Nicholas WiIliam Paea; phony SF dude
The folks at Guardian of Valor send this dude, Nicholas William Paea over to us. Apparently, he was discovered at a Disabled American Veterans event yapping about his service as a “long tabber” and his TBI from an explosion in Afghanistan. Unfortunately for him, he told a real special forces veteran that he had completed the special forces qualification course without the humdrum participation in Robin Sage, you know, the final test of special forces qualification. SO bells went off. Further investigation proved that, needless to say, he hadn’t finished the special forces qualification course. So, the folks at guardian of Valor ordered his FOIA;
On his LinkedIn profile he had claimed the following (the actual page has been edited since)
But, you see the picture at the top of the page, you’ll notice that he also has Combat Infantry Badge (Second Award) and that’s like the siren song of posers, they can’t resist putting at least one star on their phony CIB.
Needless to say Nick here, never deployed to Afghanistan, never got blowed up, never had a TBI. So the folks at GoV emailed him some questions and he actually answered, yammering about how he was in a good place now loving his children and he doesn’t want to talk about his military career…well except in the news articles that GoV found and in the social media.
Oh yeah, about that uniform. Well, he borrowed it from a friend to wear to his father’s funeral (insert heart string tug here) and he never claimed any of that bullshit, well, unless you call “by wearing it” “claiming it”. And, oh, the TBI, it was because he did a one-point Parachute Landing Fall on his pointy head.
Call me crazy, but I think he’s a lying asshole.
Category: Phony soldiers
And how many posers that have been busted here, have all had the same, sad, sorry stories and excuses? Nothing new or original anymore.
Another phony phuck who molests the truth for his own self gratification.
Another somewhat honorable career and he has to embellish, WTF. After looking at his records his last duty was in Korea. My guess is he got in some shit and got busted over there. Easy to do in Korea hahaha So many Vill’s and so little time haha..
I noticed the 9 years in and getting out as a private. His place of discharge (Camp Casey) tells us he did get busted in Korea for something.
E-1 over nine. Yeah, there’s a story there for sure. I knew a guy like that. He didn’t sew his stripes on–they were affixed by zipper.
Yep. NCOPDR w/2 shows he had stripes at one time. The fact he left as an E1 with 9 YOS says either (1) court-martial with punitive discharge or (2) field grade Article 15(s) followed by admin separation for disciplinary reasons.
I can see why he “doesn’t want to talk about his military career”. My money’s on “court-martial with punitive discharge” as the reason.
Since it was in Korea, because of the 12 month tours I’m thinking it was a Field Grade followed by separation.
LebbenB: could be. However, when I was there (decades ago now, to be sure) my unit court-martialed a few folks. Some left with BCDs – a BCD-Special can be done pretty quickly.
BINGO!
Shitbag.
Well, golly gosh! I made E3/PFC while at Infantry OSUT.
I, too, wore a uniform to my father’s funeral. However, I was the funeral detail’s OIC and I presented the flag to my mother (complete with the Arlington recitation).
What a douche.
“…Oh yeah, about that uniform. Well, he borrowed it from a friend to wear to his father’s funeral…”
Well gosh darn, right out of the Poser’s Playbook, page 17…
Well, his friend with the Class A’s must be a poser, too. Infantry cord on the wrong shoulder, end of the shoulder loop not tucked under the lapel, French/Belgian Fouraguerre on the wrong shoulder, skill badges out of order, wearing an SF SSI but also wearing Infantry specific items – the Infantry cord and blue backings, and no RDIs on the shoulder loops.
This guy doesn’t even rate soup. He’s more like a thin watery broth.
Ya know, that the Uniform and Insignia regulation is available on-line and printable as a PDF document.
A little research goes a long way.
Well I guess he felt he had to make up for screwing up 9 years of service, because he obviously did to be discharged as a Private after that long. So let’s screw up even more by claiming to be all sorts of shit you never were as well.
