How do aspies do in the armed forces?

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Now back to the subject of how Aspies do in the military...

I was in the "Chair Force" for two years in flight school before being RIFed (there were simply too many pilots). I think I would have done OK.

The good: there are myriad rules and regulations. Add to that the complexity of aircraft and the bazillion things you need to know to fly. I love airplanes. My advantage was that nobody, and I mean nobody, knew the details like me. I was a walking encyclopedia. People used to ask me to evaluate plans so I could point out the fatal flaws in advance. I would then often go on and on describing how something works and often repeating myself without realizing it. That led to some good-natured teasing where in the middle of one of my lectures, people would often rock back and forth saying "Time for Wapner! Time for Wapner!" Ironic, isn't it. Didn't know about my AS, or even that AS existed back then.

The bad: making decisions under pressure. I take FOREVER to make decisions, especially when faced with angry people yelling at me. I was in tanker/transport, so I never would have faced real combat. That was probably a good thing. I also did not do well with the drills, inspections, and getting yelled at when I made an error. That fueled me to work even harder so I didn't get in trouble.

Ultimately, I think it was a good thing it didn't work out. Maybe I would have been a good officer in a support role, like meteorology or maintenance. But as a front-line hot-shot pilot...nah.

Just got back from work and read your posts Ladybug.
First and foremost I'm so sorry if my opinion angered you or offended you in some manner that I was unaware of.. You obliviously have VERY strong feelings on this where as I was simply stating what I believe personally. I'm not here to attack each other over what I thought was a friendly conversation and you. Good luck with your opinions.

i think some do very well, i am in the canadian armed forces and im doing very well, i also know that there are others that are diagnosed with asperger here on base, and on other bases. i have read somewhere that someone with an obsession that has to do with what the military does will do extremely well, for exemple if your obsession is world peace (it is far fetched but a good exemple) you would do extremely well on peace missions, anyway for me it is the perfect spot, and as a bonus i get all the medical care and medication free of charge. and the army is a great environment for an aspie, there is structure and discipline, and they have people to help you with most of the stuff like moving and buying a house, you meet with a "housing counselor" and they take care of all the legal stuff for you. they are very helpfull .... they also have a real social worker service, anyway it is great for me ....

That's my avatar because I'm a bike-riding, tree hugging, PACIFIST(don't like it, too bad, not here to be admired by "war-mongers") and don't believe in any War that we were "Lied into" by a government bent on it from the outset. I'm also sorry for you that something you believe so strongly in, is going so badly for the rest of the world. I'm sure all the mothers with dead children will agree with me.
Don't want to hijack the thread but you think we should't be pulling out of the middle east and I think we should have never gone into the middle east. Difference of opinion, yes.
Reason to get all venement and bent out of shape, and angry, for me, No. Everyones entitled to their opinion.
Also don't see what "my Face" has to do with my thoughts. Don't really have any pictures of myself laying around that I'd put online to be honest. Really curious as to what you edited out, feel free to PM me w/ it if you like.
Good Luck convincing the rest of the world that we should stay in the Middle East BTW.

We haven't had "a round or two before" as far as I know. If I'm mistaken and we have through, "I salute you worthy adversary"
I'm pretty "non-confrontational" as a rule. But I will state my opinion. As I feel I'm entitled to as much as the next person.
As for pictures, I REALLY don't have any of me,(don't get mine taken much due to low self-esteem as a child) the only one I have that I like is quite "Racy" of me in a bikini and I really feel its unapproiate to post it here. If I get one taken I'll post it and PM you o.k. Now I'm sitting here going thru the mental Rolodex of recent pictures of me. (which are non-existent)

Gotcha thinkin', huh?

Thanks.

Wow I hadn't kept up on this for a day or two and it seems to have wandered all over the place. I'm not trying to take it political either. I volunteered for service, in two different services. The Air Force simply would not offer me anything other than a Navigator job. I was trained as an historian in college and was looking for an Intel position. So I went to the Army. They wanted me and I wanted them. And the doc shot me down in flames. I've never been a pacifist. Or a warmonger. One man's revolution is another man's insurrection. There used to be a Native American comedian who said, "Why do you all call our biggest victories 'massacres'?" Reading this reminded me of a Robert Heinlein quote I ran across the other day. I plan on mentioning it in my blog.

I never had the chance to meet "The Old Man", but I've read everything I could find by him, repeatedly since I was 9. Anyone who has read anything vaguely autobiographical by him knows he was not just a patriot, he was a PATRIOT. A proud volunteer, as was his second wife. He supported the military and the United States above all. What struck me, he wrote in 1950, then updated in the mid-60's and again in 1979. It was plain, and straightforward.

"It is utterly impossible that the United States will start a 'preventive war.' We will fight when attacked, either directly or in a territory we have guaranteed to defend."

Now if you've read RAH's books, his stories, his essay, and anything biographical about him, a lot of his personality sounds very familiar. I don't think, that RAH was a full fledged Aspie, but he certainly had a LOT of the gene's in his pool. That pinned exactly my problem with our current situation. The Taliban in Afghanistan directly supported the people who attacked us. That made them our direct enemy. I never had a problem with going in there, the only problem I had was letting Afghan warlords go after our targets and holding our professional soldiers back. We paid the price for that. Our targets got away.

Iraq was completely different. That was a 'preventive war' and that is the FIRST time the United States has done that. Period. I feel, and I think from his printed statements Mr. Heinlein would have agreed, we were wrong to do so. We did not have a justification for the action under our own history. We have, in the past, committed troops to support commercial interests, to preserve the interests of certain very wealthy and influential Americans, we have even gone in and fought over an accident. (The battleship Maine does not appear to have been blown up by military action, but rather by an accident onboard, but we still fought a war over it) We have never, not once in our history, been an aggressor like this.

There, rant done. Flame me, blame me, shame me if you like. 'nuff said.

During ROTC and TDYs, my commanders always singled me out as being one of the best cadets in the wing. However, I definitely DID NOT get on at all with the other cadets - they were often stupid and brutish, and we did not share the same beliefs about how the military should conduct itself. (During "Lead Labs" they would show us videos of "dune coons" getting shot up/blown up and laugh hysterically about it). Working with active duty folk, I found much of the same - I got on really well with the smarter officers, but not at all with the enlisted kids who hung around the Airmans center, bragging about how foul their language was or how we should bomb the hell out of all Muslims and be done with it. There's a lot of stupidity, and a very strong desire to fit in, not to mention a lot of posturing and other behaviors that, from an objective standpoint, make us look like a bunch of apes.

It's a situation of extremes...on one hand, it's possible to do very well with this type of structure. On the other hand, it requires a degree of interpersonal skills and "schmoozing". I dropped out of training but I'm planning on "going professional" after I get my master's, just so I can do OTS with an older, hopefully more mature group of candidates.

My experience in the armed forces wasn't exactly pretty. Of course, I got into trouble like everybody else would, but it felt more intense for me than what it was for everybody else. Maybe somebody else would have a different experience though.

The only advise I can give is that if you do join, stay away from the egg omlettes. A friend of mine litterally used the stuff to chop bark off of a tree before.