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Ex Military Opted Out
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As far as I understand it, your military pension was non contributory - ie, you yourself did not have to make any contribution to it from your salary.
However, like everybody else who was employed and earning the relevant amount, you did have to pay National Insurance Contributions which built entitlement to the Basic State Pension (as well as other benefits)
You may well have built up some Graduated Pension (an early and not generous form of state additional pension) through pre 1975 NI contributions.
!978 saw the introduction of the State Earnings Related Pension Scheme - workers (and employers) would pay higher NI contributions in order to accrue state pension over and above the Basic State Pension.
Occupational Schemes like the AFPS could choose to "contract out" their members (and thus pay lower rate of NI) provided that they guaranteed to pay those members a pension that was at least equivalent to what they would have received had they been "contracted in" to SERPS.
In fact such members would usually receive a pension that was rather higher than the GMP.
This equivalent pension was the Guaranteed Minimum Pension, replaced in 1997 by Section 9 (2B) rights.
You mention that you left the military in 1995 (with either immediate or deferred pension presumably) and took up employment with an engineering firm.
You appear to be saying that this firm was "contracted in" to SERPS (up to 2002), S2P up to 2016, so that you were paying higher rate NI contributions.
At the inception of NSP (6/4/2016), your "starting amount" for NSP was calculated.
See
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/80110845/#Comment_80110845
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