[familyop]

"I suspect the Army operates in a similar fashion."

In the Army, there are "combat" engineer units that do construction. Those units have "sections" instead of platoons and quite a variety of MOSs. In at least some of those units, the commander is referred to as "Bob" or whatever, and every other member by first name or nickname. They most often train with various tools of building trades and other jobs (even machining). They do fire rifles at a range once per year in reserve component units and once in a while, some adventure training for retention purposes.

The other kind of combat engineer unit has combat platoons with every platoon member having the same MOS. Their initial training is all done in one unit, for most, total control. They come to attention with a snap in shiny boots and refer to their commander as "Sir" and to every other member by rank while in garrison. They train most often with their weapons and spend all of the time possible in the field (even weekends).

[familyop]

13 weeks of initial training in one unit for those going to home units with platoons instead of sections, BTW. Only those who haven’t turned 18 and quite finished high school are allowed to leave after 8 weeks and go through a separate AIT.