Pentagon releases report on troops' mental health

Humm NOT AT all Surprised ... but then again I went thru some military training and HUMMMM

and what does mental health have to do with war?
gee everyone keeps falling for this feel good hug each stuff,
nothing but a by product of are country now, where we baby people

Mental health has a lot to do with war. When we were in Beirut, I had a young PFC on my fire team that we called Bugs. Bugs was a good kid, but after about 3 weeks in Beirut, it was pretty obvious that his elevator didn't go all the way to the top anymore. You should try walking patrol in a city where the people that wave and shake your hand when you walk up to them just might shoot you in the back when you walk away, trying to keep tabs on all your men, listen to the radio, watch every window and doorway, every vehicle, AND keep an eye on Bugs, who everyone thinks will go ballistic at any second. Telling the 1st Sgt, the XO, and 2 chaplains got us the response..."he's under a lot of stress"...well, duh!

Bugs kept it together after all, but a couple years later, I got the word that one night, while on duty guarding an ammo dump at Twentynine Palms, little Bugs shot himself. If he'd gotten any kind of help 2 years before, that may not have happened.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/05/05/995/

It is sad but understandable. The troops are kept there, no way out in sight. And it is just about impossible to tell the enemy from the civilians who they are supposed to be assisting. Matter of fact the same person that might say hi to them in the morning might be planting an IED at night.

They are then repeadely sent back and back and back.

What I don't understand is why all those pro war people we have don't ship out to help in this "noble cause" or send their kids over in a hurry. Be heros, give the troops you support so much a nice long break.

"Pro-War" is the same as "Pro-Abortion". It's an emotionally charged term to describe the opposite viewpoint that is misleading and false. No one that I know of is "pro-war".

But to answer your rhetorical question - I'm too old to enlist, and I don't have any kids.

Good grief, I would think being in a War, ANY war would give a person some emotional problems.

My father and mother live with me. My Father was in the Army in Italy durring WWII. He was part of the force that liberated Rome. He started out in North Africa. They traveled almost the length on Italy, fighting and killing Germans the entire way to Rome. The brave soldiers that fought in WWII didn't come home after a year, they fought for YEARS.

I hear my Father in his bedroom almost EVERY night, to this day, yelling, screaming, reliving that War. If I asked him if he wished he wouldn't have gone, I KNOW what he would say.

And, as long as you are asking oregon, my son DID go to Iraq with the 1st Calvary, just so you know.


***Edited to add, I am not debating this war to WWII, just the fact that their are pychological effects from War, any war.

It's true that it's common in any war and should be expected... but that doesn't make it ok.

To me, it's just another argument to say that if a government wants to go to war (any government), it has a VERY heavy burden of proof when it comes to justifying it because the consequences in terms of human life and of quality of life are extremely heavy.

I believe some things are worth fighting for, no matter what the cost.


***Again I am not debating whether this War was one of them. Personally I believe there are many Iraqi's that are grateful to us for ridding them of Sadaam and his murderous, rapist sons. But there are also many that are ungrateful and just want us out so they can now be the murderers and rapists.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/06/wa...hp&oref=slogin

Interesting article on the prolonged effect of the current war.
As for pro-war. Sorry but there are people who are. Like KBR, halliburton and a whole slew of company that are making a mint.

As for too old and no kids. They are taking skinheads, people w/criminal records and even old folks. I am sure they'd give you a crack!

As for the Iraqis. I think at first they were hopeful about a good results. & while I was and am against this war I though that as one of the most powerful nations on hearth we could do deliver.
However right now w/more than half a million of dead iraquis and more death/torture/mutilations daily. W/no power or electricity or jobs in a war that is now in its fourth year.
I am pretty sure they rather see the back of us.

And as for dubya, he also accomplished the very dubious achievement of starting off a new islamic republic with very close, chummy ties w/iran.

" I believe some things are worth fighting for, no matter what the cost."
That is all good and well. But you are not paying the cost. The civilians that are getting pulled over tortured and shot in the head for having the wrong name are. The children w/no meds or pain killers in a bare bone hosptial room are. Our soldiers and families are.

I am paying higher gas prices at the pump. But that is not paying the cost compared to a family whose has had most of its members wiped out. Regardless of flag.

& yes saddam & his creeps were bad. So are the kuwaitis, hamas hezbolla & especially the saudis. 14 of whom were responsible for 9/11/.

The military has age limits. They are not taking "old folks".


Did you even read what ckblv typed in this thread? She said her son went to Iraq. There is a cost involved to parents when their kids ship off to fight in Iraq. It's called worry.

Perhaps, but you are talking with actual PEOPLE here, not corporations.

Do you have any source on that? Because I'm in fairly regular contact with many in the military and involved with the military, and as far as I know the standards haven't changed. There are still age, mental and physical conditions you must meet before being accepted.

We (the US) created this mess over there. We just can't abandon the country and there isn't one person in the world who can convince me that things would actually improve over there if we pulled out entirely. The country is already in a state of civil war. This would escalate ten fold if we were to pull out now. I'm getting off topic though.

Troops experiencing PTSD isn't a new or shocking development. Soldiers during and returning from war have had to deal with the consequences of being a violent environment long after their service has ended. Physical scars can heal but the mental images can last a lifetime and, sadly, some of the returning vets succumb and decide that they can live with it anymore. It's tragic. I can't even begin to imagine what a great many of the WW1 and WW2 vets experienced (for any country) and had to relive over and over in their minds after being on the front for years.

