Marine officer thinks mustangs dirty up the “Aristocracy” of the officer corps
Clever design and engineering disguise rear-seat roominess and ample cargo space in the Mustang Mach-E.
No, not that mustang. We’re talking about mustang officers, those officers who were formerly enlisted (usually NCOs). We have a lot of mustang officers here, so I’m looking forward to your opinions on this elitist asshole’s thoughts. What we have is a former Marine Corps officer who thinks that enlisted men becoming officers is “like merchants marrying into the aristocracy.” They “erode the esteem, legitimacy and distinct culture of the officer corps.”
He’s apparently upset by the respect mustangs are given by enlisted men. Now, my service was probably like a lot of you. I worked with a few good officers and a lot of bad. Generally speaking, mustangs were the better officers at the company grades. I can only think of one glaring example of a mustang that wasn’t a good officer, but he went from E-3 to O-1, so I don’t know if he really got the full enlisted life experience.
Angry Cops breaks it down pretty well;
Here’s the Task and Purpose article on it.
Category: Veterans in the news, WTF?, YGBSM!!
After watching AC’s video and reading the tweets, I can only surmise that snook is an academy grad. I’ve met a few ring knockers that felt only they were true officer material and us ROTC folks were like the comic relief of the unit much less the Mustangs.
Punchline of an old joke:
Academy grad: Gosh, how’d you know I was an academy grad?!
NCO: When you were pickin’ your nose, sir, I saw the ring.
How do you know you’re about to get bad advice: It starts with “AT THE ACADEMY…”.
They rinse and repeat for their Cadre. The 1LT/CPT I butted heads with in TOG was a USMA graduate, having previously been an E-4. I ran into him again years later when he was a MAJ, teaching Cadets at West Point.
I was/am guilty of drawing on prior experiences and training when teaching others or trying to make a point. “As a [insert Drill Sergeant, Recruiter, Victim Advocate, Staff Weenie, etc. here], I found such and such.” But, yeah, the Academy is full of self-important Cadets (read: brainwashed college students in a much suckier environment than their ROTC peers (can I call them that or is ROTC far beneath them?). Probably more self-important are the Instructors, many of whom are Academy grads themselves.
I think that ROTC candidates would be considered Landed Gentry as opposed to Nobility, so no. While they are all Officers, they would not be considered true peers.
Of course knowing how people get in to West Point (or other Academies) I would question their lineage as Nobility.
As for those of us who came up through the fighting ranks (though I did dabble with the Gentry for a while), we were knighted on the Battlefield (or OCS) and will remain sufferable only through the field grades and then quietly put out to pasture.
The only good thing about being a Mustang, was to see the faces change in a meeting when I was a LT when I said “in my experience…”! The senior NCOs and a few junior who had worked for me, their faces lit up, the senior Officers eyes rolled…until the CSM said “I would have to agree…”!
Probably as good a feeling as when a Warrant says “hey, watch this….”!
I mean, c’mon man, if Joe Biden can almost get into Annapolis, how hard can it be?
Plus, make the football team. When one is a fabulist, there are no limits on one’s accomplishments or experiences.
Warrant officers don’t exist. They’re make believe like elves, gremlins, and Eskimos.
And Artesians.
Yes we are Mason yes we are….
Like “This one time, at band camp…”
I saw on a another content creator video that he was an 0311, and now in college and writing some thesis on why the military should not be promoting enlisted to officers. He was NOT actually an officer,
“Critical theory”?!
“Psychoanalytic theory”?!
W-T-Actual-F?!
Talk about “woke”.
I wouldn’t be surprised if this idjit fits into “the few, the select few” of “former” Marines.
Yep, a left/libtard idiot who drunk the “woke” Kool Aid… would fit right in with Lee Harvey Oswald probably.
Interested in that claim to “fame” ref: Fallujah.
Would love to see FOIA results on this guy.
Probably quite interesting.
Bradley Manning got inspired to do his special crime because tried to be all Billy Badass and flip over a table on his NCO… and SHE kicked his ass for it. Maybe something similar with this guy.
I still wanna buy her a beer.
Concur. His self-centered little ass needed it.
