Not surprisingly, the problems flow downward from the very top (emphasis mine):

There are two or three things you mentioned I will comment on.  The total number of troops that have served over here is a shaky figure.  I am currently serving in OIF IV.  That is the fourth full rotation of troops that have cycled into and out of the theater of operations.  The actual physical numbers have varied from time to time, but for the most part have held static around 138,000 troops.  The high has been around 161,000 and the low is supposed to be the current force target of around 131,000.  All those numbers are arbitrary.  They can be manipulated, by delaying, or expediting a unit's deployment, or re-deployment window.  

If you take a median number of oh say 135,000 and multiply that times 4 I think it is safe to say that somewhere over half a million troops have served over here.  That doesn't factor in a lot of things.  A lot of the people I know have caught two and three deployments to Iraq.  I can expect to soon see people that will be over here for their fourth tour.  So without a doubt those figures of half a million are just that figures.  

For people who want a home life, that makes life extremely difficult.  Right now the Army is pretty much on a year on year off schedule in the active duty forces.  They are trying to stagger that a bit by supplementing with the Guard and Reserve.  What those figures don't take into account is the number of Private Contractors that are over here.  The post I am stationed at has 34 different companies doing business over here alone.  Not all of these contractors are american companies.  Egyptian, Filipino, turks, pakistans, and indians are all employed by the Army over here doing different jobs from cooking, to driving a truck.  Hungarians have a sub contract from KBR to clean our port a john's.  I have no idea what the precise figure is, but I would estimate it pretty close to the same number of military in terms of the number of civilians over here.  War is big business.  This is not Vietnam.  

The corporate face of Rumsfeld's army is changing.  The Army used to be built around a self-sustained concept.  The idea was to keep civilians off the battlefield.  Most of the jobs KBR does for Army used to be done by Army support personnel.  Our cooks in the Dining Facilities over here count the number of people that come in the door.  KBR and its "sub-contracted" personnel do most if not all of the cooking.  This is the very notion of the Rumsfeldian Army.  Any job a soldier does that is not combat in nature we are going to hire a civilian to do and pay that civilian more.  This is what you can expect to see in Iraq for 2006.  An increase in the number of contracts for unit work activities.  Civilians will take over a lot of these jobs, and the military will either be sent home, or tasked out on physical security missions.  So those numbers I mentioned at the top will appear to decline, but the level of activity over here will pretty much stay the same.  Expect to see that kind of manipulation the closer we get to election day.

-On PTSD I can say that it doesn't necessarily take a traumatic event to cause someone to have a crisis.  One of the people in my unit suffered an immense change in attitude just by merely crossing the border.  A peculiar thing indeed to get the deer in the headlight look or "thousand yard stare" just by breathing the air up here, but it does happen.  (The air is probably polluted at that.)

-On General Eric Shinseki I have to say was one of the Army's Gemstones.  He was a very down to earth guy who told it as it was.  He was an officer who was a strong soldier's advocate.  He used to scope things out for himself and often did them unannounced.  General's have a habit of letting people know before hand that they are going to be "in the area" and they need to clean their act up before hand.  This is usually followed with a buzz of activity like picking up cigarette butts and other things that generals should never see.  

When Shinseki was 1CD commander he used to drive around to his motor pools quite unannounced and see what the soldiers would be doing.  This is quite different from the usual dog and pony shows that soldiers are quite accustomed to with dignitaries.  So what kind of leadership will it take to end this War?  The boots on the ground kind that sees what the real problems are?  Or the kind that flies in for a turkey snack at six in the morning and then leaves?  If Bush was smart he would fire Rumsfeld and hire Shinseki to be the Sec. of Defense.  I understand that this is not a job that Shinseki necessarily wants, but in reality I don't think he has a choice.  His country needs him.

Thank you...

On PTSD Combat | Email list | Book
by ilona on Sun Feb 12, 2006 at 12:02:48 PM EST

This incredible articel?

Relevant on many levels.

Well done, ePM.

by NYBri on Sun Feb 12, 2006 at 01:31:41 PM EST

I want to commend all the hard work and concentration on this issue.  This is precisely the kind of issue that people who are of the same generation as the soldiers can most effectively address.  Please keep at it.

I know some people who work with the GI Rights Hotline, and they deal with these issues all the time.  They too can be your allies.  

by Captain Future on Sun Feb 12, 2006 at 11:46:51 PM EST

WE HAVE B.G. BURKETT'S "STOLEN VALOR" TO THANK!

