Do they teach you to shoot with both eyes open in the military?
If you can, learn to shoot with both eyes open, and keep them open through the shot. If you close your eye when the gun fires, you'll have no idea where the weapon was actually aimed when it fired. This makes it very hard to know why the bullet hit where it did. If you know you flinched and sent it off-target, then you'll pay closer attention to your aiming and hold closer. Otherwise you will get frustrated and start thinking that good shooting is some mysterious thing that you will never master, and give up. The tactical reason for using both eyes is that if you are shooting on the two-way-range...also known as the real world... then you must have a dang good reason to fire. Something like enemies to your front shooting at you. That would be the wrong time to shut down 50% of your peripheral vision, just in case there is more out there than you see right now. If you are cross-dominant....for instance right-handed and left-eyed like I am...it's okay to squint a little to help your focus when you shoot with your non-dominant eye because of position or weapon requirements. But leave it partway open to catch movement or flash so you don't get caught unaware. To find out which of your eyes is dominant, put your hands out in front of you like a traffic cop motioning a car to stop....then overlap them while leaving an opening above your thumbs. Looking through that opening, sight in on an object across the room, then close your right eye. If you don't see the object across the room any longer without moving your head or your hands, then you are right-eye dominant. If you can still see it without moving anything once you close your right eye....then you are left eye dominant. Just so you know.
WHICH MILITARY BRANCH BEST FOR COMPUTER CAREER?
I joined the Navy in the Advanced Electronics Computer Field (AECF). I thought my job was fantastic. I always felt like I had the best job on the ship. There are a few different directions you can go while you're in training, but I knew what direction I wanted to go and I always fought to be the top of my class so that I'd get first pick for the next school or set of orders. I became a Fire Controlman and I worked on defensive weapons systems, everything that had anything to do with those systems. From the fire control computers, the communications devices, the operator interface, the synchros and servos that moved and aimed the missile launcher or gun, the radars, the chilled water, everything! No one else touched my missile systems in any way except me and the people who worked for me. I was in technical school for two years before going to the fleet and working aboard an aircraft carrier. I am out of the Navy now and I work for a semiconductor manufacturer, Intel. They hired me based on my military training and experience alone. No offense to the Army folks out there, but Intel has a strong preference for ex Air Force and ex Navy vs ex Army. The reputation of Army guys is that they didn't fix things themselves, they send them back to the manufacturer and get a replacement. In the Navy and Air Force you learn how to fix things because you actually learn how they work. EDIT: To the person below who said that the military would not pay for school before you are active, you are correct. I didn't say that I went to a private tech school. I was active duty and the first two years of my enlisment were spent in Navy schools. Going to the fleet, in Navy lingo, means being stationed on a ship. I was in school for two years and stationed on a ship for four years. Because of the schooling I had to go through my enlisment was for six years. You can go ahead and apologize for calling me a moron now.
Why doesn't the US military use guns that shoot 7.62 rounds instead of 5.56 rounds?
I’ve shot battle rifles. (That is, 7.62x51 semi-auto rifles). And I’ve shot 5.56 rifles (both the full auto sort and the semi-auto sort).And I would take the 5.56 versions every day of the week, and twice on sunday.7.62 rifles and ammo are heavy. Seriously, carrying a big heavy rifle on any long trek is going to suck donkey balls.7.62 rifles have a hell of a lot more recoil. It’s not painful, but it’s enough to make fast follow up shots pure fiction, and VASTLY reduce the rate of effective fire.7.62 rifles don’t really offer a usable range increase. The simple fact is that not many people can hit targets past six hundred yards regardless, and most combat happens within 300 yards, distances in which the 5.56mm round is plenty effective. Indeed, 7.62 offers only a marginal increase in effective range.The biggest thing that 7.62 offers is better barrier penetration. And that’s a small and dubious gain when compared to the significant advantages that 5.56 brings to the table.
What type of jobs in the military don't involve fighting?