As I recall, she was a specialist and she was literally the only one that was raising red flags about his bringing his cd player into the SCIF and his other behaviors
Well if the parents are married it makes no sense to make them officers…
That dude’s parents were probably relatives.
Shit, how long is grad school? It was showing him enrolled in 2018???
Not that long… or shouldn’t be, at least.
Average PhD program is about 5-6 years completion.
In a gif:
Well, depends…part time can take a while. It took me a minute to get my MBA.
Yeah, I’ll second that…I had to take a sabbatical in the middle of my MBA because I changed jobs down range and found myself actually working!! Finally finished when they sent me to CGSC after my Primary Staff position.
It’s a lifetime career for some.
Masters should be 2 years. PhD is 3-5.
He advertises Fallujah but not when or what operation. Fallujah during Al Fajr is very different than 2008 Fallujah.
2008 Fallujah was so quiet they sent us somewhere else.
College students say dumb stuff; I was one.
Word.
I was a mustang. 3 years enlisted the ROTC. I got nothing for this douche nozzle. Elitist asshole indeed. This is the kind of guy that gets dragged.
7yr enlisted then off to OCS. Bad officers were not limited to any particular background, as I think anyone here would have seen.
Sounds like he is a douche canoe and jealous of the mustangs getting more respect because they have walked in the shoes of their subordinates while he was busy wearing his chucks at college doing shooters and beer bongs.
At academies, don’t forget making “spirit videos” too.
After being a non-academy occifer with life and overseas experience before seeing any, they are surprisingly unpleasant… grating, even.
About 98% of the Mustangs I flew with were just outstanding. Two were complete douchenozzles, and both were former AWs.
Heh.
Someone has sour grapes.
I refuse to listen to his wine.
Maybe he needs some cheese to go with his whine? It’d probably slide off his cracker (can we still say “cracker”?).
Like everyone else, I served with good troops of all ranks and backgrounds. I also served with sh^tbags of all ranks and backgrounds. Saw some damn good Battlefield Commissioned Mustangs get thrown under the bus by the WPPA during the RIFs of the ’70s. Saw some piss poor ossifers get protected by the WPPA for…reasons.
A Good NCO will generally make a Good Officer, if he/she doesn’t let it go to their head. A piss poor NCO will generally make a piss poor Officer. And not all Service Members that make a good troop can be a good Commander/Leader be it at the squad level or the Highest Level. YMMV
Did someone say, “Wine”?🍷
And before anyone starts in, just remember:
He can have some:
I almost went the Ring Knocker route right out of HS, but, for better or worse, at the last minute said “no”.
After a lifetime, I can almost be glad I didn’t go West Point.
*finally looks at picture*
Ah subtle humor that. The Mustang E, the Mustang no one wants. Much like this officer who is complaining, bet his OERs were a hoot.
It’s a pretty nice car, but it’ll never be a Mustang. It’s blasphemy.
Like putting racing stripes and a spoiler on:
How about this Jeep? I had a 1960 DJ3A, albeit not the Surrey Gala. Mine was a hardtop with the top long gone, so I pulled off the fixed windshield, registered it as an antique, and cruised around in aviator glasses and Hawaiian shirts for a few years before selling it.
Gotta love the surrey top DJ’s. It’s essentially a CJ2A minus FWD. I love my ’55 CJ3B, ggets you anywhere you wanna go, but you ain’t getting there fast. Or comfortable. Rides like a skateboard.
Better.
Pretty nice, I learned how to drive stick shift on a 1946 CJ2A!
Supposedly chevrolet is going to make an electric version of the corvette 🙄
Again…
They registered two Trademarks in 2020: E-Ray signaled to everyone that a Electric version was on the way. The Hybrid was shown to the press last winter and will debut in 2024, everyone expects the all electric variant to follow shortly after.
I wonder what type of radar signature it puts off. I’m thinking I 80 in Utah, Bonneville salt flats area, middle of the night with night vision googles. That part of 80 is dead flat and straight for about 80 or 90 miles 🤔
Never had a bad mustang officer. I had one in particular that was excellent (commisioned as SFC, former Drill Sergeant, guy was awesome), another that started rough but found her groove quickly (had a little trouble remembering she was now an officer not an NCO). Only one West Pointer sticks out in my mind, he wasn’t a bad officer, just pretty average. Wasn’t that impressive.