I just don’t understand! Why do douchetarts, who’ve had a decent run in the Military, feel the need to elaborate on their service? I served for 8 yrs as an 11B & I’m proud of that!! No!! I didn’t earn a long tab, 2cibs, silver star, etc… But I’m proud of what I did!!!
I hear ya.
I served 24 years, was Infantry and Field Artillery branched. Got some ARCOMs and AAMs, nothing spectacular, but I did my jobs and took care of my people.
I’m proud of that.
“I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am, let’s face it…” – Terry Malloy
This guy was probably a chapter case from Korea, given his place of discharge.
I’ve chaptered more than a few Soldiers in my career. It’s never a pleasant task (for one, the paperwork is horrendous. For another, the Chapteree has to be escorted everywhere he goes while he clears, which pulls a good Soldier from training.) Before they went out the gate for the last time, I always told them the same thing – Don’t let this event define the rest of your life. This is but one moment in time and you have a lot of time left. Learn from this, sure. But don’t define your self-worth by it. A real man learns from his mistakes. Others are consumed by them. Don’t be the latter.
Most of the time, that little speech fell on deaf ears.
I’ve done two chapters, and I said essentially the same thing to both Soldiers… in a mentor format… over the course of them checking out over the course of them checking out. I capped that with a simple comment capturing the above statement.
Even to the end one must try to help these Soldiers out.
Til they do the final duffle bag drag, they’re still Soldiers. Not very good Soldiers, but Soldiers just the same.
Wow, what a fucktard… just read everything else over at Guardian of valor.
He did make a public apology on facebook, but surprise surprise that went bye bye. It was a pretty lame apology especially regarding his claims, and I do hope his information was passed on to the VAOIG regarding his claims of Combat injuries.
Hell they need to check the character of his discharge given his discharge as an E-1. If it is other than honorable he is not elligible for VA benefits.
He had “Other than Honorable” discharge, than he asked for review and the Army changed it to “Honorable”.
Hey! Just cause you borrow something to wear doesn’t mean you’re claiming to be that! I don’t claim to be a man just cause I am wearing a strap on!
/sarc off
Hoo boy. When the ladies here at TAH start talking “strap ons” in the context of going after a poser, you know the fool done f-ed up. (smile)
I will need your adress to submit the claim for one new Computer Monitor….
The guy didn’t have the integrity to put on the things that he actually earned. Appears that he tried to dress to impress… and to match his stories.
He didn’t care to the point that he had the infantry blue chord on the wrong shoulder, and he was sporting the French Fourragere on the wrong shoulder as well… the latter not being earned either.
He has no excuse here, he could’ve just put the things on that he earned, based his stories on what he actually did, and move on from that.
Hawt….. 😀
/*runs*, lest I’m on the receiving “end”
I had to make sure everyone was awake and paying attention. This guy will come here to defend his actions. I just wanted him to know who he’ll be dealing with, people that are sick and tired of others lying about who or what they are.
Plus it was the first thing that popped into my head, this is why I usually don’t say the first thing I think of. Guys it’s scary in my head!
Awake? Trust me, lady, the image of you wearing a strap-on is gonna take a while to go away.
What a fucking bozo. Just sickening. He is lucky that the SF community has not beat his stupid ass because it sounds like he has really pissed of members of 7th Group.
Maybe he really does have a TBI cause someone with all of his brain cells functioning probably wouldn’t go around pissing of Green Berets….
What does “long tab” and “short tab” mean?
Long Tab = Special Forces qualified
Short Tab = Ranger qualified
The tabs are qualification insignias worn on the sleeves of various Army uniforms…
Yahoo answers has this decent quote and anyone else can certainly pile on
Those who wear the Special Forces Tab (nicknamed the “long tab”) have completed Special Forces Assessment and Selection Course (SFAS) and Special Forces Qualification Course (SFQC).
Those who wear the Ranger Tab have completed Ranger School.
Those who wear the Ranger Scroll (different from the Ranger Tab) are members of the 75th Ranger Regiment.
