When I was coming to the end of my second enlistment and had eight years in, I was at a crossroads as to whether or not I wanted to continue on in the Air Force doing the shit I was doing. Either I was going to get out under 10 and go on with life or jump to another branch. I got a hold of. USCG recruiter and he said at the time they didn’t have a rate that matched mine so I’d have to revert to E-3 and they would “try” to find me a billet. Yeah, no. There was no chance in hell I was going to be a non-rate and wait for a job seeing as how slow things can move in the Coasties.
So I thanked the recruiter for his time and left active duty because back to back deployments and remote tours that I’d been doing up to that point weren’t hitting it for me. I got out and went into the Nasty Guard and a year later land an fulltime gig with them. I ran into Coastie recuiter and told him about my last interaction with their recruiter and he says, “Well you’re in luck we have an LE rate now, you wanna join up?”
Just my luck. I this day and age I would tell anyone to go in the Coast Guard before any other branch. Perhaps this new option they’re providing to allow vets a way back in isn’t such a bad thing.