All officers should be required to spend at least a decade as
as an enlistee. If you can make E-6 within that time frame then
you are good to go to OCS.
Schools such as Norwich were a great hiding place for those
trying to evade Viet of the Nam. You can tell them by the lack
of a meaningful rack. One in particular became an expert on
the Viet of the Nam war and every conflict since then.
This country is in deep shit with the lack of war fighting
experienced military leaders.
I feel the same way about engineers, they should be technicians (bench or field) for at least two years before being given their sheepskin. That way they know how to design/build stuff that 1) works, and 2) a tech can easily program, access and repair.
Yeah, it’s kind of funny that what you describe is the career path I took in the civilian world as well. Assembler on the shop floor, engineering technician, field service technician, field service engineer, and so on. Didn’t get my EET until 2018 after I had been in the industry for 23 years! I only got it because I only needed 21 hours to complete and I couldn’t leave it undone. I had earned a BS in Technology Management in 2010, which was what got me into OCS.
When I was a wee lad and could not grow a beard even, one of my Sunday School teachers was an electrical engineer, as was my father.
They concurred that the engineering schools taught them all the theories about why something couldn’t be done, then real life taught them what they could do – which often contradicted their professors.
Had an engineer on a road project we were working on and he needed core samples. To cut concrete, water is required for dust and to keep cutting edge cool. Water has to go somewhere while cutting and what didn’t run off, went in the hole. He got his sample, took his measurements and dropped core back into the hole. Again, water has to go someplace. I wouldn’t say he got drenched, but he got a face, shirt and pants full of nasty concrete water runoff. One of the guys watching him do this asked after engineer got wet, ” So, you’re an engineer “.
Somewhere, Archimedes laughs.
A fucking Mustang Mach-E? What the fuck, man. You could’ve put up a picture of the awesomest Mustang of all time:
1969 Mustang Mach I with the 428 Super Cobra Jet, you pick the color but my personal favorites would be Candeapple Red or Grabber Blue
But no….you had to put up that electric crossover piece of shit. I was about to go off on a rant about the subject but you distracted me with that abomination pretending to be a Mustang. I need to dip out for a second and collect my thoughts before I address the topic at hand. 🤣
Really? 11 likes and no muh-fuggin’ replies? Damn…🤣
Real easy to click a “like” one handed, Pappy. It’s harder (see what I did there) to make a comment when the other hand is rubbing the chubby brought on by your comment vehicle.
Full disclosure…(a) yeah I had a chubby meself (b) retired wing wiping brother has one of those in dark green that he did a frame off restoration on. And like shake n bake…I helped. It’s his wife’s daily driver. I can neither confirm nor deny that it was test drove to redline revs on an AFB runway. I admit nothing…call my lawer
Let’s try this again…
📱
1-800-B-E-R-N-A-T-H
🛎️ 🛎️ 🛎️ 🛎️
*The number you are trying to reach has been disconnected. No further information is available. Goodbye*
Curses! Foiled again!🤣
That would be one kewl car.
Ahhh…the Pareto principle has spoken.
Remember, 80% of your value is produced by the square of the number of your employees.
*Adjusts monocle 🧐*
Shhh, you enlisted scum are supposed to be illiterate and innumerate. 🤣. Sitting here quoting business principles involving complex numbers,,,that’s far above your station in life!
/SARC (just to be safe)
In NCO-speak, 20% of your troops will consume 80% of your time. These people are known as “shitbirds”.
It was 10% in my day…. what happened?
Reduced enlistment standards during OIF-OEF.
So 10% post-Vietnam ~ Desert Shield; and 20% thereafter? Wow!
I had a few troopies that wouldn’t have made it into Macnamara’s mob.
INFLATION.
LoL
14Ts… and many not even by being sh*tbirds unfortunately.
I have personal 1st hand reason to disagree.
As do others here, I’m sure.
I could show this to my “mustang” son today.
But frankly,
he is a little bit too busy right now in the Middle East.
I’ll save this VG article link for later.
Perhaps he can see it before Spring 2024.
