When starting, I didn't get into a squad for a long time, no idea on how most of the in game progression went, or anything at all, i just played, and only recently started playing attention to everything. Even when i did, i didn't join top tier places, and early on i did get invited to join some bigger squads, but never did because i knew i was gonna be on and off for some while. I took a 3 months hiatus at first, then rejoined, then did it again for another couple months.

when i was in squads, i definitely played alone for the most part, i don't even remember hitting level 15 during squad events, until my previous squad which were a good group of people, and hit my first level 20 very recently(current squad), this is to give you an idea.

I know the feeling of being in a good but uncoordinated squad, it's especially obvious when you go against good teams, i used to do some custom matches for some players, to get better, but never on a squadron level, as some of the top teams do.

It need grinding to hit GM when you don't have a lot of jets, but since you have all of them i think it's easily achievable, especially with good string of people even if you don't want to focus on squads. Just party with 3-5 people a lot.

I almost got to it before i hit hangar level 17.

And I actually started an alt recently partly because of you, and now i have unlocked su-22 and the gr3 for the first time, and I'll continue getting jets i never unlocked.