LOVE THIS THREAD!
Guys I can't believe most of you don't ask the easiest question to expose these posers! What's your MOS? I was a dirty nasty leg (infantry) from 86-90. Nothing amazingly special. Still it annoys me when I run into these tools. I am obligated to "out" them.
At the range I work at part time I meet a plethora of them. For a while I felt like the original poster of this thread. I was meeting more "S.E.A.L.S, S.F., Delta, and Rangers that didn't have a clue about disassembling a Glock, Sig, H&K, Beretta, or any of our 1911's. One guy came in wearing a tee-shirt with an Army logo on it. He didn't have the look. I baited him with this question, "what did you do in the Army?" His serious answer was that he was a Special Forces Green Beret Airborne Ranger/Sniper. I asked him what MOS that was. His response, a blank look he then asks what's a MOS, (pronounced like it rhymes with loss), and then he repeats the first above answer. I decided to play a little. I asked him what the numerical designation of the MOS was. He insists that that information is secret and repeats original answer. Mind you he is very serious about all this. I ask him where he took basic and airborne school and when he went through RIP and SF School. His answers were NOT Ft. Benning and or Ft. Bragg or any of the myriad of places these guys train to earn those tabs and he didn't know what RIP was (Ranger Indoctrination Program) Did I mention that he is with buddies of his. I look him in the eye and say sir you may have been a Power Ranger but there is NO way you were a U.S. Army Ranger! He gets angry and informs me that he will never come back to this place again. I told him I would try to weather the loss.
I know the above is a rant but fakes like that burn my butt. My grandfather was an electrician in the Navy aboard a fleet tender during WW 2. Whenever I asked him what he did he said "I put batteries in flashlights." I never really knew what he did beyond being an electrician. I work with a guy who will tell you he painted ships in the Navy. The owner was an O-4 in the Air Force, a former manager was in the Army with a few different MOS's. Another guy that was ex-Army and our former training director was the real deal when it came to bad asses. You would never know it talking to him. He was a cav scout in the Army, a 19D I believe. He was also a cop around DFW and he is on his way over to Pakistan to work for the State Department. It's the third time he has been overseas in two years. Long story short he rarely speaks about anything he's done and will only do so in when pressed. Even then it's not in great detail and he is usually giving a great deal of credit to other people for their contributions over his. Then you read an incident report faxed to his wife by his supervisor in Iraq. She faxes it to us. It details how even though he was wounded in an ambush of his convoy from Bagdad Airport he managed to rescue the principle and save the lives of other members of his team. Let's just say that he would never have shared this info with us and when asked just simply said those things had to be done, anyone would have done it no big deal. Somebody mentioned a quiet professional. This man is that. He carries himself as a warrior. It's an easy going attitude that exudes confidence without trying because he is in a dangerous business, so really what's there to worry about. This in contrast to a 23 year old cop wannabe that worked with us that had no problem telling you what kind of bad ass he was and how he worked as a "federal officer" in the highest crime infested neighborhood in Dallas. He worked for a security company that was given funds by the fed for the work they did, I think HUD. That made him a "federal officer." He would also go into great detail EVERY chance he could about the gun fight he was involved in and how a particular Sig P228 saved his life. I don't know how that occurred because it certainly wasn't his shooting of said weapon. No quiet dignity there. Just a poser wannabe.
Best,
Dave