🙂
Some of the best officers I worked with were former enlisted.
Also, some of the worst.
Let’s not forget that commie what’s-his-name (I’m not going to waste my time to look it up) who got booted from the Army after graduating West Point. He was a former enlisted Ranger.
Either way, I can’t figure out if this officer is simply tone deaf or whether this is some kind of deep-fake parody.
I mean, c’mon, “like merchants marrying into the aristocracy?” What real live American would actually say that?
Did we not settle all that “aristocracy” nonsense between 1775 – 1783? What military force does this clown think he belongs to? His Majesty’s?
The commie what’s-his-name was 2LT Spenser Rapone. He was assigned to the Ranger Regiment for a while, but flunked out of Ranger School after being commissioned, so never really a “Ranger”. Nobody knows where he is today. Probably in the soup line holding a canteen cup alongside Shane Kunzman. / s
That shitbird needs to be left alone and forgotten.
Last name sounds an awful lot like “Rapinoe.”
“Rapinoe” and “Slapahoe” sound a lot alike.
😄
Ah, the “enlisted and dogs keep off the grass” attitude of the well-off northeastern liberal…
Shaggy?
I have much more respect for Shaggy.
Never left his buds and went home early.
Yeah, Shaggy never left his buds…he smoked ‘em.
Two things my dad did not allow in his house:
1- Jane Fonda movies.
2- Heinz ketchup.
But she was so cute in “Cat Ballou” … Does she get a pass for her pre-Vietnam Protest activities?
NO!
That is all.
Concur.
That’s why I used that particular photo …. thought it would resonate here. (^__^)
Yup.
Awwww, why the long face, Johnny Boy?
OK, I’m back. Had to do a Lefty Ruggiero and have a couple of spritzers to settle my nerves. 🍷🤣
Anyway, I saw this video last night on Angry Cops and I had to laugh at the elitism shown. I’m almost thinking this Snooky mofo is just trolling. But, proceeding on the assumption that he’s for real, it’s laughable that he’s so butt hurt about this. His comparison to the aristocracy is also funny considering that the purchase of commissions by the nobility led to some major military debacles throughout history. Does Lord Cardigan and the “Charge of the Light Brigade” ring a bell for Snooky? We’ve been guilty of that here in the States with the various volunteer regiments raised for combat up to the Spanish-American War, but I get the feeling Snooky here would be just fine with that. The point is, we are a representative Republic and anyone who uses “the aristocracy” as one of his arguments regarding our military is already suspect in my eyes. Yes, as a currently serving Mustang, I’m hardly impartial, but in keeping with my working-class origins, “Man, fuck this fucking guy.”
“His comparison to the aristocracy is also funny considering that the purchase of commissions by the nobility led to some major military debacles throughout history. Does Lord Cardigan and the “Charge of the Light Brigade” ring a bell for Snooky? ”
Guy could rock a sweater, though.
Dude was one knittin’ son of a bitch!
Mr. Rogers was proud to welcome him into the neighborhood…with no charge.
Didn’t Mr. Rogers wear that sweater to cover his military tattoos… 😉
Well…when you’re a Marine SEAL Sniper in the Viet of The Nam…you gotta wear something that will cover up the I :heart: Mom tats she used her sweater knitting needles to ink you with. Couldn’t have Corn Pop thinking he was a badder dude than Mr. R now could we? 😉
Speaking of Cardigans:
https://youtu.be/FQ70oQVos5Q?si=wfgCHpH4HSxQuyhV
And:
https://youtu.be/Q3gQSPMHPm0?si=G2tZDQIJ5Bojacl5
I’m sorry, hotness excuses a lot of sins. Plus, these are very interesting, jazzy takes on some heavy metal classics.
This dude needs to be punched in the face and then taught to smoke.
Like this?
https://youtu.be/aPwPAMvEWOM?si=u1s7gZAdKaAp2c_g
Yep.
Sounds like that Zero feels threatened.