Not having the balls to blatantly stab Veterans in the back here in the United States, B.G. Burkett and his right-wing Tugboat crew of Veterans for Bush have taken their "Stolen Valor" views to turn back the clock on research and treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) across the border to Canada for discussion.

In doing follow up research on the roll of toilet paper "Stolen Valor," I ran across this association to B.G. Burkett.

A 2005 Guest Editorial in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry called "Troubles in Traumatology" in which Burkett is thanked for his contributions and comments, although B.G. Burkett is neither a Psychiatrist nor has a PhD in Psychology. What is wrong with this picture?

I give proper LINK to the article and paraphrase extracts from those parts that are of interest to Veterans and Military Families only. I had to rewrite it to translate the medical jargon.

What I wish to highlight is the fact that the same arguments and attacks made here are the same excuse made by Neo-Cons in the Congress, Bush appointees within the VA itself, plus anyone else who supports yet another look at (study of)PTSD. Folks it is all just more right-wing NEO-CON smoke and mirrors to DIVERT more money from the VA to pay for the War in Iraq without having to Repeal Tax Cuts for those not sacrificing anything for the War Effort.

The smoking gun: Check out who paid for this Guest Editorial to appear in a Foreign Journal? A grant from the National Institute of Mental Health (Grant Number  MH 61268 to be exact) That is right U.S. taxpayer money is being used against America's Veterans. If that is not grounds enough for Veterans to raise Holy Hell, I don't know what else will get you off your feet to protect yourselves. If the right-wingers will go after PTSD using taxpayer money, what will be next Agent Orange?

Note also that the Department of Veterans Affairs has contracted with (you got it) the National Institute of Mental Health, Bethesda, MD to do yet another study on PTSD. How fair would any study be? Read on to find out.
Bobby "Indy Thinker" Hanafin

Extracts from the article, "Troubles in Traumatology," By Richard J. McNally, PhD.1

Read Bobby's Post...
But I'll leave you with a thought:

A recent Incident just may have the Detrimental Effects on a certain person to bring on a case of his own PTSD.

And that Certain Person is none other than big brave pRes. dick cheney, wonder if he's still sleeping soundly, this time he was Witness to what happens!!

Than again!!


by jimstaro on Tue Feb 14, 2006 at 02:43:08 PM EST

I had sent the 3 part series to Jay at Coalition for Free Thought in Media, his once Yahoo Group untill Shutdown by Trolls now over at Google Groups, along with some other boards and individuals.

Jay in turn sent it over to Bobby and he posted the links and his comments in an Entry over at Veterans For Common Sense as Subject:

Three Part Series: Blaming the Veteran for PTSD                                               Hippocritic Oath vs. Hypocritic Oath

Posted By Bobby Hanafin at 8:11 AM

This is what he has to say at the bottom of his post:

It is a three part series called, "Blaming the Veteran: The Politics of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder"
Commander Jeff Humber, USN-Retired, D.E. Ford, M.S.W, and I.L. Meager have done and OUTSTANDING job in showing how PTSD became part of the American vocabulary after the Vietnam War as its affects on veterans became widely publicized.

They note now, a new generation of American veterans are again victims of PTSD. This series explores the impact of politics on the funding, diagnosis and treatment of veterans suffering from PTSD. It examines the propaganda used to justify a reduction in benefits to veterans with PTSD and the effort to redirect blame for the ravages of war to the soldiers themselves.
Part I: Stacking the Deck - With trillion dollar estimates for the Iraq war, the Bush Administration looks to cut costs, eyeing treatment for the returning PTSD wounded veterans.
Part II: Ration & Redefine - Redefining PTSD and substance abuse as moral/spiritual failings opens the door to cheaper unregulated, unlicensed faith-based "treatments".

Part III: Malign & Slime - Use of Propaganda to stigmatize veterans seeking help, reduce benefits to veterans with PTSD and blame the soldiers for their own illness.

ePluribusMedia

(BOTH PART II AND III THOUGH NOT MENTIONED BY THE AUTHORS HAVE ROOTS IN B.G. BURKETT'S "STOLEN VALOR" ATTACKS ON PTSD AND GAVE THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION THE FORUMLA REQUIRED TO DISMANTLE NEAR 30 YEARS OF RESEARCH INTO THE TREATMENT OF PTSD - INDY THINKER).

The LINKS above cover the OUTSTANDING series which is long but well worth the read.

Until next time when hope I simmer down,
Bobby "Indy Thinker" Hanafin
===
[You'll have to read the beginning of the posting to get the 'Simmer Down' statement in the signoff]

by jimstaro on Wed Feb 15, 2006 at 10:59:40 AM EST