Would I be a fool to get out of the military?

[dcan]

There is a third option as well: Active Guard and Active Reserve. Those in the Guard and Reserves are part-time but they report through a chain that has to have full-time staff. Basically you would report through the Guard or Reserve chain but be in permanent Active status, possibly assigned on a regular AF base as a liaison of some sort. I've worked with both including at least one who was a programmer who was actively recruited from Active Duty into the ANG to do the same job in the same seat but to answer to them instead of the normal chain -- but that was a very unusual situation.

There are benefits to it, including full-time pay/benefits and I believe more stability and less or even no deployment (depending on your job, don't quote me). There are drawbacks as well, such as positions being cut when times are lean. In the Guard at least (again, to the best of my knowledge) your rank and your job depend on the slot you are in. You are promoted by moving to a different position, so you can go up or down in rank when moving positions, and if the budget is tight in the state they can cut the position and you are effectively returned to non-Active status.

So there are pros and cons, but you should at least know about them and find out more about them. Now that you have an extra year you have enough time to find out everything you need.