Support the Troops: If They're Going Nuts, Drug 'Em and Send 'Em Back to Combat!

The BBQ Pit
#1

This is old news from last May, but it’s the first time I’ve heard about it, and I’m so mad I can’t see straight. It’s like a nightmare of futuristic soldiery out of a Joe Haldeman SF novel, not something from the here and now:

Yeah, the same Kiley as in Walter Reed. Now there’s a reliable source.

And in another article in the series, here’s what Kiley’s top psychiatry expert had to say:

So the Army itself is saying the troop shortage has forced them to send soldiers with PTSD back into combat. And of course the ‘surge’ is only making that shortage worse.

To me, this is the ultimate betrayal of the troops. We’re already sending injured troops back to Iraq, but at least when they get there, someone should notice that they aren’t even capable of carrying their body armor. But if the war’s blown your brain circuitry and they send you right back…that’s fucking barbaric. Evil.

It’s past time to rescue this nation from the monsters who currently rule it. Where’s a mob of peasants with torches and pitchforks when we need one?

#2

Depression =/= “nuts.” :dubious:

#3

Fuck 'em. They volunteered to an organization known for this sort of thing.

#4

No, fuck you. This shouldn’t have happened.

#5

http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/49233/ This nasty war affects soldiers of all levels. Wrong is wrong.

#6

Don’t most people with depression want to return to their job after they get their depression under control with meds?

#7

Related thread from 2005: Antidepressants in combat IIRC the poll results accurately (it’s now offline), soldiers wanted more access to their traditional antidepressants.
It looks like they now have it. To me, that seems an improvement over shipping out, and going cold turkey.

#8

Dude, any war, or exposure to the kind of constant, unrelieved stress that being in a combat situation brings, is going to create these kinds of problems in many otherwise healthy individuals, regardless of the correctness or not of the war at large. Seeing people randomly blown to bits, knowing that it could happen to you at any time, without warning, and being encouraged to kill other people in order to carry out your orders and/or protect yourself against strangers wanting to kill you for impersonal reasons are all “wrong” in the sense of social mores.

I used to know a guy who was a brownwater Navy crewman in The Bad Place. He once (and only once) told a story about how they were cruising along one sunny, stinking day, laying prone on the deck, when he heard the crack of a rifle. He looked over at his crewmate to see if the guy had seen the shooter, then nudged him when he didn’t respond. The guy’s head rolled over, exposing the fact that half of his skull was missing. My coworker spent a fortnight in the hospital unit after not being able to sleep for days. They finally pumped him with morphine, gave him a supply of sedatives to help him sleep, and sent him back to his unit.

This sort of thing has been going on since time immemorial, and has nothing to do with this disagreeable and ill-conceived invasion. Going to war–whether just or not–means casualties, and I’m not talking about those from bullets and bombs.

Stranger

#9

Maybe, but at least with the bullets-and-bombs kinds of injuries, they can more or less tell when or whether you’re able to go back and fight again.

That’s not exactly the case with psychiatric injuries. You don’t know how bad someone’s cracked up, until it’s too late of course.

And as far as this particular war is concerned, we’re supposedly trying to pacify the country, which involves not turning the citizens into enemies (more than we’ve turned them that way already). Psychologically fit soldiers should be more or less a requirement, if that’s what we’re trying to do.

Of course, if we’re being lied to about that (of course we are), then no problemo.

#10

No, fuck you. Fuck you up the ass sideways with a rusty chainsaw.

Licentious Ectomorph, no shit, Sherlock. I don’t think that was the point.

:dubious:

#11

Excuse me, but the OP himself described the soldiers as “Going Nuts” in his own fucking title. Since he’s obviously on their side, he should know better. And as someone who’s on medication for depression, I didn’t appreciate it.

#12

Do you appreciate it more, or less, than when someone who barely knows you slaps a bottle of pills into the palm of your hand and tells you to get your ass back into the battlefield?

#13

Excuse me, but you may have noticed that there’s a limit on the number of characters you’re allowed in a thread title. Two things: (1) do you have a problem with the OP as opposed to the thread title, and (2) do you deny that some of these soldiers who have been given drugs and thrown back into the war were indeed going nuts?

#14

Why don’t you support the troops? You know, Walter Reed style, while wrapped in the flag? Isn’t that what all those bumper-stickers mean?

It sure seems like it’s what the administration elected by those sheep means…

#15

Now I’m confused-I thought the reason I wanted to bring those troops(including my brothers) home in one piece was because I hated them. :confused:

#16

And as someone who is also on meds for depression AND anxiety, I think you’re way overreacting.

Get a fucking grip.

#17

That’s ok. I thought the reason I was an un-patriotic and treasonous citizen was because for every one dollar spent on Iraq, I wanted another dollar spent on helping the kids traumatized, scarred & crippled by it. I wanted them helped through a properly staffed / supplied / funded VA system. Guess I’m just a Nanny-stater because I wanted adequate VA help for the people who have to actually fight the wars the DC Gutless have never had the nads to fight. Intead of just throwing the wounded back into battle to die like ‘good soldiers’. Or tossing them out of the system to fend for themselves as Homeless.

Oh, but evidently I don’t support the troops, dontcha know… :rolleyes:

#18

They are committing suicide after being medicated and returned to battle. Does that sound to you like their depression is under control?

#19

Dude, wars that go in the streets with non uniformed combatants are much much worse. When you absolutely know you have killed another human being who you know nothing about, you have to deal. If an incident about previous wars constitutes proof that previous wars are just the same you win the debate. However 36 percent of the soldiers returning home are showing mental problems. medical experts expect the numbers to go much higher. This in my estimation is much worse on the psyche. Plus the average age of an Iraqi male is 15.

#20

Lets make a distinction. Soldiers, especially combat experienced soldiers, tend to have an intense desire to return based on their sense of loyalty to thier comrades in arms. However commendable the motive, this is not a decision said soldier should be permitted to make. If his judgement is altered by either experience or by medications, this must be taken into account.

Lord help us if an American soldier makes an error in judgement that results in civilian deaths, and said soldier was “on drugs”. Its not like we haven’t handed our enemies sufficient propaganda fodder.