I have a friend who is a officer in the National Guard, and he is a very faithful Republican. I just spoke with him yesterday, and he started commenting on morale of returning troops and PTSD. I never thought he would admit to any problem regarding Iraq.
He is on deployment inside the United States for an assignment regarding National Security. I won't say what state he is deployed to or what type of assignment he has, and I won't even say what rank he is (it is below General and above Lt.), out of respect to his privacy both as an officer who has carrer interests, and as a friend and as a family man.
He is a very commited Republican, I don't think he would ever vote against the party. He is self made, rising from poverty and a not very nice home life.
I know him because our sons are in school and scouts together and we car pool our kids to school together. I repect him for his hard work and his dedication to the military. He is a hunter and very pro gun.
We were at scouts together yesterday and went out into the hall for a while and started chatting. He commented on the people he works with at his deployment assignment post. First he was talking about the politics of getting promoted to a high ranking office in the military and said that a friend of his had been up for Major General. One of the questions on his paperwork was "have you ever considered commiting suicide? This officer told the truth and said yes, because he had had bouts of mild depression. His application was rejected and he retired. My friend said that the scrutiny that officers go through was very thorough, no anti depressants or history of mental illness allowed. No PTSD allowed. I can see the need for mentally stable Generals, but the irony of the situation strikes me, in that we are breaking down our few good men at an alarming rate, so that our Generals soon won't have had the experiences that our combat- stressed Iraq vts have.
He said that several officers he knows have returned from Iraq with PTSD and have no chance to advance. Many had carrer aspirations that are now gone. He said many, many of the guardsmen he sees come back have PTSD. One soldier that drives him an field assignmenets has PTSD and is on medication, and my friend can immediatly tell if the soldier is off his meds and makes him go back to barracks to take them.
The comment that I found interesting was that he said that everybody that comes back from Iraq is stressed out and has low morale, because they see no success from their work. Not just a lot of returning soldiers, but every one of them. He says they don't see progress, they don't see that they are making any difference. If people could see that their work yields some success, then they would be ok, but that isn't the case.
Also, the stress comes every day. My friend said that every day when soldiers in Iraq leave base they don't know who the enemy is. They all have cultural training to learn dress styles of Sunnis and Shias, etc., but can't trust anyone, don't who is going to shoot at them next, don't know when their vehicle is going to blow up. My friend says that all this would be tolerable IF they soldiers could see some reward for their efforts, but their is none. Every soldier is going through this.
He started an argument with my wife last week about Iraq and blamed the Democrats about wanting to leave the war in Iraq and then we would see how long it would be before the terrorists strike in the US again. When my wife told me this I told her that would be great, lets bring them home and then spend 1/3 of the Iraq cost on real domestic security, rebuild our armed forces and give the troops a rest. I think it would be along time before we would be hit agian if we had the best domestic security in the world instead of the crap we have now.
In conclusion, my friend is in a place to know and is very pro Bush and pro military and even he now sees to where our handbasket is going.