Actually, the current use of the "S" identifier for support personnel is very useful. It allows the assignments personnel to keep track of the "well liked" guys and ensure that we (the Regiment) can continue to use and abuse them. In theory, the ones who aren't well liked (didn't do a good job, got in trouble, couldn't play well with others) don't get the "S", go away, and never come back. It's not a guarantee, it's an award and requires three years of "exemplary service to the Regiment". (No - the AR doesn't really say that!  )
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A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.
~ Marcus Tullius Cicero (42B.C)
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