Anyone who has been in the Army whould have caught the bad uniform mistakes in Dear John. He is a Special Forces Soldier. In the scenes where he is wearing his full dress uniform, he has Infantry Blue Discs under his branch insignia, and the Infantry Blue Cord. Special Forces are not part of the Infantry and therefore do not wear these items. They look good and a SFer is well deserving of wearing them, but they do not. Being a Special Forces Soldier, he would have also got promoted between 2001-2007. he would not have been the same rank.