askchapo

The following applies to the US Army as of 20+ years ago, but I doubt it has changed a whole lot since:

As far as I'm aware there are 3 main paths to becoming an officer: 1) West Point 2) ROTC and 3) OCS.

1. West Pointers are by far the most numerous, and they typically come from wealthier communities, especially in the NE. West Point is considered to be a top notch school, and the majority of people who go there to be upper crust types who later spend the minimum amount of time they need to be in, and then get out and go work on Wall Street or whatever. Some stay in and make it a career, of course, and these represent most of those above the rank of Captain.

2. ROTC - These are people who come from college ROTC programs and are more rare. I think they probably come from a range of different backgrounds.

3. OCS - Officer Candidate School - These are basically NCOs who became officers through the OCS program. These are also rare I think, but officers who go this route generally get more respect from enlisted ranks for obvious reasons.

I'm assuming grand armee is Napoleon's French army?

Anyway, as of 8ish years ago (doubt it's changed), the US Air Force basically recruits officers in the three ways the other guy wrote about the Army. The Air Force came from the army and essentially copied/pasted most of its structuring.

I would say as far as the Air Force goes, to my knowledge, most of the officers came in via ROTC (college straight into officer as an Lt). So if you're comparing the Air Force bulk officer corps, the majority, to French of Napoleon's day... they're not bringing their best, folks (the US).

Basically the Air Force rank structure for officers goes 2Lt (2-3 years good behavior, doing your job, etc.) -> 1Lt (same) -> Capt and that's where many people's careers go to die because by then you're looking at 6 years in or so, around 28 years old, and gotta decide 20 years+ (career) or get out, maybe go back to school, and use your officer bullshit on a resume forever. (Btw this a third party perspective- I was never an officer. I did talk to a shit load of them though). As you might imagine, this promotion system results in decently educated officers as far as liberal arts goes, but for war fighting capabilities? Debatable. Admittedly though, I didn't talk to many pilots or other personnel who could potentially do direct fighting.

The next biggest recruiting block is from the Air Force academy. These guys are generally the ones who are related to or know some high ranked officers. Like their dad was a colonel or some shit. This is the West Point equivalent for the Air Force and almost all of the generals (not all of course) come from here. It's apparently incredibly shitty to be there as a student, I talked to a guy who had to drop out about it, but for those who make it through retiring as a Lt Col is basically the baseline. A lot of these guys end up being incredibly well educated. They aren't stupid by any means... just using their knowledge for evil.

And the smallest group (even though it should be reversed, right) is the OCS (or maybe it's OTS I don't remember) officers who went from enlisted to officer. Generally these are the best managers because they were NCOs before and they know how shit gets done. I think every single prior enlisted officer I ever met was incredibly down to earth, didn't bullshit around, was approachable, understanding, etc. Unfortunately the fucking Air Force emphasizes the ROTC recruits, which shouldn't even BE a path to the military as an officer, over promoting enlisted people. I'd probably say this right here, the over abundance of ROTC officers vs enlisted, is the Air Force's biggest officer corp weakness. I have no idea, besides elitism at the top, why they don't change this. (Maybe it has in last 8 years but I doubt it)

As far as dispositions, everyone is there for a paycheck. There is a MASSIVE resentment from the junior enlisted and junior NCOs (below E7) for the pay that fresh officers, 2Lt and 1Lt and HOLY FUCK captains, get. They treat officers today almost the same as they did in 1920 or some shit like this pampered elite that require far far better pay and other compensation (housing pay, etc.) while the enlisted, who actually do the work, get shit upon until they're an NCO basically. People can look up pay charts themselves if they like, but a very small but realistic comparison is a captain gets paid more than a master sgt. A guy who may well have just graduated college and did ROTC + did his like 6 years of not fucking up getting paid more than a guy probably in his 10th+ year (pretty average promotion time to hit E7 in 10-15 years. A lot of guys retire there at 20 years since the top top ranks E8/E9 are a super tiny minority of the entire Air Force). A captain and a master sgt will generally have close to the same responsibilities too, so it's not that insane, but when you look at 1Lt pay vs like E4 pay (same time to get these ranks basically) it's absolutely absurd because the E4 is gonna be leading people in their job field daily while an Lt could very possibly be sitting at a desk checking emails (no joke, also possible for the enlisted too, but not common since their skills are required day to day).

So, I dunno. The pay/responsibility discrepancy has always been a thing in modern militaries between officers and enlisted. It just seems extremely comical now days when you have enlisted with bachelors (and higher) degrees serving under officers who have a bachelors but did ROTC... and that's it. Nothing more special. It's something they need to reconcile in some way if maintaining the structure is desired (and of course it is. It's also pretty core to everything working. That rigid hierarchy). Probably recruiting almost solely from within from enlisted NCOs and making them officers would be the best way to reconcile it, but, hey, wtf do I know. It's not like promoting knowledgeable and skilled people has always been the best way to build militaries or anything... wait a second...

But also, fuck the military, why am I giving them good advice? Fuck