I am a high school senior. Next year, I will be attending a Military Junior College (most likely the New Mexico Military Institute as part of their Academy Prep program). Hopefully, I will be attending the United States Naval Academy after that. Many people are surprised by that fact, as I am strongly anti-authoritarian. However, I have an extensive list of reasons why I want to be an officer in the United States Navy.

I will list a few of these reasons right now.

1. I am considering running for federal office at some point in my life, as our current three branches are almost entirely void of reason. I believe that the only people who can make informed decisions on military matters are veterans and current servicemembers. We need the people in charge to make informed decisions. One example of this would be comparing the Kennedy approach to the Vietnam War to the Johnson approach. Kennedy's approach emphasized covert and clandestine operations (16,000 servicemembers in Vietnam, primarily advisers and special operations), while Johnson's approach was far from subtle (550,000 servicemembers in Vietnam). Had Kennedy not been assassinated, it is very possible that the Republic of Vietnam would still be in power. During WWII, Kennedy was in the Navy, while Johnson was in Congress.

2. There are evil people in the world. I read a book this July, The Heart and the Fist, a memoir by Eric Greitens. He is a SEAL officer (Iraq and Afghanistan) who, before becoming a SEAL, was a Rhodes Scholar, earning a Ph.D. in humanitarian studies. His reason for becoming a SEAL was that he believed that it was the most effective way that he could benefit the world. Although I do not intend on becoming a SEAL, I find myself agreeing. In fact, one of the initial reasons why I started considering military service was because I was so horrified by something that I read in the news: several children (roughly ten years old) were executed by the Taliban for being suspected informers. Although I believe that the Iraq war was a bad idea and is the primary reason why we're still in Afghanistan and Osama bin Laden survived until 2011, I do think that the Iraqi people are better off without a brutal, genocidal dictator.

3. The healthcare and things received by active-duty military, and to a lesser extent, other reserve, retired, and veteran military, are evidence of the benefits of a mixed socialist/capitalist system. As an example, a Second Lieutenant or Ensign would receive an above-average salary for somebody who had just graduated from a university and he/she wouldn't need to worry about paying student loans, mortgage, or healthcare.

Those are not the only reasons, but those are certainly reasons.

Why I picked the Navy instead of one of the other services is that the Navy is most suited to my abilities. While I can definitely shoot accurately, my most useful talents are my prowess in things relating to mathematics or science. The Army and the Marine Corps do not have very many technical jobs and I don't want to commission into the Air Force because I don't want to be a pilot and non-aviators have limited chances for advancement beyond a certain point. That limits it to the Navy and the Coast Guard. My personality does not make me very suitable for law enforcement, which is a major responsibility of the Coast Guard.