Does this sound right? DD214 Question

[ChicagoRonin70]

I'm an ex-military Desert Storm combat vet (served as an 11M with the 1/41 Infantry Regiment in 2nd Armored Division Forward, attached to the 1st ID in theater) who works as a researcher and journalist these days. I am doing some biographical ghost-writing for some veterans as part of a book being put together by a medical (psychology) client focusing on combat veterans. As part of my research, I've seen these men's DD-214s and I've noticed some odd things here and there in them. It might be just human error, or slightly different procedures from base to base, but I'm a stickler for fact checking and I'd rather do right by my client by being accurate with my research.

My question is as follows:

For one veteran who had sniper training, in his DD-214, in box 11 (Primary Specialty), his MOS number, title, and years/months in specialty is listed thusly:

11M20B4 FIGHTING VEHICLE INFANTRYMAN/SNIPER
5 YEARS 6 MONTHS//4 YEARS 6 MONTHS//NOTHING
FOLLOWS

In box 14 (Military Education), it lists his sniper training like so:

SNIPER COURSE 3 WEEKS (OCT 90)//NOTHING FOLLOWS

On a second veteran's DD-214, who was also a sniper from around the same time (early 90s), box 11 is listed like this:

11B10 INFANTRYMAN//4 YEARS 6 MOS//B4 SNIPER//
3 YEARS 3 MOS//NOTHING FOLLOWS

Box 14's reference to sniper school reads like this:
SNIPER CRS, 3 WEEKS, OCTOBER 1989//NOTHING FOLLOWS

Now, I've looked at a lot of 214s, both in person and in electronic format, and I can't find any exact matches to these to confirm that nothing hinky is going on ad it's just clusterfucked clerks doing things slightly differently. I don't have any ASIs on my own discharge documents, so I can't even use that as a reference.

Can anyone give me an idea whether this is just standard but legitimate variations of putting the same information in the form for sniper training and positions?

It'd be much appreciated!

 

[cavscout1983]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

What does the bottom of the dd214 look like on the one in question?

i.e.-

The top example you provided is how mine looks ( minus Sniper school) but as far as MOS/Skill level/ASI/SQI in the appropriate box.

Do they have similar discharge dates? If so, and unless the DD214 form changed between the earlier discharge date and the second, it should be identical as far as the form number and date of replacing the previous form version.

It's not unheard of for admin to be lazy and/or put things in the wrong area but if the date on the bottom of the dd214 is after the date of discharge that is a sure sign he forged it.

Can he provide orders awarding the B4?

 

[ChicagoRonin70]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

To CS1983

If I recall it correctly, both of the guys got out around <span style="text-decoration: line-through">92-93 </span> (that should be 94-95; damned typo) and the DD-214s are the 1988 version, so they look different from yours a bit. However, the bottom information line looks the same as other examples and my own as far as I can tell.

As to their actual orders, I think that for both of these guys that might not be the easiest thing. Most of the vets taking part are currently or have been homeless/PTSD/substance abuse cases, and the only docs I've seen on probably 3/4 of them (out of about 75-80 total) is their DD-214s—and in some cases, not even that, because they are so scattered they lost it somewhere down the line. Makes my job difficult, for damn sure, but the client I'm working for doesn't want me interrogating these guys and maybe chasing them away because they think they're being persecuted. A lot of them are really paranoid, given their backgrounds and circumstances.

So, I'm going about it the old-fashioned legwork way and seeing if I can verify things by other sources. It is what it is.

 

[sinister]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

Army admin has some screwed up instructions and policies for specific combat skills courses on the 214.

As an officer my airborne, air assault, mortar, and sniper course (USAMU course in 1982, prior to the Army even starting their formal course in 1987) information isn't annotated in blocks 14 or 18 (although the jump and Bullwinkle badges are listed in block 13 for decorations and badges).

I would imagine if these are final and<span style="color: #FF0000"><span style="text-decoration: line-through">/or e-signed</span> [scratch that -- too early for e-signatures]</span> 214s they are legit -- they would have had to produce diplomas or orders prior to personnel people annotating a 214.

If you have their socials off the 214s, <span style="color: #FF0000">student records at Benning will have their course graduation data on record </span>(unless they went to local division-level schools -- unlikely after 1987-88). I've been amazed at how helpful both Benning and Bragg have been as far as old diplomas and orders.

Without seeing their 214s (and seeing how short their enlistments were from your original posting) I would initially assume these are legit.

 

[cavscout1983]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

CR70- If you have access to the guys (and especially the ones without dd214's) and are serious about both getting the right info and also helping them out, you could use:

http://www.archives.gov/veterans/

It will be required that the actual veterans submit the requests, but, if you have time to work on "sure" things and come back to it, that would alleviate all doubts as well as help them out immensely when trying to apply for jobs and benefits in the future.

As Sinister suggested, Army school houses are fairly good about providing records, especially in this day and age of increasing Stolen Valor cases.