So to answer your question, no. Not all Rangers are “Special Forces-qualified”. Not all Special Forces are “Ranger qualified”. And not all members of the 75th Ranger Regiment have the Ranger Tab.”
Funny story. When I was on the trail, one of the other DS’es in my company had a short tab and senior wings, but no EIB/CIB. I found that peculiar, so over beers on cycle break I asked him about it. Turns out he was a 63B that was assigned to 1st Battalion. We had a good laugh about me thinking he was a door kicker.
Wouldn’t the lack of blue on his drill sergeant hat be a better giveaway that he wasn’t a “door kicker”?
This was during my first cycle and I came in at the end of that cycle, week six or so just before the FTX. In 2-13 IN during that time, when DS’es were out on the range or doing tactical training we wore PCs or K-Pots, so I didn’t see his campaign hat til graduation or thereabouts. I didn’t get the chance to get up with him until we were on cycle break and ask “WTF?”
Yep, my buddy just retired as a long tabber and he never went to Ranger School.
Ran across that myself decades ago. Had an instructor who was SF, but had no Ranger Tab. I asked him during some “down time” during training why he’d never gone to Ranger School.
His response – I sh!t you not – was, “I didn’t think it was worth the hassle for 10 promotion points.”
ChipNASA sez: …So to answer your question, no. Not all Rangers are “Special Forces-qualified”. Not all Special Forces are “Ranger qualified”. And not all members of the 75th Ranger Regiment have the Ranger Tab.”…
AND, more importantly … not all men who wear a RANGER Tab are/were members of a Ranger Regiment.
rgr1480
“…
athe Ranger Regiment….”Fixed that. Or, coulda said “a Ranger Battalion.”
Where’s my coffee cup?
On a related interesting note, not all who wear the green beret (or at least back in MY day…) are qualified Special Forces. Beret + SF patch – Long Tab = assigned to a SF unit but not an A-teamer who went through the JFK school at Ft. Bragg.
In addition, I used to run into a lot of guys in 1970s Germany who were assigned to 10th Group down at Bad Tolz, but were helicopter mechanics, crew chiefs, etc. For a while they were wearing a really weird “candy-cane” beret flash behind the SF crest, later you saw them with a beret and crest but no flash.
I think that changed in the early 90’s. Only the guys that had gone through SFAS and passed Q course were authorized to wear the green beret. All others who were assigned to an SF Group and were airborne qualified and in an airborne slot wore the maroon beret.
May have been in the late 1980s, LebbenB.
The various SF groups have gone back and forth on headgear over the years. At one time, if I recall correctly non-SF qual personnel assigned to SF groups wore a baseball cap w/parachutie ID disk (if they were on jump status at all – I personally know of at least one “leg” who served with one of the SF groups). At another time, all wore the green beret – but those w/o SFQC wore the “candy stripe”, so called because it was a small stripe in flash colors worn below unit crest/rank, on the beret; those who’d been thru SFQC wore the flash. They later moved to all berets, but in different colors – green for SF qual personnel, maroon for non-SF qual.
I’ll take your word that all wore the green beret w/flash at at least one point in time, and differentiated by tab/no tab. Never saw that in person, but after all the others it certainly doesn’t surprise me.
Not sure about current practice. Been quite a while since I was a youngster stationed at Bragg. (smile)
I was at Campbell when that change was made. Some of the bubbas that I knew on the support side of 5th Group had the boo-boo lip that they had to go buy maroon berets.
Holy shit. This mofo was an 11B NCO, possibly a E6, NCOPD 2nd award in that time frame makes me pretty sure he was already a E6. I made my E6 in early 2006 with no cool schools and no college, so the cutoff was pretty low then, and he STILL can’t figure out how to wear the uniform and puts his Infantry blue cord on the wrong side? Booted in 2005 and no CIB? Well I guess that’s possible, I went to BNCOC in late 2005 and we had a handful of guys in the class without CIBs, but most of them were in the chute for a upcoming deployment.
