What's it like being a 11B in the Army National Guard?

It largely depends on your unit. Whether it's land nav or entering and clearing rooms, they always have us doing some kind of training. It's very rewarding in the sense of honing your basic soldiering skills farther than your typical soldier. Most pog jobs have you training to do your job and doing common soldier tasks second. The infantry's job is perfecting those basic soldiering tasks.

Florida Guard 1990-1998:

I joined to watch things go boom and do something I felt was important to me:

1. A good 30% of the time was a build up to the actual exercise. Boring stuff as in qualifications, PT testing, Common Task Training, pre-planning, PMCS's, cleaning and setting out gear, waiting for orders, etc...
2. A good 60% of the time was spent at Camp Blanding/Ft. Polk/MacDill patrolling, movement to contact, reacting to ambushes, creating ambushes, defensive positions, calling for fire, setting LP/OP's, etc...
2. At that time the Gulf War was won, and 9/11 was not even a glimmer. The military was slowing and there were even thoughts of greatly reducing the US Army in size.
3. In periods of "down-time" I kept my eyes and ears open and my mouth shut and learned from my peers in active duty (Vietnam Vet's, and Active Duty soldiers that had been in Europe during the REFORGER days).
4. Training was based on the concept of team work but also self responsibility. Hot, humid and crappy in Florida and if you didn't hydrate, got stung, bit or didn't take care of personal hygiene, cleaned your equipment, ran crawl, walk phases properly, ate what they gave you, or just listened you were a dirt bag and would likely fall out.
5. Training was a mix of platoon and squad based exercises in swamp and it was better than being back at the barracks/armory due to the high number of officers or senior NCO's who had nothing to do and would see 25-50 guys and think of any number of ways to keep us "busy" cleaning, scrubbing and moving things because in their minds we were big dumb monkeys. After all if you were intelligent "Why 11B? Why just a junior NCO? Why not OCS?"
6. 10% of time was spend in live fire exercises, or actually shooting those blank rounds Uncle Sam provided. Far more blanks...Far more blanks...
7. Feel we were tougher soldiers, but less well trained than todays soldiers. More time with M16A1/M16A2/M60/M249...Crew Served Weapons and NVG's were limited (very limited).
8. We had been prepared for missions that no longer existed. So the Vietnam Vets would take us aside and share their knowledge and set up exercises related to unconventional warfare in hot, wet, crappy places.
9. Infantry is hard work because you have periods of inactivity punctuated by high energy exercises at unknown times and are a magnet for poison ivy, poison sumac, ticks, chiggers, snakes, heat stroke, heat rashes and creeping crud.
10. Our time the field ran 2-3 days on the weekends and 2 weeks in the summer. Looter duty in Andrew and Opal.
11. You got muddy, smelled like ass, leaned up against a pine-tree at night to sleep, ran radio watch, and took the role of an infantry soldier.
12. It s hard and there is no way I could run at that tempo anymore.
13. Infantry is hard, and demanding. During war I can only imagine that when you add in live rounds, a hostile population and some blood it is an experience you are glad to leave behind.
14. You only see rank during a time of war in the Infantry. Hard lesson but a true one.

Glad I did it and I played the role of a link for all the others that went after me.

Don't do it for "macho points", do it because you want to. Not fun, but it's rewarding when you look back after a decade and say to yourself I was part of something that very few volunteer for.

Lots of resect of infantry, armor, artillery the world over it as is a shitty life, but it is the heart and soul of the military. During war brutal. During peace exercise, exercise, exercise and sometime you wonder "why?". But if you have good NCO's and listen you will learn. Hopefully you will never have to apply those lessons.

JAC

Ft. Benning 8/1990
53rd INF 1990-1993
C. Company 2/124 1993-1996
IRR 1996-1998

Being an Infantry Soldier takes a lot of guts and dedication. You need to train yourself off drill weekends to stay in shape. Depending on the unit and funding, embrace the suck is the phrase you better get used to. Drill weekends at home station can be boring if you don't have engaged NCOs. It can also be a time to fine tune basic skills. Every Infantry unit has 42A's. Get yourself in an Infantry unit and see for yourself. What ever you do, dont waste anyone's time/money to reclass only to find out you don't have what it takes to wear the blue.

Becareful what you wish for.The Infantry isn't for everyone.As far as worth it,depends on your long term goals.You do have better promotional opportunities,or it was that way when I was in.If your just pondering the idea and just need a change,why not something less challenging physically.

I miss humpin for miles on in setting OPs ambushes etc and watching the POGS just look at you when there are barracks provided and we say no we will just sleep outside under the stars thinking about your GFs.

I can't speak as to the Army infantry experience, but I was an 0331 (machine gunner) as an active duty Marine and it SUCKED, whether we embraced it or not. Since then, I've also been in admin, and I'm currently in public affairs - and yes, public affairs does go to the field more often than we're given credit, at least in *my* unit. So, I think I have a fairly good basis for comparison.

The majority of my fellow grunts were in the infantry because 1) they were young, 2) they had something to prove, and most importantly, 3) their recruiters BSed them into thinking it was all kinds of awesome. (Don't ask me how I know.) A few guys claimed to love it, but I noticed that very few of them reenlisted when their contracts were up. The infantry was kinda cool for the first year or so, mainly because I was in my late teens. That said, it got old real quick.

Now, if you're only dealing with Guard drills once a month where the light at the end of the tunnel is only a couple days away, then going 11B might be fun, and you get the bragging rights of being a grunt.

However, as you get older - especially on active duty - not being able to sleep because you're getting rained on in the field in the cold dead of night loses its appeal after a while. You'll be rucking a lot, with all the side effects that come along with that: blisters, back pain, messed up knees, etc. Infantry life is hard on your body, which is why regularly taking Motrin, aspirin, and other pain killers is a normal routine for a lot of old war horses who stay in the infantry long-term. Then, there's all the general hurry-up-and-wait and being treated like a child that, in my experience, is worse in the infantry compared to other MOSes.

I hate to be the wet blanket, especially since you sound really enthusiastic about laterally moving into the infantry. I can only speak from my personal experience as a Marine grunt, which unfortunately, wasn't very positive. To be fair, you might really enjoy it.

The best advice I can offer is to make damn sure your personality is a good "fit" before you start executing the re-class paperwork. Seriously, that's a big deal. Otherwise, you might start longing to be behind a desk again sooner than you think.

It's def worth it, if you don't mind laying in a muddy hole to sleep,80% of your meals are MRE and youcan wear out a pair of boots in just a couple of months, you'll love it. And that's only some of the benefits of infantry . Ya get out what you put in, don't come in with a REMF attitude or you won't make it. So I say doit!!!

3 yes served,grueling but self rewarding. Able for direct orders and follow commands.Come a conflict your more less going to be there.Fast ranking if u applie good leader ship.
PFC miles wenigar 7ID,32ND Battalion, Fort Order,California. Job I was a grenadier M203.

My 1st three years was 11B them a year as a mechanic the next 16 as a combat photographer my time as an 11B really was helpful and gave me an advantage over others in my MOS. 2/12Cav.

I never thought Id actually see the words Being a 11B is fun. Now that I have, I gotta mention that it cant be that hard when you have the USMC going into the shit long before you do.