8 years? Where are you getting your information? My son is in the Marine Corps and most sign up for a 4 year commitment. Even my son, who is going into intelligence and thus will be getting extra training (he's currently learning Arabic) only had to sign up for an additional year.
Cindie
I'll explain it as best I can. When I joined the Navy in 1976 I signed up for 4 years active duty. I did my time and got out. However I was still an inactive member of the U.S. Naval Reserves for 2 more years which means a 6 year obligation. That was the obligation standard for that time. It was referred to as 3/3 if you did 3 years active and 3 on inactive and making weekend drills + 2 weeks a year. 4 years active relieved you from having to attend reserve weekend drills once a month for the next two years at which time you are actually Discharged.
Todays enlistments as I understand it are 3/5, 4/4, or 5/3 for a total possible 8 year service obligation. To an 18-24 year old first enlistment thats a bit much.
If at the end of the 8 year obligation the ex-service member joins the National Guards however his/her total time in service including inactive reserves determines their pay scale in years in service.
Any parent having a young man or woman considering joining the military read their contract. It's a good place to grow up and to learn but the recruit needs to understand their full time obligation. If you sign up for 4 years do it and come home at year 7 you could be called back in for deployment and your enlistment frozen at that point. I knew some guys who got out of the Army after doing their 4 years only to see Gulf War one soon after.
I may be wrong but I would say your son has a 5/3 service contract.