ABSTRACT
In discussing soldiers’ careers one should really restrict the field of investigation to Warrant Officers, senior Non-Commissioned Officers, and certain very highly qualified tradesmen, as well as those who are in the lowest ranks only temporarily before moving up the promotion ladder. The muddling factor is that many of these men do in time become career soldiers, because they find a certain attraction in the military life, or discover that they have skills which it requires, and so stay on to become long-service men. The majority of soldiers are short-service men, and this is not only inevitable but desirable as well. Although the basic regular soldier’s engagement is for 22 years, with options to leave, it is rarely that the ordinary recruit thinks about the possibility of serving for such a length of time. The man who began in some form of junior service is more likely to become a long-service man.
