This has been an interesting (and overdue!) exercise in occupational therapy. I'm also hoping that it helps someone else to reach their own decision, or to at least start the discussion.
First, let me frame the context when I started this list on 18 June 1991. Our submarine & crew had just survived our 7-17 June portcall in Subic Bay, RP, where we had contended with
two eruptions from Mt. Pinatubo (~20 miles away) as well as Tropical Storm Yunya & several volcanic earthquakes. Shore leave had gone from libertine hedonism to living hell overnight. Surprisingly none of our crew was killed. One of my shipmates had 50 stitches in his arm and another had been trapped in a collapsed building for 24 hours listening to people scream until they died.
I'd been up for 36 hours as the Duty Officer, beginning with an emergency reactor startup ("latch 'em & snatch 'em") and frantic repairs to the ship's diesel. (Shore power was not coming back.) The reactor was looking shaky because our seawater intakes were fouled with volcanic ash (a bad thing for reactor cooling). We feared sinking pierside because the topside was under a foot of volcanic ash. "Luckily" most of the crew returned aboard when the earthquake crumbled their six-story barracks, so we had plenty of guys topside shoveling ash in hardhats & gas masks with flashlights while the black steaming sky was split by red lightning-- at noon. Even if the weather lifted in the next 24 hours (it didn't) we had to remove the sail scaffolding and patch up the repairs. Somehow we held it all together, despite the XO & us department heads having to constantly fight with a traumatized CO who couldn't lead or make decisions but who could certainly second-guess us.
The next morning we rescued the rest of the crew & escaped to Guam, but the damage was in the million$. The engineroom cooling systems were a leaky disaster and Naval Reactors was whining concerned about several reactor-safety decisions that we'd freelanced in the heat of the moment. Our torpedo tube's valves & seals were clogged & ruined by ash, as were all of our antennas & periscopes. We spent four days in shift-work cleaning just to dispose of all the ash that had crept into computers, electronics, and ventilation & cooling systems. Even circuit breakers were tripping on clogged ash.
So during one watch as we chatted about our experiences (discussion-group therapy), I wrote the first draft of this list. Note that I was blissfully ignorant of the advantages or even the existence of the Navy Reserve.
What I like about the Navy, in no particular order:
- Human beings. Great officers like (insert mentor's names here).
- Battle stations & tactics in the simulators.
- Giving training talks.
- At-sea tactics & exercises.
- Great fellow officers like (insert shipmate names here).
- Great former officers like (another list of old shipmates).
- The benefits-- commissaries & exchanges, free gyms & pools.
- The chance to try out a different submarine wardroom (& CO).
- SSNs.
- The adventure, wherever it went to.
- Watching the movie every night (not that you've done that lately).
- Decaf coffee.
- Smart young sailors who answer the questions right the first time and don't bluff.
- Smart Chief Petty Officers & Leading Petty Officers who (see previous entry).
- Shore duty.
- Hawaii duty.
- Promotions-- the VIP treatment & deference can really go to your head.
- Engineering & ship's drills.
- Engineering watches, especially if we get to put the plant through its paces.
- Quiet engineering watches where we can chat.
- The knowledge that headhunters & HECO are dying to hire nuclear submariners.
- Hoping that the burnout of 1991-2 was temporary (it wasn't).
What I DON'T like about the Navy, in no particular order:
- Subhuman beings like (insert bad names here). "Leaders" that I can't respect or admire.
- Running into the same subhumans at subsequent duty stations.
- The feeling of apathy, helplessness, & frustration 11-16 June 1991 during Mt. Pinatubo.
- Spouse separation. Six-month WESTPACs, six-week EASTPACs, or weekly local ops are all equally bad.
- Being in a wardroom without friends. That won't improve when you're XO.
- The constant grind of pushing the squadron & maintenance shops for upkeep support, cleaning the boat, prepping for the next inspection, and getting ready for deployment. This may be end-of-tour burnout. (It wasn't.)
- Trident SSBNs, which incorporate all the bad of SSNs at a higher level of politics. The boomer good ol' days are gone forever.
- High-stress socializing when the wardroom is full of subhumans and their spouses.
- Incompetent department heads.
- Admin bozos (see previous entry).
- Bangor, Washington.
- Chinhae, ROK.
- Training clueless Junior OODs like (insert names here) who don't listen and aren't trying.
- Mission reports, especially when the Russians don't go to sea anymore.
- Counterdrug ops.
- Four-section import duty.
- Freezing submarine air conditioning.
- No air conditioning.
- The amount of administrivia an XO has to track.
- Lack of workouts, even ashore.
- Wardroom attitude-- very cut-throat & back-stabbing for minimal returns.
- West Loch's weapons loads.
- Drydock.
- Shipyard.
- Endless wardroom homages to "Wild Bill" alcoholics officers on other notoriously unsafe legendary submarines.
- Cutting slack to adulterous admirals while hammering JO indiscretions (insert long list here) and then complaining about the behavior of the younger generation.
- Eating lukewarm, mushy, fat-filled food provided by sullen cooks.
- Getting the time to do laundry.
- Having to institute punitive leadership for those who don't respond to anything else. "Holding accountable" vice training.
- CDO as XO. If there's anything worse than four-section import duty it's staying up all night in red goggles training OODs in the dark.
- Getting underway on a Friday for a Tuesday exercise because your CO isn't senior enough to pull a Monday underway timeslot.
Four years later I updated the list. We'd won the Cold War but the "peace dividend" was ensuring that the submarine force would be considerably smaller and not everyone in the game would get playing time. I wasn't selected for an XO tour and, although I didn't realize it for two more years, I'd already seen my last promotion. I had just escaped a horrible HQ staff duty and slowly recovering at a training command, but we were still encountering our share of drawdown problems. So the possibility of an early retirement seemed pretty attractive despite the massive pay cut.
The good things about a Navy early retirement, in no particular order:
- No more burnout stress. No more midwatch wakeups with my brain overspeeding.
- Not feeling trapped by the job, the family obligations, or the bosses.
- No fear of being deployed while spouse is deployed, forcing us to find other family to care for the kid.
- No before/after school childcare problems-- I'll be in the kitchen baking cookies.
- A fresh start. I won't be killing my mental & physical health for a few more years of pay.
- Investments are way ahead of schedule-- but confirm with retirement planning software. (We were right.)
- No more bozo leaders like (insert list here).
- I won't have to talk to bozo shipmates like (insert list here) any more.
- If I'm up at night I can still nap during the day. (Our kid did not sleep well.)
- I only have to drink coffee for the taste.
- I can save at least $200/month by taking over housecleaning & yardwork.
- I can spend more time on investing.
- I can handle rental-property repairs whenever there's a problem.
- Regular workouts & bike rides.
- I can explore other careers (or not).
- No more stand downs for "good order & discipline" or sexual harassment.
- I won't be worried about my next military duty station.
- Honey-dos from hell!
The not-so-good things about a Navy early retirement, in no particular order:
- No more steady paychecks (for the steady mortgage payments).
- Only a ~$17K annual pension instead of $25K (in 1997).
- Greatly reduced retirement portfolio.
- No earned income for IRA contributions.
- Might have to get a real job.
- "Daddy track" sacrifices for an uncaring kid?
- The extra 2-5 years of salary could pay for a lot of psychiatric treatment.
- Putting the pressure on spouse. We'll be transferred overseas or she'll be unaccompanied to Diego Garcia.
- What if I could stick around for 20 years or even promote (yeah, sure)?
- Honey-dos from hell!
) and it's not the volat that has increased ! And it's the driver's seat, nobody tells you what is good for you any longer.