How bad do you have to screw up to go from E6 to Civy Street? Lets see, if it was a pile of Field Grades, it would have had to be three of them to get knocked down to E1 (E6/5 a Field Grade can only knock you down one E-grade, E4 they can take it all)Maybe he was having too much fun down range in TDC since he was on Casey?
self correction, I made my E6 in March 2005,went to BNCOC in late 2006, 2006 is when I got out. Memory is fading.
still can’t type for shit, late 2005 is when I went to BNCOC, it’s too damn early for me.
I’m thinking he was an E5(P) at most. During the time of his service, NCOES completion was a pre-req to promotion – in order to pin on E6, he would have to successfully complete BNCOC first and then make points.
Looking at the FOIA, I’m not sure he was an active duty Infantryman, either. He might’ve been an Infantryman in some state NG unit (Which is more than Dennis Chevalier did, BTW) then went active as an Avenger crew member. Pity we can’t see his ERB.
I’m thinking the opposite. I think he started out as Avenger in the 90s and when they started closing out a lot of those ADA MOSs he reupped as Infantry. Or hell, maybe he finished his first hitch as ADA and reupped as 11B on his own. After 9/11 with the optempo it seemed to me that everyone was getting promoted without PLDC/BNCOC. Hell, as soon as my points went active 60 days after the board I got my rocker. When I went to BNCOC in late 2005 I want to say 95% of our class was already E6. Hell, now that I think about it, the guy I sat next to was getting messages to his AKO account that he needed to get a DA photo done because he was going to be eligible for a first look for E7 in the near future.
Hell, long about 2005-6 didn’t DA have to come out with a policy allowing for a waiver of PLDC so some E5s could go to their E6 board and keep up with their piers because optempo had kept some people from going to PLDC?
Not sure if you guys saw this at guardianofvalor.com but here it is:
Also, there was a FB commenter that said he served with the guy and that he had been bragging a few years ago about his VA award of $75K in backpay plus 100% disability. I can’t find that comment now for some reason.
David Bryant · Sierra College
He got a 75k backpay check and an award for 100% complete and final for 3400 a month for the rest of his life, no further dr appts needed… I know this because I know him.
I was a SSG and didn’t earn my CIB until 2005. I left Ft. Campbell right before they got orders for Iraq. When I got to Ft. Wainwright my unit became non-deployable as we transformed to a Stryker Brigade. I was in the last Active Duty Brigade to be deployed for the first time during the war on terror. Sometimes it’s just luck of the draw.
“…Maybe he was having too much fun down range in TDC …”
That’s Tongducheon — the town right outside Camp Casey. I spent 6 months in the 2ID’s G5 shop there doing Civil Affairs before getting my command (okay, so it was Chejudo Training Center … it still counted!) (^__^)
I recall a few courts martial I had to attend because the soldier got drunk and beat up his live-in. One victim described her profession as a “Comfort Woman” — that was before I heard the term in relation to the Japanese occupation.
Ahhhhh …. the good ole’ evenings of patrolling the night’s activities keeping law and order in the various and sundry establishments of vice.
rgr1480
I came late to the party and I’m PISSED! Where did he get that uniform? 2 CIB AWARDS!!! BSM w/V and 2 PURPLE HEARTS!! For fucks sake, where in the hell do they come from? The guys was in long enough to know nobody in his age range could have 2 CIBs. Infantry cord WRONG SHOULDER!!! I guess you guys have already said this stuff. I just to the typing before reading. Sorry if I’m redundant.
Although his give away for me was the nice, close, clean shave!! That says, Special Forces, Ranger right there!
I was a proud as hell, plain old 11Bravo! Nothing high speed. This guy pisses me off to know end. There is honor in being a regular old grunt. What the hell happened to that notion?