Little-dick syndrome…
I already shared some of my thoughts here: Daily FGS : This ain’t Hell, but you can see it from here (valorguardians.com)
Here’s a 4-year-old video of Snook talking about transitioning to the civilian world: (37) Marine Vet speaking at SBT’s 6th Anniversary Celebration – YouTube
There’s nothing of real substance in terms of determining his attitude about his military service in the above video, but he seems like the sort that might have thought he’d skyrocket in the officer ranks only to have some “setbacks” (anyone wonder what could have affected his career, given his current opinions and attitude?).
Sounds like an early-stage grifter, softening his audience before hitting them up for donations.
One of the best Platoon Leaders I ever had was a SGT in the 82nd, got out and went ROTC. When he graduated, the Army said, sorry, no RA slots available. This was in the early 90s during the post Cold War RIF. He became a cop in Phillidelphia. A couple years later the Army came knocking. He liked being a cop, so he told them they missed their chance. However, Uncle Sam wasn’t having any of that and he ended up in Korea with me. He was a good leader, honest, unpretentious, and looked after his troops. For the most part, “mustang” officers have real military experience that gives them an edge. There are exceptions, but generally they are a better quality leader.
The finest and toughest officer I ever served with was a mustang. LTC Charles Q. Williams (retired and R.I.P.) was a 1st sgt in the 82nd before he went to OCS. As a 1LT he was the XO of a SF ODA in Vietnam. He almost single-handedly prevented his SF camp from being overrun by the NVA, despite suffering multiple gunshot and shrapnel wounds. As a result, he was awarded the Medal of Honor. When I first encountered him, he was still a captain and commanded one of the rifle companies in 2nd Bn/509th Inf. Once promoted to Major he became our Bn XO. His inscrutable, tough as nails demeanor terrified many a 2LT or PFC. When still a captain, the troops called him Captain Smoke cuz he could smoke your ass. He was a man of few words and did not suffer fools. A superb officer we would follow anywhere.
Did I read that article correctly that Snook left the Marine Corps as a corporal?
Every good corporal should know that Napoleon was a mustang.
Yep, a former corporal.
And…an Engineer!
Hence his if-the-Corporal-don’t-get-it,-redo-your-order standard.
https://awealthofcommonsense.com/2016/04/napoleons-corporal/
“Enlisted men are stupid, but extremely cunning and sly, and bear considerable watching.”
Army Officer’s Guide 1894
I gotta wonder, even back in those days did officers (even senior officers and commanders) really look down on the long-service Sergeants and Sergeants Major under their command, especially those with possible combat experience in the Civil War?
That sort of nonsense was actually taught and inculcated at both service acadamies for years. To a certain extent it is still taught at Quantico. They infuse the boot officers with the incorrect belief that they are the smartest ones in any room, and that is almost never the case.
As portrayed in Maj. Powers in ol’ Heartbreak Ridge:
Maybe they should teach them skills to avoid becoming fodder for map readirg memes.
Agreed.
I was at a briefing at my community’s headquarters some years back and we were told that anyone in our speciality who was chosen for a Limited Duty Officer (LDO), aka Mustang, commission would NOT be commissioned as an LDO, but as a Restricted Line officer.
The reason given? We LDOs got all the good jobs and the RLs wanted to level the playing field. WHUH?!!! I was already commissioned so it didn’t affect me, but I decided then and there that there was no fucking way I would ever ship over to THAT community.
By the way, our LDO designator was 6440, the RLs were 1610. In other words, 1610 x 4 = 6440. We LDOs liked to bring that up once in a while to unsuspecting RLs. There MUST be a reason for that.
Tried the OCS route after graduating from a local Public University. Was told by the local Officer Recruiter, “Well, the Navy already has you right now. Sorry, they’re just not looking for enlisted right now.” That was after 10 plus years of deployments, great GPA, and nothing but great evals.
Looking back now, I should’ve fought that BS, but instead I shrugged my shoulders and said oh well. Single greatest regret of my career.
Didn’t I read somewhere that Israel REQUIRES their officers to be prior enlisted?
Some of the officers I respected most were prior enlisted. A few of those I respected the least, too, but overall a normal distribution curve.
No idea, but we had a SPC in A/1-3 that had supposedly been a CPT in the IDF before moving to the US. Interesting company at the time, we had a South African, Irishman, and Frenchman along with the Israeli in Bldg 47 in on Fort McNair during the same period. The French guy ended up going AWOL and supposedly going back to his home country.
