To the best of my knowledge, at no time since the Civil War have troops faced the situations that current troops are facing - repeated deployments, endless "stop loss" periods, deployments when judged by the military as unfit to deploy, and the deployment of both parents at the same time. Then, to magnify the damage of these policies, there is lack of services for, and deliberate obscuring of, the injuries and traumas received. One of the major consequences of this situation is a continued increase the suicide rate of serving and released troops.

Thanks to the obfuscation and outright lying of the Department of Defense (and the VA), it is difficult to get an exact grasp of the number of troops dying by their own hands. The stigma within the military of reporting and seeking treatment for emotional and psychological issues certainly complicates the problem. The numbers of those struggling is staggering.

According to a just-released Rand Corp. study, 320,000 troops who served in Iraq and Afghanistan suffer traumatic brain injury and 300,000 troops suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder or major depression. The PTSD numbers are probably artificially low, as the stigma surrounding mental health diagnoses is strong in our culture. There is also a disincentive within the military toward seeking help, as those who do are often cited for "patterns of misconduct" and then discharged, which further stigmatizes them and can have a lasting impact on them in civilian life. (Invest in veterans, not war)

However, traumatic brain injury, PTSD, depression (or some other injuries) does not mean that those troops will be relieved of deployment - or receive necessary treatment and support. In fact, they may actually get redeployed. According to a May 7, 2008 report by USA Today, more than 43,000 troops determined to be medically unfit for combat have been deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq since 2003. This was the situation for Sgt. Chad Barrett who died by his own hand on February 2, 2008 while hospitalized in Mosul. Sgt. Barrett had suffered traumatic brain injuries in 2003 and 2005, but continued to be redeployed. Those injuries damage the portions of his brain that controlled anger and anxiety - as documented by VA doctors - had been "permanently damaged."

Barrett has a copy of a letter from her husband's commander, Capt. Karen Baker, urging the Army to medically discharge Barrett because his mental illness - he attempted suicide in June - left him unfit for duty.

The Army, though, says Barrett was given the go ahead for war duty.

"Chad Barrett was cleared by SRP to deploy prior to his deployment, that is about as much as we can tell you," brigade spokesman Maj. Mike Humphreys wrote in an e-mail from Iraq. SRP refers to the soldier readiness processing system at Fort Carson that determines whether troops are ready for war. (Casualty of a hidden war)

Thanks to discovery in the class action lawsuit by Veterans for Common Sense, we now know that there are 1,000 suicide attempts among troops per month. According to an investigation by CBS News, "more than 6,250 American veterans took their own lives in 2005 alone. That comes to slightly more than 17 suicides every day" (Hushing Up Crisis Of Suicide, Mental Scars). Current conflict veterans are from two to four times more likely to commit suicide than those within the same age groups in the civilian population (TimesOnline, 11/15/07).

While the Pentagon refuses to admit it, it is clear that repeated deployments (and the consequences thereof such as relationship difficulties and loss of employment) as well as PTSD and other emotional issues underlie the surge in suicides and suicide attempts.

Senator Jim Webb (D-Virginia) wrote:

"Our troops and their families are under unprecedented levels of stress due to the pace and frequency of more than five years of deployments,"

From the floor of the House, Senator Patty Murray (D- Washington) stated:

"Our brave service members who face deployment after deployment without the rest, recovery and treatment they need are at the breaking point." (Concern mounts over rising troop suicides)

Not unexpectedly, the number of suicides is higher for those from the Guard and Reserve:

A Department of Veterans Affairs analysis of ongoing research of deaths among veterans of both wars -- obtained by The Associated Press -- found that Guard or Reserve members accounted for 53 percent of the veteran suicides from 2001, when the war in Afghanistan began, through the end of 2005. (AP, 2/12/08)

America suffers an epidemic of suicides among traumatised army veterans

At least 6,256 US veterans took their lives in 2005, at an average of 17 a day, according to figures broadcast last night. Former servicemen are more than twice as likely than the rest of the population to commit suicide.

Such statistics compare to the total of 3,863 American military deaths in Iraq since the invasion in 2003 - an average of 2.4 a day, according to the website ICasualties.org.

The suicide rate among Americans as a whole was 8.9 per 100,000, but the level among veterans was at least 18.7. That figure rose to a minimum of 22.9 among veterans aged 20 to 24 - almost four times the non-veteran average for people of the same age.