The only job that guarantees you not to use a weapon is Chaplain. To get that job you have to be an ordained minister. Otherwise, either you train with a firearm or you don't join. It's really as simple as that. Officially (at least for the Army, I learned this in recruiter school), you could enlist as a CO and get a job like cook or bath and laundry specialist. However, that requires a pretty high waiver involving a man or woman with stars on their chest and with the drawdown there is no way whatsoever you would be granted that waiver right now. If there was a draft and you was a conscious objector that was willing to support the war effort you could be drafted in a non-combat role; there were actually three conscious objectors that earned the Medal of Honor. We train all of our troops before they are handed ammunition. If you are deemed a threat because you are just too "clumsy" to handle ammo you will not graduate training and you will get an early ticket home. If you want to serve you just have to deal with the fact that you will have a weapon. Your chances of actually shooting somebody are low, though. Most people in the military never fired their weapon outside of a qualification range. We have jobs that deal with computers (35Q for the Army just came out recently and it pretty much a cyber warfare job).
NAVY: Difference between Gunners Mate and Fire Controlman?
It depends on the type of Fire Controlman, to be honest. Conventional ones, especially on small boys (cruisers and destroyers)? Very little. AEGIS FCs? Night and day. Gunner's Mates (GMs) focus mainly on the mechanical side of weapon systems-the guns themselves, with some other expertise in electrical, hydraulic and pneumatic systems. Also, they specialize in maintenance of small arms, and nowadays torpedo tubes. Vertical Launching System GMs (better known as Square Barrels, vice the Round Barrels who deal with guns per se) are also responsible for that system, to include the electronics of it (they are a lot more like FCs in that way). GMs also learn about ammunition administration. Conventional Fire Controlmen focus more on the computer systems (there's no algebra in today's world-we have computers to do math for us, and you can't think that fast anyway), the radar systems, and the electronic aspects of various weapon systems. They also deal with missile launching system (specifically the NATO Sea Sparrow Missile Launcher and RAM). If you are into electronics, FC is a better bet. On cruisers and destroyers, Conventional FCs are in the same division as GMs, and learn a lot of the same skills (specifically with small arms). Both GMs and FCs are heavily involved in running Force Protection and Anti-terrorism efforts for surface ships. AEGIS FC (FC AEF) are a completely different animal. They deal with the AEGIS Weapon System, and depending on which career path, become experts in either the SPY-1 radar, the computer systems that integrate the AEGIS Weapon System, or the Fire Control Systems associated with. AEGIS FC don't deal as much with small arms and launchers, but are very heavily involved in electronics. AEGIS FCs tend to be the smartest of the FCs (it's harder and more demanding to get into). Hope this info helps, and hope to see you in the fleet one day.
How do snipers calculate how to hit a target over a mile away? Do you just feel it the way I instinctively know where a baseball will be thrown, or do you do math? Or are there instruments that help?
As Carter Moore correctly explained, it's a skill and an art. Math alone won't give you the answers because of varying conditions between yourself and the target. Hot atmosphere is more dense which will slow and deflect the bullet faster than a less dense atmosphere. There are also eddies and currents in the air, just like in water, so looking at the landscape between yourself and the target will give you an indication of wind speed and direction at various points along the flight path.*Also, once the distance of the shot exceeds about 500, the Coriolis effect comes into play, meaning the earth is rotating under the shot, moving the target away from your bullet.We have the following conditions to deal with on long shots:1) Speed of the bullet (effect on bullet drag as it drops into transonic speed), which must also factor the weight of the bullet2) Coriolis effect on bullet drift long flight-time shots. Also, you need to take into account your location on Earth as this effect is magnified as you get closer to the poles and is less an issue when at the equator.3) Air density (water vapour content, temperature)4) wind speed differential over entire flightpath, especially important as the speed of the bullet lowers and the gyroscopic effects lessen and the bullet becomes more sensitive to external factors (a gust near the end of the flight path can have a significant impact on the final impact location): Magnus Effect5) Spin drift due to rotation of the bullet (this is where knowledge of your equipment and the bullets used become critical, since this stuff is specific to your rifle and ammunition)6) Getting even more into the esoteric, if there is a large magnetic flux between you and your target, it can deflect the bullet, even if you are not using bullets that contain any iron.7) Barrel stability during the initial moments of firing. If there is too much vibration or movement as the bullet moves down the barrel, it will cause an erratic movement to the bullet which can make it wildly inaccurate. This is why having a floating barrel is one of the big improvements that sniper rifles have over normal long guns.