Can’t hear the video but here’s my thoughts with five enlisted years, culminating as weapons squad leader. My enlisted time was invaluable up through company command. Of much less value after that, and increasingly, the value was in terms of increased acceptance by the NCOs rather than through better understanding of the actual job. In Bn command, it was again highly valuable in terms of helping me understand that every decision I made impacted 820 Soldiers AND their families. It’s not duty honor country for many but simply making it from month to month. Having gone well past most, at 34 years in, my enlisted time simply makes me five years older than my peers and gives me a ton of good stories but has very little bearing on how I do my job. But the standards and experiences I leaned in my youth still inform my behavior daily. I once had a supply sergeant crack that at least I knew how to shine boots, unlike most officers and I was both proud and embarrassed for my profession as an O. I think prior Service makes for being a good company grade officer but is less relevant later. Prior Service makes for good officership or, sometimes, for crappy officership. The crappy are those who take advantage of the position or can’t relinquish being an NCO and try to still do it as an O. The good use their time for common sense and to ensure they lay out expectations for their NCOs and then empower and enable them to BE NCOs. The fact I’m Fb friends with far more of my former NCOs than officers makes me think I succeeded at that.
Very well put and makes complete sense.
My dad was a mustang (USAAC/USAF). His brother was a mustang (USN). My nephew was a mustang (Amy). All three were outstanding officers. Never forgot their enlisted roots or the lessons learned there.
The best thing about my serving with Mustang Officers is I did not have to burp and change them during their first deployment.
In Combat Arms units the Platoon Sgt will make or break the career of that units Officers. I watched several good Officers get passed over because of a shit stain created by some enlisted idiot that managed to put on a rocker of two.
Seen that go both ways.
Sometimes the best way to fuck one of them over when they want to be large and in charge, and do things their way, is to just do what they tell ya to do. Then if asked why things are hammered up, just say that is what the officer wanted done, and let things fly from there. Did it twice to ignorant and arrogant lieutenants who knew it all and refused to listen to those who really did. Neither one got augmented.
I’ve always been a fan of “malicious compliance”. Sometimes ya gotta let them step on their crank and feel the pain.
As an Army Chief Warrant Officer we often referred to officers who couldn’t cut it as “commissioned trash”. NCO’s are the backbone of any branch and warrant officers bring special expertise to the table. An NCO who has the initiative to become commissioned should be commended not made fun of. I served a joint tour at Camp Smith (a Marine post) as an enlisted swine. I was not impressed with the quality of many of Marine officers I encountered, particularly the lower grades. All I can say to that particular Marine Officer is “Well ain’t that nice!”
The amount of tears shed by academy grads because I was paid more as an O-1E was crazy. They spend four years getting told they are better than everyone else and then to find out they get paid less was too much for their little hearts to bear. They actually tried to get enlisted credit for academy status for a number of years because; “it was so much harder than being an enlisted soldier”.
Whiny bitches.
Put your ass in Iraq on patrol and tell me how easy that shit is.
The 01E thing is pretty sweet! But they screwed mine up for 2 years. Then I got promoted and they screwed it up for three more months.
As an NCO, I always liked getting Ossifers with Prior Service because it meant that i wasn’t getting some fresh-out-of-college Cherry that was going to need constant babysitting and most of the time would make sound decisions. That pampered prissyass sounds like a PL I had in Korea who got an ass-chewing from our Platoon Sergeant who cam from “The Trail” to Korea after service on Fort Bragg, while slamming his hand on his desk in the Platoon office he’d say something like “DAMMIT SIR, I need you to go to your desk and I’ll bring you the paperwork when it needs to be signed, NOW get over there and I’ll run my Platoon the way it needs to be!”. Said LT also “Z’ed out” the radios just before Convoy SP time on one field problem, and we were close enough to the DMZ to hear the commies’ loudspeakers!
If this “person” has issues with enlisted becoming officers, my career path would make his head explode. 12 years as an officer (ROTC) in the National Guard, a six-year break, followed by 17 years as an NCO in the Guard. The last ten years as the fulltime training NCO in the Combat Engineer Company I had commanded in the 90’s.