I'm not defending the current administration- Bush is a tool- but I don't think that they or the military even considered that we still be in Iraq or Afghanistan this long. If they did a better job should have been done to provide the returning troops with the medical care and counseling to help them try to cope with what they have experienced.

I'm a vet and I haven't experienced anything near as bad as the constant stress that our troops are under right now, for which I am very fortunate. Desert Storm and a couple of other places weren't as bad as what is going on now. I have a bad dream now and then. I remember hearing the sound of machine guns in my head for three or four days after seeing Saving Private Ryan for the first time. I support the troops no matter where they are sent, even if I don't approve of why they were sent. Supporting the troops is different from being "pro-war" though. My back injury is the only thing that kept me from being able to reenlist after 9/11.

The biggest difference is that after WWI and WWII they were just told to forget it and get back to real life. Shell shock, as they called it then, wasn't something treatable. Since Viet Nam there have been a lot of advances to help them deal with their experiences in war, both in medications and talk therapy. PTSD is real, but it can be worked through. It's no longer the major stigma it was in previous generations, if one wants to get help. That is a major improvement, IMO.

The other side of the coin is that since they know what it is, they can also quantify it more now than ever before. It's kind of like ADD in schools. In the 1950s, there were just class clowns. Now they are diagnosed with ADD and put on Ritalin. Well, now any kid who is having problems in school has ADD - it's an epidemic if you believe all of the diagnoses. I think the same holds true with PTSD. Depending on how they qualify what is or isn't PTSD, almost everyone who has seen action in war has it.

You are taking that worth the price out of context. It goes w/out saying that the loved one of a person in combat worry.

But you said some things are worth the price. Now.
We have been at this "war" for four years. Spent and lost billions of dollars. Lost lives both in our military and civilans. The poor leadership has almost broken a branch of our military.
The supposedly jeffersonian democracy has turned into a civil war where the majority of the people want an islamic republic that is chummy w/iran.
Corportaions are making billions.

Tell me this price that has been paid. What exactly is it getting us?

Also one of my ex co-workers had a son in iraq, and the husband voluteered to go to afghanistan for the money, They felt it was worth the risk for the hazard duty pay. Not for a couse. for the money. He is dead. IED.
Had that man had a job w/a good wage he would not have gone over.

But I really want to know. For all of that what have we the USA, gained? And for the iraqui who bear a dealy death toll. No jobs. A nasty and so far un ending war. What have they gained?

Just curious. Espcially as the mission was "accomplished".
as for the lowering of the us military recruiting standards...here you go.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washing...cruiting_x.htm

http://www.slate.com/id/2133908/

you can also just google...

military recruiting + lower standards

Wow, talk about taking it totally out of context. So they are accepting people with lower aptitude tests - a whole 4% up from 2%. Wow. Oh, and they are letting those "criminals" as you call it - misdemeanor convictions. You'd have us believe that they are recruiting gang bangers and rapists. But I suppose instituting a draft would be better than accepting these people who volunteered?

And gee, NO WHERE in those two articles is there anything talking about skinheads or "old folks". Is that from some anti-military propaganda? Because it seems to me that there is a decided anti-military bias, as well as anti-Bush and anti-Iraq bias, in your posts. And you're changing the tactics of your arguments as soon as someone else brings up a valid counter argument.

I am not going to do the research for you.
It has been reported on NPR, news, newspapes that lot of people getting in the military now have way, way more than a misdemeanor. Becouse quite simply nobody really wants to enlist to go to iraq.
I myself remember seeing on the news about a 68 years old doctor returning to serve in iraq. He was a psychiatrist.
Here in Oregon an autistic kid was enrolled. Until the parent went to the governor, (i think) to get him out.

As for the change in context. I see you nobody answered my question.
For what everybody has paid so far. What have we gained?

We got rid of Sadaam, a tyrant that had hundred of thousands murdered.
We got rid of his 2 sons and we got rid of the rape rooms.
We got rid of Sadaam and his paying off suicide bombers families.
We got rid of a man who tried to have an ex-President of the United States of America assinated.
We went in and enforced the failed 17 UN resolutions because the UN sure wasn't going to do it. And we know how WELL the "Oil for Food" program was working.

He was a nasty awful little tyrant. & so were his son. They were also no threat to us, and worse. Thanks to the war now some iraquis that were happy to see us now miss the creep.

They saudi also are quite vicious when it comes to rape, especially the workers that they import from outside countries for maids, like the phillipinos. I think it is in Uzbekistan, One of our ex-allies (they kicked us out) they actually boiled people alive. We looked the other way.
In pakistan (yey! another ally) the treatment of women is somewhere below that of animals, not uncommon in muslim country. And they are the people we have to thank for sharing the nuclear know how w/korea and iran.

And now in place of saddam we have multiple power hungry religious fanatics tyrants. The Majority of which allies itself w/iran.

The minority the sunny, w/the saudi. Who use us as their enchmens.

As for us...we now torture people, spy on americans, put them on secret lists. And rather than think about health care or education for our citizen. We blow our money up w/ordinance instead.