Sparks, you would be surprised how many people on active duty don’t understand how the award periods for the CIB/CMB etc work. I didn’t even know that Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Desert Storm, and Somalia, were all covered under the same award period until a few years ago. I did know that multiple tours in the same combat zone didn’t rate you multiple awards. There was some crusty old MSG in my reserve unit in the late 90s who had done two tours in Vietnam separated by 14 months and he only had one ward of the CIB, so that’s how I learned that.
Andy…What gets me is his FOIA says he’s an 11B. Don’t they teach them which shoulder to wear the braid on anymore? I mean, I agree with you. Coming from the Vietnam era I wasn’t aware of the CIB periods after I mustered out. But for fuck’s sake, this guy’s doing about EVERYTHING wrong. Again…stand a little closer to that razor troop!
Maybe it was that BS two week long course POGUES take and then claim they’re Infantry.
Didn’t get my Blue Crapper Cord until the last day of the cycle.
I’m overly proud of it and it hangs from truck’s rearview mirror.
I was at Casey around that time with 1/72 AR. I do remember quite a lot of Article 15’s. Usually drinky girl related. Quite frankly I was lucky to get out of there with my sham shield intact, but I did what I had to do to uphold the sacred honor of my regular guy tab.
“Purple Heart (2)”
That always gets me like no other false claim can and when a false claim of Purple Heart–or two–comes from someone who wore the uniform, it is particularly loathsome. So, it is time, once again, to share The Salute, just so the casual visitor knows what I’m talking about.
I agree with you on this one. I’ve said before on her, I think that every single poser that claims a PH should be forced to go to Walter Read and see the real warriors that earned the PH.
I did not realize that we do not have to shave wearing class As.
He’s SF. Everybody knows that when you’re SF they issue you a beard. That alone makes him legit.
And what is up with the Blue Cord?
GT…it just adds to his “shit on a stick” costume. The new Don Johnson, Miami Vice, SF/Ranger look. Fucktard!!! Need to be nut stomped!!!
Hell I served in Korea from 92-93 when I was AD, and YEAH, plenty of places and situations where one could lose all kinds of rank! Getting involved with the black market over there sent plenty of GIs’ careers off a cliff, they were always Court Martialed, and the lightest punishment I saw was for an AF Captain, who got two years of hard labor and dismissal, followed by a 1SG that got knocked to E1, forfeiture of all pay and benefits, 3 years HL and a DD. It wasn’t hard to find info, it was always posted in the “Court Martial Results” column of “The Indian Head” the official 2ID Newspaper, it posted their names and units unless they were acquitted, Then it would say for example “A soldier fron 2nd ENGR BN was tried by Court Martial for Black Marketing, found Not Guilty, and released to his unit.”
If I had to guess, I’d bet it was for Black Marketing, that got more Soldiers busted to E1 and thrown out than anything else over there!
Infidel, we had some pissed off looking Captain show up in my unit because some guy in our HQ plt had gone over his monthly ration for hard booze and they thought he was black marketing. This guy laughed and took the Captain to his room and showed him his collection of empty Jack bottles on top of his wall locker. I think he also had some empty ones under his bed. Yes, he was an aclhy, but I don’t think they ever referred him for treatment. I’m just glad Korea was my second duty station and not my first, or I might have gone down that hole too.
Camp Casey, 5/20 Inf 94-95
Oh yeah, did they still have the RCP’s (Ration Control Plates, which loooked like credit cards) when you were there? I remember seeing Korean women (Some GI’s Yobo, Korean Wife)smiling as they put two cases of Budweiser into the trunk of an AAFES cab getting ready to go back downrange every time I went to Casey. Anyone asking them what they were going to do with all that beer would be told “IT OK, I drinkee-drinkee mysewrf!” and it was known that brew was going straight to the Black Market. Groceries from USDOD Commissaries were a hot item as well!
when I got there in 94, they were just switching to a new ration card. when the new one went into full affect the commissary/PX complex there on Casey was empty for about a week. No more lines of little old Korean women with their bags of multiple appliances and 12 bags of groceries jumping into a AAFES cab.
