How good does an MSM (Meritorious Service Medal) look for an E-4 with 3 years of service with no airborne, air assault etc.?

Obviously most awards and decorations are going to enhance your jacket, and in turn your promotion potential.

When you get to Fort Campbell you will be going to Air Assault School. You should be able to get some but a SPC isn't expected to have much.

Don't worry you'll have your chance to earn your wings at Campbell! Lol. As far as an award l, it really doesn't matter. Just go there and show them you are squared away and ready to do more!

I wouldn’t worry about it. I’m sure you’ll get some looks and the occasional question but just focus on being good at your job. An MSM is gonna draw suspicion on anyone under E7 just because it’s such a high award. Don’t take it personal and just focus on adding to your resume and becoming better. Focusing on what people think will just get in your head

I’m confused by the wording of your question. You state that you only have “a few AAMs”, but are inquiring about how an MSM looks. Care to elaborate a bit?

I foresee E5 on the horizon for you and with good evaluations E6.

I earned my first MSM was as a CID Agent as a SSG. It was awarded to me as a CID Agent assigned to the 7th Infantry Division. It was an impact award for solving a $1.8 million Ponzi scheme involving a senior officer who victimized 68 military victims and 12 civilian victims. It also highlighted my reduction of evidence held in the evidence room by 33%. I was an agent from 1978 to 1994. During that time, every agent I knew (WO and enlisted) earned awards for actual things accomplished and not war game stuff. I actually worked in a career field which awards could have been handed out on a weekly basis to every assigned person. That includes personnel and supply. Yet, I wasn’t awarded anything for effective use of the Heimlich maneuver in saving the life of a two-year-old child nor saving the life of a civilian neighbor, who attempted to end her own life by shooting herself with a .357 revolver. I was expected to do my job, I was trained to do what I did and it worked out in the end.

I was an agent, not for the rewards, but to make a positive impact to the people around me. As a mentor to much younger agents in rank and experience, I was expected to evaluate their performance on a monthly basis and train them in investigative techniques, not taught in the school house due to lack of time.

For 17 years, I was expected to step into the lives of those supported when they often were having the largest crisis in their life. You don’t lean over the emergency room bed of a badly beaten soldier, who is not expected to live, and think what type of award you’ll win if you solve his anticipated murder.

Once you are retired or well after you are discharged, awards and their citations are only good for cocktail party talk, though winning an Army Achievement Medal for solving an attempted homicide in less than 36-hours garners a lot more talk than preparing a motor pool for an IG inspection.

No one at Campbell is going to care and you won’t be the only E4 with one there. Way to many high speed low drag dudes on that post.

Sad commentary when awards are tied to rank.

Does it look good? Yes. Does it matter what other people think? Not at all.

Just focus on your career and don’t worry about the rubber neckers staring at the candy on your chest