That’s not a career path. That’s a long and winding road.
My first thought was “Chesty weeps” – but Chesty would kick this idiots adz, smoke him seven times, then make him go first in the stack for 8 months someplace where the fertilizer and the ventilator frequently intersect.
Then, maybe, this ossifer might be worthy of the name of Marine.
On 21 March 2003, Marine Lieutenant Shane Childers, an infantry platoon leader. became the first Combat fatality of the Iraq War.
He received his commission through the MECEP ( Marine Enlisted Commissioning Education Program) program as a Dean’s list student at The Citadel.
This guy sounds like a silly cunt.
His Twatter bio lists 5 reasons I wouldn’t listen to him nor consider his opinions.
Retired mustang here. 12 years enlisted and 25 years as an officer. It’s pretty obvious that Mr. Snook is self-unaware that he’s the problem, not mustangs.
The officer I least liked working with was the son of a MLB manager. He gave off the Snook airs.
Which manager?
Just curious. Since you mentioned baseball, I remember watching a documentary about Kurt Russel’s dad owning a minor league team in Portland. Kurt played on the team and was a vet, Air Force Reserve as I recall. Kurt Russell, actor, baseball player, veteran, and tapped Goldie Hawn. One of the few people I’m jealous of. 🤣
Bing owned the Portland Mavericks in the 1970’s. I knew a couple of the guys who played for Bing and with Kurt. They were fun to hate.
He was with the Boston Red Sox in the 1980’s.
I’m afraid that I have to agree as an officer and more so a gentleman!
They should drive Dodge Challengers!
Marine Corps promotion boards brief commissioning source because Naval Academy grads are preferred and Mustangs are less likely to compete 20 years of commissioned service. Mustangs at Company grade billets tend to perform better than peers, but that difference goes away in field grades because few mustangs have Regimental or Division experience.
I don’t buy Snookie’s reasoning because very few prior enlisted officers go back to serving with the same group of Marines they were enlisted with.
Wonder what Chesty and Smedley would have to say about that…
Back when I was a young Lt of Marines (Desert Shield/Storm timeframe) I was accused of being a Mustang several time. I always considered it a compliment.
This guy was apparently a Cpl that went on to college at Columbia and got a masters. I wonder if he thinks that he is unqualified to be an officer based on his tainted history as an enlisted. My guess is he’s a narcissist not unlike Lars that couldn’t recognize his own hypocrisy so blatantly obvious to everyone else. I doubt he would consider himself inferior to a 2nd Lt from a public school.
I bet he wears a monocle and carries a pocket watch on a chain.
Don’t forget the swagger stick
Uh-oh… if so, he’s giving somone a bad name:
The monocle is to closely examine manholes.
The stick, mentioned below, or above however this post is placed, is to check the depth.
His tounge cleans them out.
The aristocracy is under attack!!!
Well there’s a mental image that can’t be erased after reading. Thanks.
I commented at length below, but I think that it’s possible that he attempted to commission through OCS or another path, was rejected, and is now simply an overeducated Blue Falcon. “If I couldn’t do it, no enlisted Marine should” may be his mentality.
The narcissism seems to be evident in his responses. He’s got the fancy degree and everyone else is not only undereducated and ignorant, but simply wrong about everything.
Never mind the countless officers who came from the enlisted ranks and became outstanding leaders, even making it to the highest of ranks. It’s a shame he went out the way he did, but I wonder what ADM Boorda’s response to Snook would have been.
All it takes is a good fire fight to make an E5 Platoon Leader. Ring Knockers are way overrated. I will take leadership and ability. I Turned down that Battlefield Commision. I had 11 months in and the thoughts of returning after 2 months at Benning. Just didn’t feel right.
I read elsewhere that this Snook guy was an infantry corporal, that he was not an officer but an NCO.
I’ve heard conflicting things, but it does seem as though he wasn’t an officer, especially considering his “former 0311” status. I’m not too familiar with Marine MOS’ but 0302 seems to be for Infantry officers, like 11A denotes Army Infantry officers versus 11B/11C enlisted MOS’.
I wonder if his hyper-educated self is simply trolling for the sake of trolling and infamy, or if he is trying to Blue Falcon his way into the Hall of Shame.
