enlisted service personnel can go to college and participate in ROTC. my brother knew several men who had prior service as enlisted personnel in his ROTC program in college.

I disagree with every single piece of this advice.

1. There is no point in starting drama with the other brothers in case he is legit.

2. No need in starting unnecessary drama between the pledge and this guy if he is legit. If everything is confirmed true, you can always go to this guy and tell him that you have confirmation and to stop talking shit.

3. There are absolutely NO repercussions for this kind of act, except immediate dismissal. If they can lie about that, they will lie about anything. If you've ever been involved with a pathological liar, you'd (in general) know.

I agree with your assessment. I'm just not sure how you're going to get the real information about the guys service without risking a little drama in a confrontation with the pledge. I really wonder what the ROTC guys know.

Is there a chapter advisor who can confer with the head of the ROTC program on behalf of the chapter?

I agree to keep it very confidential until any action, if any, is taken. Don't start a storm of gossip - which no doubt will spread beyond the chapter - and threaten the integrity of your group.

Each college will have a Colonel or LT Colonel in charge of the ROTC program who would know the cadets but the Captain is the one who deals with them daily. Go over to the ROTC building and ask to speak to one of the Active Duty officers. I didn't realize it was your college he had been in ROTC at, or was it? The ROTC guys could just be talking "smack" b/c they don't like him.

Maybe sit down and start asking him general questions about his "military service". Where he did boot camp? Where he was stationed overseas? What his MOS is? Ask to see pictures from him overseas. Now I'm not saying just automatically believe everything he says (because if he is in fact lying about the service he has done he might have "everything else" picked out and planned to keep up the lie, or he might be telling the truth).

The reason I say question him, is you can really gauge his responses. I mean someone who did boot camp isn't going to forget where they did (especially someone at his age). They aren't going to forget their MOS. They aren't going to forget where they were stationed overseas.

I definately agree that you should ask to see his release papers.

Liars... they exist
 

A girl I knew dated a guy who pretended to have cancer, and be on the verge of dying... which is sick, because her father died of cancer. Anyway, he kept up that lie pretty well for the two years they were dating. It was pretty weird finding out it wasn't true after all that time! He also spent a lot of time pretending to be super wealthy, buying her lavish gifts and whatnot, but it turned out he was actually accumulating lots of debt in her name.

Then we saw him on the news... he had a whole OTHER secret fake life where he was pretending be be a veteran from Iraq. He would wear all this military garb around, had a fake ID, and so forth. Even his mother was in on it! All their neighbors thought he was a veteran. Turned out he was just scamming people, cashing in on freebies, discounts, etc.

You read my mind. As someone who did serve over in Iraq for the military-I would say that if he can't produce a DD214, he's lying. If he's out of the military now, he may no longer have his ID card-so you can't always go by that. In fact, if your ID card expires-it's either supposed to be taken from you or shredded and thrown out.

As far as pics in his BDUs-be careful of that because if anyone wanted to lie about it-it's easy to buy desert camis (or borrow them) and take pictures of yourself in the desert (Arizona, etc.) if you really wanted to try this-trust me when I say-you'd be surprised the things people will do...

If he is still in college (undergraduate), chances are (unless he went to a 2-year military school where they commission you before you go to your 4-year institution or you completed OCS) he is not a commissioned officer.

Unless he calls the VA himself, no one is going to tell you any of his information. Besides, why would someone call the VA and say, "Hey-was I in the military?" Even if you try and call for records-please remember that the military isn't always too good about having everything. Thankfully I have made copies of all my things because I've called the VA hospital and unless I personally went to that specific hospital-they had no information on me.

Anyone can lie and say they went to a certain basic training or AIT but, just ask him what his AKO email address (Army Knowledge On-line) or NKO (Navy)...not sure about the other services-sorry. I'm sure Military Wife will agree that these are some good ideas to find out. Maybe those other cadets were jerks to the guy and thought they were better because they didn't go enlisted first-that happens alot too....

Give him the benefit of the doubt because if he's a decent guy-maybe people are just talking trash on him. Good Luck!

That's horrible that people can so easily lie to people. It reminds me of that book where the writer just came out and said the experiences during the Holocaust never happened to her-it was made up. That's really offensive! WTF? Who LIES about the Holocaust? I hope she sleeps well at night or has no problem looking herself in the mirror the next morning because I know I never could if I did something like that!

Anyway-back on to topic. Hope he's not a liar. Good luck!

As a child of a Vietnam War Veteran, I saw my father come across at least 1 guy who was lying about service during Nam. It turned out the one guy went as far as purchasing a purple heart from an estate auction (I still can't believe an auction would auction off a veteran's purple heart!) and had dog tags made. What made my father and other nam vets suspicious of this guy was that when they started asking questions, this guy just couldn't keep his stories straight -- one day he would say he was stationed one place, the next day some other place. Eventually the lies crumbled around him and he was outed.

I hope that this guy isn't lying. That the ROTC guys are just bitter or caught up in the rumor mill.

Have your advisor talk to someone high up in ROTC, either to see if they can help obtaining the truth or at least squash the rumor.

You see...i'm trying to be discrete about this so i think demanding his discharge papers may be a little forward and suggestive that i question his service. I'm going to be speaking with the ROTC member tomorrow to check up on things. But i guess what our pledge was doing was taking ROTC to get his BA and then enlisting to go career? i'm not entirely sure.

If you want to be discreet (math is discrete) about this, then why not ask him for discharge papers or any other military-related form and say that you need it for the fraternity's records for any kind of report?

HUH??? You don't "take" ROTC and then become enlisted. First of all, you sign an actual legal commitment paper when you join ROTC (B/C they are paying for your college and you owe time in service after graduation). So, if he graduates thru ROTC he will be commissioned as a 2nd lieutenant, not an enlisted man. I'm still confused, is he currently in the ROTC program at your college?

"Hey, Bob, I need help. I keep hearing rumors that may come back to bite you, about your military service. Will you show me your DD214 so I can absolutely, positively look them in the eye and tell them to leave my brother alone?"

You want to do this for him, right?

If it is just for your own edification, you are right to leave it alone. Then you would be satisfying your own curiosity, not helping a brother.

Oh my god, I don't believe it and I almost hate to admit it, but I absolutely, 100% agree with DGTess. Marker!