Military & Gambling

When I was on active duty, the EM, NCO and Officers Clubs all had slot machines and poker tables in places it wasn't against civil law. We also had poker games running 24 hours a day in the missile site day rooms. All bets were made with "chits", and no money was on the table.

Pool tables were also active betting games.

Bases in states with gambling laws did not officially condone gambling, but poker games went on in the barracks, as long as they were friendly. If a card shark was running a game, the First Sergeant would put an end to it as soon as he found out.

Officers did not gamble with enlisted men...at least I was unaware of it happening.

I'm sure things are much different now.

It can be a violation of the UCMJ.

http://usmilitary.about.com/library/milinfo/mcm/bl134-24.htm

wordmonkey said:

So the Officer/Enlisted mixing is frowned upon?

To what degree? I mean I understand why, you don't want an Officer with something held over him by an enlisted soldier, but how serious is that? Career-busting?

Click to expand...

Keep in mind that in some units it's not as frowned upon as others. In the case of special operations, there is fraternization. It's a different world there. Some infantry units are a bit less tight as well. Usually the longer the troops and the officers have been together, the more "familiar" with each other they'll be. Specially if they've seen the elephant together.

On the whole......officers are blue bloods, e-troops are commoners....they don't usually mix well.

As for your original thread.........gambling is overlooked as long as it stays friendly as Gary alluded to. I've never seen any high stakes games going on at a base. It's average fun........poker games being the rule.

D&D........Top used to come down on Sat and Sun mornings and hawl all us out of the hoosegow after we'd been detained for D&D. The cops gave us slack, and we weren't usually mean drunks. Just stupid.

As for hookers. Off limit locations are posted on company bulletin boards in some units.........and that gave us the location of the places to go for fun. Bars, brothels, and hedonistic things.........nothing like a guidebook on the board.

Known criminals? Well, anyone who knows a lawyer or media correspondant knows a criminal. IMO. Depends on whether that person is active and under oberservation. We will be chastised and disciplined for conduct un-becoming a servicemember.......officer or not.