Expert: Rod Powers - 9/22/2009

Question
Hey my name is Siera and in 2003 i signed up to go to the army national guard in march but by April after a pre boot camp training experience gone wrong i realize i wanted out. I talk to my recruiter at the time and he said i was free to go. Now 6 years later i wanted to join the navy and can't do to the guard discharging me with a RE Code 3. If i opted out before my boot camp date why I'm i getting this code why is the guard able to screw me?

Answer
Hi Siera,

When you enlist in the National Guard, it's not the same as enlisting on active duty.

When you enlist on active duty, you are placed into the DEP (Delayed Enlistment Program), (See: http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/joiningup/a/dep.htm), until you ship out to basic training. While in the DEP, you are not really in the military, because you are not entitled to pay, nor do you perform military training or drill. When one requests a discharge from the DEP, they are discharged without an RE-Code, because they were never actually *in* the military.

However, there is no DEP for the National Guard. When you enlist in the National Guard, you are *IN* the National Guard, even before you ship out to basic training. You are allowed to perform drill, and you are entitled to military pay for that drill. When you are discharged from the National Guard, even before basic training, it's no different than if you are discharged after basic training. Because you were *in* the military (entitled to pay), when you are discharged you receive an RE Code (Reenlistment Eligibility Code). The commanding officer determines the RE Code, base on the reason for discharge, the discharge characterization, and his/her recommendation as to whether or not you should be allowed to re-enlist in the future.

An RE Code of "3" means you are eligible to re-enlist, *IF* the service grants a waiver. Unfortunately, because all of the active duty services are doing so well with their recruiting goals for the last several months (probably due in large part to the poor civilian job-market), they aren't favorably considering very many waivers right now. From their point of view, why should they take a chance on a waiver, if there are plenty of folks who want to join, who don't need one?

Perhaps, once the civilian unemployment rate goes down, the military will again start favorably considering more waivers. Until then, your only chance is probably asking the board of military records correction to consider changing your RE Code to "1." Procedures can be found at: http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/airforcebase/a/chgrecords.htm

For more information about the United States Military, feel free to visit my military information website at: http://usmilitary.about.com

Hope this helps!

Rod Powers
http://usmilitary.about.com