It takes a special kind of person to want to enlist in the armed forces.  While most of the world is content to simply think of the military as a group of people who are “out there” fighting in the latest war, those few people who are brave enough to actually do so are truly cut out of a different sort of material from the rest of us.  After all, we have long since abandoned the idea of having a forced conscription, either out of the general civilian population or out of the prison population.  So we have an entirely volunteer military, and every single one of them has made a conscious decision to serve in the armed forces.

But since the military is the armed forces instead of the armed “forced,” one has got to wonder what can motivate a person to want to serve in such a potentially dangerous occupation.  Now granted, there is going to be some degree of danger in any kind of job that anyone is ever going to do.  Every day we all face the prospect of being maimed or killed, often through some kind of a completely random event.  In a situation like the military, however, one is often literally marching (if not actually charging) right into harm’s way.  While it is definitely admirable to do things of this nature, one has got to wonder why.

Most people who go into the military are not crazy in the slightest.  Rather, they have decided that, while they might end up dying in the line of fire, it is worth the risk in order to do something great in life.  Often they have goals that will require more education later in life, and the military will often help them to pay for that education.  And this is not even mentioning how the military teaches discipline and leadership skills.  It has to, in order to bring its people back home safely.