At the very least, I can see some potential flaws in methodology. Veterans are overwhelmingly likelier to be male, and suicide rates differ greatly between men and women, with women making more attempts but men being more likely to succeed. Comparing veterans to the general population is problematic. Heck, when Cecil addressed a similar problem a while back (did more WW2 soldiers die of lung cancer, presumably linked to freely-issued cigarettes, than in combat?) he also had to take gender into account.
Possibly she made other statements as well. In the one I heard (on the Senate floor) she was making a comparasion between Iraq and Viet Nam. She said we will be paying for Iraq for decades. She said we are still paying for Viet Nam since half of the homeless are Viet Nam vets. Complete bullshit. Even if you throw in all the other vets it would be bullshit.
Each year, 2.3 million to 3.5 million people experience homelessness in America. By taking 23% of that range for veterans, that would indicate there are between 529,000 and 840,000 veterans who are homeless at some time during the year.
In 1998, an estimated 56,500 Vietnam War-era veterans and 18,500 Persian Gulf War veterans were held in State and Federal prisons.
From here: http://www.nchv.org/background.cfm
Maybe not half, but a significant percentage. Is this what todays vets have to look forward to?
Estimated. Read the book Stolen Valor. Do you know how they usually come up with those estimates? They ask the inmates. Asking people who are by definition dishonest to be honest about their background doesn’t result in good data. When people have done actual work through the FOIA they find that the veteran population in prisons and on the street are no greater than to be expected from any other large group of people. The author of that book found out through extensive research that the percentage of vietnam vet inmates was no different than that of WWII or Korean War vets.
And it’s good that you said Vietnam era veterans. In the statement I mentioned from Sen Boxer she was saying that half the homeless population was there because of their experiences in Vietnam not just that they happened to have worn the uniform at one time. I was on active duty during Desert Storm. I was in Germany the whole time. Most people who served during Vietnam did not get shot at. Many never stepped foot in SW Asia. To say that half the homeless population is made up of Vietnam vets who are suffering from PTSD is an absurd myth. She used it as an example of the what the future cost of the Iraq war will be. There is enough other things to mention without bringing up false data.
Of course, I’d be willing to believe that half of all homeless people are willing to stand on a street corner and hold up a cardboard sign with VET written on it.
From Tom’s cite “deaths from suicide were 1.7 times more likely among Vietnam veterans than non-Vietnam veterans”. I’m not sure, but I would interpret that as meaning <Vietnam veterans> versus non-<Vietnam veterans> (civilians), not <Vietman veterans> versus <veterans who served in places other than Vietnam>.
I haven’t read the book you allude to, I rely on my own experiences after serving three tours in VN (in country, not just offshore, or an “Era” vet). I believe VN vets had a rougher time of it for a number of reasons, for one the 60’s was the beginning of the drug culture and VN was considered, by many, to be an unjustified and even “lost” war. There was a stygma attached to being a VN vet that didn’t apply to WWII, or even Korean war, vets. Add to that the lack of understanding about PTSD, which all war vets experience, but is just recently becoming understood, and you have a very unique experience with VN vets.
According to this researcher, over 2.5 million Americans served in Vietnam from 1964 to 1975. If 58,000 of those who returned home killed themselves, that would be a suicide rate of only about 2.3%, or about 1 out of 44.
[hijack]No, not all war vets experience PTSD. PTSD is by definition a pathological reaction to trauma. All war vets may experience trauma, but not all vets meet the criteria for PTSD. [/hijack]
Fear Itself writes:
> According to this researcher, over 2.5 million Americans served in Vietnam from
> 1964 to 1975. If 58,000 of those who returned home killed themselves, that
> would be a suicide rate of only about 2.3%, or about 1 out of 44.
1.2% of all Americans die by suicide. It’s considerably more common among men than women. I can’t find the exact figures, but it may be that about 2% of all American men die by suicide. It appears from this statement:
> The CDC Vietnam Experience Study Mortality Assessment showed that during
> the first 5 years after discharge, deaths from suicide were 1.7 times more likely
> among Vietnam veterans than non-Vietnam veterans. After that initial post-
> service period, Vietnam veterans were no more likely to die from suicide than
> non-Vietnam veterans.
that Vietnam veterans will be slightly more likely to die by suicide than the average American male. It’s thus possible that the suicide rate among Vietnam veterans will eventually reach 2.3%. I say “eventually” because the two periods of life when suicide is most common are the teenage years through the early twenties and old age. The first period happened to coincide with the period when most of those veterans were in Vietnam. The second period has just started for many of those veterans.
So it may be true eventually that there will be more suicides among Vietnam War veterans than there were combat deaths during the war. It still wouldn’t prove anything though. Suicide is a common cause of death for everyone. The suicide rate need only be slightly greater than average among Vietnam War veterans to make suicide a larger cause of death than being killed in combat.