Scenario: young Cpl Snook feels he is the best and brightest amongst his peers and even leadership. He’s earned his BA in History and feels every bit the Marine that he is, but there’s one thing: he’s a lowly enlisted “merchant”. He’s qualified on paper, so he submits his OCS packet, knowing that he’s not only officer material but superior to the current officers in his unit. The packet is either kicked back by unit leadership or rejected by the USMC, possibly by a Mustang who’s “gate keeping” and feels that Snook–possibly due to attitude or lack of demonstrable leadership ability–is not officer material. Snook then decides that the Marines are undeserving of him. It’s all or nothing. He would have been the finest officer out there but is instead relegated to staying enlisted. His chance at joining the “aristocracy” has failed and he will never accept just being an average Marine NCO.
Flash forward, Snook has “shown them”, earning a graduate-level degree from an Ivy League school. Now, after much reflection and study of history, he realizes that just maybe there’s no place for prior enlisted among the officer corps. Regardless, if he wasn’t good enough to commission, then no one else in the ranks should be. “Let them eat cake…NCOs, that is. Make SgtMaj and you can do everything a Col can do. It wasn’t for me, but I was far superior to both my SgtMaj and Col when I wore the uniform.”
With comments like that, he is more than qualified for a senior position with a proud but humble woman owned business that sells outdated and overpriced Red Hat Software to the Federal Government.
You mean the one that’s “humble” enough that it doesn’t even have a door on the mailbox of its Corporate Headquarters?
I recommend that young Mr. Shook read “Once an Eagle”. Or, probably easier for him to watch the miniseries. The TV miniseries led me to the book.
Read the book during a short stint on a fire base in Vietnam. Then years later, saw the miniseries. When making “Gettysburg,” I had an interesting conversation with Sam Elliot about his character, Sam Damon.
I’ve read it at least twice and watched the miniseries multiple times. When I decided to reread it, I couldn’t find it, so now I have two copies of the book.
Snook does seem to have some Massengale-esque qualities, while Damon’s character is representative of what Snook seems to loath: a lowly enlisted man, promoted on merit, leadership capability, and performance. Due to the system, Damon is always one step behind Massengale, with the latter being promoted based on ticket punching and sly manipulation and maneuvering. But enough about that…though I may read it again before long on one of these sleepless nights.
It’s a good book and Courtney Massengale is clearly a douche (nice joke by the author there) and the villain. Wish it were better (not to mention shorter) though.
How I grew up, Sam Damon– couldn’t control his zipper, didn’t dump his cheating wife and took too much sh*t from Courtney Massengale– would’ve ended up dead before the Army. Spoiled the book for me after all I’d heard about; was disappointed.
They need to put his ass back on active duty, then hit up the troops to donate to Navy Relief. A great career killer.
Craig Lowell was unavailable for comment.
Neither was Rudolph G. MacMillan, but if he was…I’m sure Mac’s comment would be…”Hold my MoH, hand me that TOW, and watch this…” Roxy beams!
KoB, you’re like the big brother I never had. Cantina is open, pour yourself whatever your black heart desires.
Thank ye, Young Sir…High Praise, indeed. I’ll have a Jameson…with a Jameson chaser.
Just remember…Jameson’s is a TERRIBLE wingman:
I’m guessing dipshit had an athletic scholarship to Canoe U for something like track & field.
Was in the bottom third of his class at TBS.
Ended up as an Aviation Supply Officer.
Bought his mess dress complete with boat cloak at The Marine Shop in Quantico the first weekend he was there.
And discovered his fiancee getting banged out by some salty hashmark LCPL.
He won’t make it to field grade.
Pretentious douchebag alert
“I can’t imagine being at a party or some other public gathering discussing my graduate school research analyzing small unit group psychology, veteran suicide and the causes of war atrocities with Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory and Axel Honneth’s recognition theory, and then having a friend of a friend with no background in philosophy say to me in front of everybody: ‘Wow, that’s f—ing stupid. You’re a real dumbass,’”
Snook is the officer version of Anthony Swofford
Didn’t this douche exit AD as an E-3? What evidence is there this dipshit was ever an officer?