The National Alliance to End Homelessness, based the findings of its report on numbers from Veterans Affairs and the Census Bureau. Data from 2005 estimated that 194,254 homeless people on any given night were veterans. (All veterans - not just from the current occupations)

Yet the Department of Defense and the VA continue to lie, hide, and refuse to treat the troops. A press release in August 2007 denied there was any problem:

"We have not yet seen an increase in suicides in multiple deployers or those who have been there longer; we may over time," Ritchie said. "We're certainly looking for that and certainly wanting to do everything we can if we do see that as an issue to mitigate any of those factors there. The senior Army leadership is paying very, very close attention to these issues."

Then we have Dr. Ira Katz (chief of medicine for the VA) sending out an email that stated:

"Shh!" begins one e-mail from Dr. Ira Katz, the head of the VA's Mental Health Division, advising a media spokesperson not to tell CBS News that 1,000 veterans receiving care at the VA try to kill themselves every month.

"Our suicide prevention coordinators are identifying about 1,000 suicide attempts per month among the veterans we see in our medical facilities. Is this something we should (carefully) address ourselves in some sort of release before someone stumbles on it?" the e-mail concludes. Glantz, FPIF, 5/09/08

Glantz also reports the following damning information:

The high number of veteran suicides weren't the only government statistics the Bush Administration was forced to reveal because of the class action lawsuit.

Another set of documents presented in court showed that in the six months leading up to March 31, a total of 1,467 veterans died waiting to learn if their disability claim would be approved by the government. A third set of documents showed that veterans who appeal a VA decision to deny their disability claim have to wait an average of 1,608 days, or nearly four and a half years, for their answer.

Other casualty statistics are not directly concealed, but are also not revealed on a regular basis. For example, the Pentagon regularly reports on the numbers of American troops "wounded" in Iraq (currently at 31,948) but neglects to mention that it has two other categories "injured" (10,180) and "ill" (28,451). All three of these categories represent soldiers who are so damaged physically they have to be medically evacuated to Germany for treatment, but by splitting the numbers up the sense of casualties down the public consciousness.

Here's another number that we don't often hear discussed in the media: 287,790. That's the number of returning Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans who had filed a disability claim with the Veterans Administration as of March 25th. That figure was not announced to the public at a news conference, but obtained by Veterans for Common Sense using the Freedom of Information Act.

Despite denials, it seems clear that the VA does not want to acknowledge the problems, and doesn't want to provide the necessary services. A psychologist at a PTSD military medical facility in Texas told staff to diagnose "adjustment disorder" rather than PTSD:

"Given that we are having more and more compensation seeking veterans, I'd like to suggest that you refrain from giving a diagnosis of PTSD straight out," Norma Perez wrote in a March 20 e-mail to mental-health specialists and social workers at the Department of Veterans Affairs' Olin E. Teague Veterans' Center in Temple, Tex. Instead, she recommended that they "consider a diagnosis of Adjustment Disorder."

VA staff members "really don't . . . have time to do the extensive testing that should be done to determine PTSD." (Lee, Wa. Post, 5/16/08}

Time is not the only "issue." Disability payments for "Adjustment Disorder" are far less (compensation for less than six months usually and without compensation) than for a diagnosis of PTSD (which may make them eligible for over $2,500 a month in compensation (Lee).

So we have a situation where more troops have died by their own hand (by several magnitudes) than have been killed in combat (or combat related activities). I am shamed by the Bush administration's ongoing lying and lack of support for the veterans. I urge people to contact your representatives to investigate and support legislation to provide much needed services and treatment. I also encourage you to contact Senators Jim Webb and Patty Murray to thank them for their efforts on behalf of the troops. Further, help support veterans organizations such as Veterans for Common Sense and Operation Dignity who are fighting the good fight.

Lastly, I would also encourage you to read an excellent editorial by Joseph Galloway in the Salt Lake Tribune - Here's how we can really honor veterans on Memorial Day. Below is a teaser for the article.

The Pentagon and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, a former university president, oppose better educational benefits for veterans, for fear that offering them might entice more young troops to leave the service for the campus. This is odd, coming as it does from a president who talks a lot about supporting our troops, from a senator who draws a 100 percent military disability pension and from a former college president who surely knows the value of higher education. Others among us wage endless battles and rage against the very agency charged with providing medical care, disability pensions, mental health care and counseling and, yes, the parsimonious educational benefits for all who've served and sacrificed for our country - the Veterans Administration. In recent months, VA officials have been caught providing false statistics that far understate the true number of veterans, old and young, who commit suicide. They've ordered doctors to diagnose fewer cases of post-traumatic stress disorder and to substitute a diagnosis of a lesser, temporary stress disorder. The young people marching home from war and trying to rejoin civilian society, get a job and start a life aren't having much luck, either. The government's own statistics show that fully a quarter of returning veterans are employed in jobs that pay wages that put them below the poverty line, or less than $21,000 a year if they're single.