Many young naval reserve officers now serving on active duty will have the opportunity of changing to Regular Navy. Why should they? What inducements does the Navy offer to an officer who was educated with the naval profession as a secondary consideration?
Recruiting ads present good pay, retirement benefits, security, free medical service, travel, and many other advantages. What do those things mean if you become a line officer in the Regular Navy?
Pay and retirement: The intent of pay is to permit you to live like a gentleman without financial cares if you are reasonably prudent. Varying with economic conditions it will do just that, a situation sometimes known as genteel poverty. At the moment, many artisans and mechanics can afford better living than you. However, the object is not to make the naval officer rich, just moderately indifferent to money. The officers especially needed by the Navy are not those to whom Navy pay looks like big money, but those men who on the outside would make many times their Navy pay and who in the Navy can discharge responsibilities which in civil life would yield greater income.
Retirement pay is, today, no more than existence pay even though an equivalent annuity would represent a small fortune. To live as you will become accustomed, you will need to make good investments from your active pay and, anyway, you will probably desire more employment than fishing and golf after retirement.
Security: Security is not for you in the sense that CPO’s and Warrant Officers possess security. The Navy long ago chose selective attrition over seniority promotion. The attrition rate will vary with the needs of the Service, which, judging from present world conditions, will be considerable for many years.
Medical services: You yourself will receive excellent medical care. Your family will find it sometimes excellent, sometimes fair,-sometimes inferior, and generally exasperating. The reason for this last is that the medical organization of the Navy was tailored for the service personnel and is not sufficient for the relatively recent commitment of aid to dependents “where available.” Many times you will prefer to send your family to civilian doctors and hospitals.
If you change to Regular Navy, how will you fare in comparison with Naval Academy graduates—not on paper but in practice? There are two answers. One can be obtained from the ex-reserves who transferred at the end of the war. It is likely they will have found that Naval Academy graduates have no closer ties than those of schools such as Yale, for example. The second answer is found in your own knowledge of the instinct for self-preservation. All officers have the self-interest of getting the best results from their subordinates. The subordinate who can produce the best will naturally be preferred regardless of what ring he wears.
Travel: This you will get. What about family life? It can be rough. You will see some junior staff corps officers and specialists fare much better than you in this respect. Among the general line the grass will often look greener in other designations: however, by hazard, comfort, and professional experience these things largely balance out.
What then does the Regular Navy have to offer a prospective line officer? Just one thing—a career. A career in which the only limits are those set by you, of your own volition or capability. At the end of the war it was fashionable to condemn the Service as undemocratic. On the contrary, you will find it most democratic. No one will ask, “Who are your family or your connections?” Most of the top men of the Navy knew no one in the Navy when they joined. You are on your own, and the influence you achieve will be the result of your abilities.
Rank in the Navy is relative. It is a military convenience for quick recognition of approximate responsibility. It doesn’t prove how important you are. The most important person in a ship may be the petty officer who repairs a machine without which the ship cannot accomplish its mission. The moment when, by alertness, a young OOD will more than earn his year’s pay will occur regardless of his stripes.
Even if you have been in the Navy only a short time, don’t underestimate the extent to which the Navy becomes a part of you. Many officers recognize too late the strong bond formed between them and Navy life and the people in the Navy.
The rewards of this career are the knowledge in your own mind that you performed a much-needed job—not in making someone else rich—but in the service of your country, your family, and yourself—and possibly in contribution to a better world. Opportunities will have come when you will have represented the United States.
An admiral’s flag will not necessarily be the measure of your success. That flag is not a reward but a symbol of responsibility which can be assigned to only a small percentage of your contemporaries. You may not get it, but you will have been up to bat. Success in this career will depend on what you think you have done with it. Success also is relative—you will know some officers who entered as seamen and retired in the middle grades, having served an eminently successful career, highly respected by you. You are starting at a different place and can judge accomplishments accordingly.
Forget the standard inducements. In prosperous times civilian life can outbid them. What the Navy offers is opportunity to serve in a proud profession. You may know officers who are not proud of it and of whom you aren’t proud; all the more reason that if you are worth your salt the Navy needs you as a regular officer. That the Navy grants you a regular commission proves only that you have met the minimum standards. The question is not what does the Navy offer you, but what have you to offer the Navy?