Thread: Joining the USMC as a foreigner...

Originally Posted by chIEr

why not join the french foreign legion???? they will accept you without question trust me....

Umm, I think you do have to be really, really fit to get into the LE, other than that, I don't know that they take EVERYONE who applies, since they only have so many places in the Legion. You'd also have to learn French, although being from the UK our man may have some experience with the language, and its not THAT hard to learn once you get your head around some of the big differences with English. They will also teach you I might add, I think most of their recruits don't speak it when they enlist so it shouldn't be a problem. If you're not into the idea of Combat Maneuver service then you'd have a problem, the LE is all combat arms, which is why they don't accept females right now.
Prior Military experience is always a winner, maybe you should just do some time in the Bundeswher and I think you'll find your application to join a friendly Army as a resident would be more likely to be accepted. More to the point, what the hell is wrong with the Bundeswerh?

Once you have the residence issues solved and do enlist into the USMC or another branch, service members deployed into a combat / imminent danger zone can have their naturalization processed accelerated. While deployed to Africa, 19 of the Marines in my Company and one Army soldier from another unit were naturalized. The Marines all started from scratch on the process and all took the oath of citizenship in the last week of our 6 month tour. It was a pretty awesome ceremony.

It took a LOT of effort to get to that point, but the Marines were motivated and they plowed through all the obstacles.

Originally Posted by -{SpoonmaN}-

Umm, I think you do have to be really, really fit to get into the LE, other than that, I don't know that they take EVERYONE who applies, since they only have so many places in the Legion. You'd also have to learn French, although being from the UK our man may have some experience with the language, and its not THAT hard to learn once you get your head around some of the big differences with English. They will also teach you I might add, I think most of their recruits don't speak it when they enlist so it shouldn't be a problem. If you're not into the idea of Combat Maneuver service then you'd have a problem, the LE is all combat arms, which is why they don't accept females right now.
Prior Military experience is always a winner, maybe you should just do some time in the Bundeswher and I think you'll find your application to join a friendly Army as a resident would be more likely to be accepted. More to the point, what the hell is wrong with the Bundeswerh?

The LE will get you into shape and teach you to speak French. They ARE interested in your criminal record. They don't like drug dealers. They will investigate you. Yes prior military experence is a BIG plus.

A former Sergeant I know personally had a mid life crisis and enlisted. Everything was going well, they promised a promotion to Corporal upon completion of basic training, which wasn't that hard. Then he was called in from training to be questioned by the Surete.

Question is an euphemism for having the crap beat out of you while in handcuffs. It seems while working as a bodyguard the soon to be Corporal had shot three Colombian hit men with ties to a drug cartel. Claiming self defense of the third party he was not charged by the US authorities. Despite his innocence the French were sure that made him a drug dealer and a mafia hit man. When the two Surete agents were done questioning him one left while the other unlocked the handcuffs and proceeded to finish his tea.

It was at this point the soon to be Corporal started a discussion with the agent about excessive use of force while questioning a helpless subject. This discussion resulted in the unconscious agent leaving in an ambulance and the almost a Corporal asking for and receiving a discharge.

Walking back from retrieving his passport from the consulate he was set upon by two men in civilian clothes who tried to force him into an unmarked car. Being about 75 meters from the main gate he yelled "HELP, LEGIONAIRE!", and was quickly assisted by five Legionaires who stomped the living crap out of his assailants who's IDs later (they were unconscious) showed they were Surete agents.

The could've been a Corporal left the country after booking a flight from Orly as a subterfuge and being driven to the Swiss border in a borrowed Corporals uniform and Kepi. He paid the driver for the Kepi and uniform blouse which he kept as a reminder to not go back to France on holiday.

A good story, well told, my friend. The few Brits I have personally known who served in the LE seem to have a certain something about them, poise or confidence, they have it in spades! Like many long-established outfits, they joined as immature boys, and left as real men.

I have considered the LE after I've done however long it is I'm going to do in the ADF (probably 4 Reserve, most of it training, probably the same on Acrive duty), say if I get bored of law enforcement, which is my likely career path. I guess it would suck to go from an officer position (my most likely path in the ADF since my application has been going so well) down to private, but hey, it'd be something different.

Originally Posted by -{SpoonmaN}-

I have considered the LE after I've done however long it is I'm going to do in the ADF (probably 4 Reserve, most of it training, probably the same on Acrive duty), say if I get bored of law enforcement, which is my likely career path. I guess it would suck to go from an officer position (my most likely path in the ADF since my application has been going so well) down to private, but hey, it'd be something different.

You wouldn't start at the bottom. They'd probably make you a Corporal initially and then promote you to Sergeant as long as you didn't mess up really bad. You'd really have to like the military to sign for six years after four.

The Spanish Foreign Legion is only three years. I've heard the abysmally low pay has been corrected. Don't expect conditions to be good and the training is really tough. Prior military experience is common. I know of one company that was commanded by an American Sgt-Major, the XO was English and had been to Sandhurst and the platoon commanders were former British and South African NCOs.

Originally Posted by joey

lol this is weird so many guys posting here with "post 1".

They are probably typing in a search term on Google and this thread comes up:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...=Google+Search

Originally Posted by Ironduke

They are probably typing in a search term on Google and this thread comes up:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...=Google+Search

Thats how I wound up here, I think I was searching for the relative costs of MBTs or something like that, and I got the never-ending "which is the best tank" poll and liked what I saw. Been at this for a fair while now.

He he fancy that a german jarhead nah seriously a guy that i knew said the marines only see one colour and thats green so if you can become a citizen then go for it,brainwave check the internet maybe u can get a male order bride