline or the boss yelling at you, but the pain of stepping on a mine, or having a bullet rip out your guts or tear your head off, a person who just wants to kill, and is volunteering to kill, likely isn't going to be too interested in that aspect of the job.