Could well be. When I was in Korea decades ago, black marketing was exactly what tripped up most of the folks who ended up court-martialed in my unit.
Perhaps I missed someone else commenting, but did anyone else notice that his dates of service and active duty dates are a year off ? One runs from April 7 2004 and the other from April 7 2005. If he spent time in the stockade, would it be characterized this way ? Or is it just a typo ?
His first active duty stint was for BCT/AIT/OSUT, meaning that he was a reserve component (Reserve or National Guard) Soldier. Then it looks like he went active six months or so later.
So it appears he did admit to his lies and apologized on his Facebook page. He left the apology up for a few hours before deleting his account. When compared a lot of the other fakers on here, that almost makes him a righteous man. I’m sure he was hoping that by offering the apology he was hoping Jonn and the G.O.V guys would remove everything from the web. Sorry bud, that’s not going to happen. But just go away with you tail tucked between your legs, suffer your lumps for the next day or so, and do your best to start over from the mess you created. If you do that, you’ll be much better off than a lot of the POSers on here who cling to their lies and become internet legends.
Dennis Chevalier
He’s one those I had in mind…among others.
Jay Kerwin.
Him too….plenty more to go. Green Thumb I’m surprised you’re not bringing up a certain logistical company.
The lying turd dropped his Facebook page with the half-assed apology on it. But he does have another page, https://www.facebook.com/nicholas.paea.5
Yeah NCO, I agree. He’s obviously embarrassed, he did apologize, albeit quickly deleted. Maybe he will just fade away. But something tells me one day this will come back to him and I hope he doesn’t start this all over again. I mean cripe, the guy has more ribbons than I do…legitimately!
Discharged as a Private.
Enough said.
Best part was when his former mother in law came on and bashed his ass…haha OMG how the world turns for stupid people…bahahaha
Oh man…this was a comment on a post about this dbag on an SF Poser FB page: “Looks like the plot thickens…KATHY JEFCOATS MAY 2, 2014 AT 4:21 PM My opinion: I am beyond thrilled to see Nick Paea finally exposed for the fraud he is. I am one of his many ex-mothers-in-law. He never divorced his first wife, married a second time and then married a third time to my daughter in 1999. They have a son who will be 16 next month. He does NOT pay child support. He and his new wife, I’ve lost count on which one this is, just relocated to a beautiful house, they take incredible beach vacations and brag about it all over Facebook, all without supporting his son. I think he has five kids by three or four different women. He was in Korea when my grandson was born in Georgia. When he came back, they were stationed at Ft. Bragg, living on base housing. He got sent overseas, leaving my daughter and grandson behind at Ft. Bragg. She thought everything was fine. He suddenly stopped her allotment and quit paying on their car, which was repossessed. My grandson was a toddler and my daughter was a stay at home mom. She suddenly had no income. The Army was fine with that. While he was overseas, he got someone to forge leave papers for him so he could go to Russia to meet other women. The Army was fine with that. Nothing ever happened to him, he was never held accountable. My daughter got a job while still at Ft. Bragg, trying to support their son. We sent her money to help. She didn’t even have a car because of him. He didn’t even have the guts to tell her he wanted to end their marriage, he just let her figure it out. He finally came stateside and helped get her moved out of base housing. She returned to Georgia where we and our family helped her and her son get back on their feet. He has lied, schemed, connived, manipulated, conned,… Read more »
This dude is an extra dirtbag.
I concur, GT, and looking again at his FOIA info where it says he was discharged as a PVT from Camp Casey says to me that he probably got a BCD for something like Black Marketing. They didn’t play around on that when I was there 92-93! Given what spd0302 said, he seems like the type who will always be after a fast buck or thrill, consequences be damned!!
As someone who has a personal side in this, Military stuff aside,which I agree is despicable at best, it is a shame that he has drug at least 5 children through the mud with him…what a huge letdown for them