I've flown with loads of ex-mil guys who are skippers on Big Airlines 744's, they're just not senior skippers. One could equally say that the non-mil guys are disadvantaged. While Sqn Ldr Smythes was doing 200 hrs a year, living in the mess and having jolly good times flying fast jets around at low level everybody else was slogging their guts out doing 800 hrs per year on the 5 am Paris in the snow. Also why does 20 years in the mil trump the experiece of someone ten years their junior who's been doing real airline flying?
Just an alternative view.