Despite the fact that the drugs are generally beneficial (and that’s why they’re prescribed), it would indeed be terrible propaganda.
But you’re right that it shouldn’t be the soldier’s decision, or the soldier’s CO’s decision. It should be the decision of a doctor who’s not going to lose a promotion if he sends too many people home.
The fact that drugs somewhat help soldiers bear the psychic wounds of too much blood, death, and gore, of killing and seeing their buddies killed and maimed, doesn’t mean a soldier bearing those psychic wounds and taking antidepressants for them is sufficiently whole that he can be sent back in to the very circumstances that caused him to need those drugs in the first place.
Thank you for that. It’s funny that in a thread about soldiers “going nuts” you put into words exactly what my thoughts are, thoughts that often result in the question “Are you nuts?”.
I don’t think you’re quite getting the point, here. I think everyone in this thread recognizes that the mental effects of combat are just as valid a casualty as taking a bullet. The problem is that the army itself doesn’t seem to recognize it. Sending troops diagnosed with severe emotional problems back to the front after a long weekend and a handful of Xanax is the equivalent of sending a recent amputee back to the front with a crutch and a box of band-aids. It’s a callous and disrespectful way to treat wounded veterans, and like so many other policies implemented under the current administration, it’s killing our soldiers.