Given the nature of your work, I feel that it would greatly behoove the Army to cooperate assuming this book is not going to be a hit piece on the evil army that boots out perfect angels and turns them into drunks. Though, I do feel the good head shrinkers at the U.S. Army Research Institute might have an agenda, perhaps through contacting them and explaining the book, they could be of assistance as well if it would further any current behavioral studies on patterns leading to PTSD, Homelessness, and Substance Abuse.

http://www.hqda.army.mil/ari/about/index.shtml

Good luck and sorry I couldn't be of more help.

 

[ChicagoRonin70]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

Going the SSN checking route is one of the ways I have tried for looking into this sort of thing because this is not the first or even the tenth time I've had questions that I couldn't resolve with my own resources—and I'm damned good at finding out stuff. However, when I've made inquiries, what I've gotten back is basically that it has to be the soldier in question making the request for information—privacy issues have gotten pretty big what with identity theft becoming so prevalent.

I do some veterans' advocacy work in my volunteering time, so I've managed to get a few of these guys to submit for their records, but so many of them have been on the fringe for so long, it's often pretty difficult to get much done even to help them out. It can be damned frustrating. Hell, I had all of my records squared away and I do this kind of stuff professionally, and it STILL took me 7 years to get rated to the level I currently am for my disability and have my benefits situation fully taken care of.

To CS1983

Yeah, I was concerned about this possibly being a hatchet job-type project against the military, given the bleeding-heart bent of most of the psychologists who study this kind of thing. This book won't be; it's the reason I agreed to do the work I am doing in the first place. I have a good grounding in psychology, fortunately, so I've had the (often dubious) pleasure of having to dig through more studies on the subject of the difficulties faced by traumatized vets than I care to even count over the years.

But again, as I said, it is what it is. That's when I just put my head down and slog into the teeth of it and see what I can get done one way or another. Gotta give credit to my service, because otherwise I'd have probably said "Fuck it" long ago.

 

[cavscout1983]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

It's hard to make butter without churning.


Check out This Ain't Hell blog. The main guy is very good at getting information on vets as he is an ardent Stolen Valor researcher. Just send an email to the Admin/contact email on the page and let him know what you're doing and he might be willing to help and be a further resource since the book doesn't have an obvious anti-mil agenda. He was also a Platoon SGT in C Co. 1/41 INF in DS/DS and another writer was a platoon leader in another platoon in C Co. 1/41 INFSo, you might already know each other.

Good luck! It sounds like you have an admirable and yet thankless job ahead. Sound familiar?

 

[Switchblade]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

If the Vet in question has lost his copy of his DD214, he can always get one from the VA as it is usually part of his/her record. The local VA office will have access in their Business Office, especially if it is one of the mail Hospital Campus' such as Nashville, TN, Fort Miley, CA, et al

 

[kraigWY]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

The one constant about DD214s is you CAN'T TELL.

An example, my wife was navy, NG, Reserve, Active Army (as an IRR). She had 4 DD214s, ALL DIFFERANT. If you didnt look at the name and social, you would swear it was 4 differant people. Best example is awards. When she was discharged (from the Army)after returning from the sandbox in '04, her DD214 didn't include any of the awards and ribbons she got in the Navy.

She was medivaced back from Kuwait, I met her at Walter Reed, and accompanied her to Benning for discharged. While out processing. While setting around watching things I notices others getting their DD214s filled out, some were telling the clerks what to put on the form.

I think if one really wanted to know what a person really did was to look at their 201 files. Even that wont be totall accurate. Mine was totally closed out and started over when I went to OCS. Lots of dead space from when I got out of the Regular army in 1969 and went to OCS in 1978.

I just checked my 214 & 201 file, my 214 dosn't include sniper school but my 201 file does.

 

[ChicagoRonin70]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

To CS1983

Hah! That's my old platoon sergeant, and I know the other fellow you mentioned, too. I'm familiar with This Ain't Hell and a number of other military sites and blogs that do the same sort of thing. I'm not necessarily trying to bust people, because it doesn't seem to me that these guys are out there trying to claim things they haven't done—at least, not to any public extent. I'd rather go about it with more subtlety than some of those sites do, primarily because my client would flip his coconut if someone chased his subjects away by being confrontational with them about their background.

If I find out that there is anything amiss, which is part of my job anyway, I'll definitely take action then, but it's pretty hard to un-shoot someone if you turn out to have jumped the gun.

To CraigWY

Yeah, tell me about it. I've seen so many different and messed up 214s over the years I've been helping vets it's depressing and pissing me off to no end. And some of these guys have 201 files that were destroyed when that fire happened back in the early '70s (the ones from Vietnam-era and before), so that just complicates and makes things even more difficult.

As CS1983 said, it's more of the same from back in the day when I was serving. But it's what I'm being paid for and someone has to do it. Might as well be someone like me who actually gives a damn and can do it decently.

 

[cavscout1983]

Re: Does this sound right? DD214 Question

I wasn't intending you should bust people but that perhaps the resources could for once be used to help them; providing of course your old platoon sgt likes you. hahaha