US soldier suicides the highest on record: army

US soldier suicides the highest on record: army

news.yahoo.com

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The US Army said 115 soldiers on active duty committed suicide in 2007, the most in one year since the service began keeping records in 1980. Nearly a thousand soldiers attempted suicide.

(visit the link for the full news article)



[edit on 30-5-2008 by imd12c4funn]

Is it any wonder?

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Originally posted by imd12c4funn


Is it any wonder?

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Part of me feels sympathy for the soldiers and the way the government just discards them when they are no longer of use, then another part says that's what you get.

IMO, we have no business being over there. We are the invaders, we are the enemy.



[edit on 30-5-2008 by Flory]

[edit on 30-5-2008 by Flory]

Well, no wonder over here. Let's think about what a soldier, in this war, gets to deal with:

Called up to fight and die in a war which only benefits those who started it.

Enter Iraq, get shot at.

Loose friends to bombs, get shot at.

Loose friends to bullets, get shot at.

Wake up every day and look out on a country which now has little to no infastructure...which it used to have. Get shot at.

Get shot at.

Realize that all of these people are not better because you're there. They are miserable; they are being killed in the thousands and still they are demonized as the 'they' who wants to kill us so bad. Get shot at.

Realize that all the crap you have been spoon fed back home by the media and the administration is just that: crap. Get shot at.

Watch thousands of civilians die for...no reason whatsoever. Unless filling the coffers of those who started this war can be considered a reason. Get shot at.

Having no god damn clue as to why you are even there. Get shot at.

Get blown up.

Come home, recieve pittiful assistance from the government you just lost your leg for.

You want to go to school? Tuff.

You want decent medical assistance/rehab? Don't you get it yet, boy? Screw off already.

It is a joke right now. My brother-in-law was active duty way before any of this started to happen but still stays in close contact with many of his actice duty friends.

Do not believe the propoganda that talks about how wonderful the care and assistance is. Start to realize that these, in many cases nothing more then boys, are being sent over again and again. They have wives, they have children...they are just starting their lives and after doing their job they are thrown to the side like trash.

It is disgusting. Our current vets are being treated like crap and nobody seems to give a damn.

Whoo, that was a rant.

Originally posted by imd12c4funn


Is it any wonder?

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Thats it? Is it any wonder? Come on OP, at least offer some discussion points, your own opinion, something. Jeez.

This has come up a couple times over the last 5 months.

Concern Mounts over rising troop suicides

Soldier Suicides at Record Levels

There actually was some good discussion on the first link with links on how to help out by sending care packages, letters, donations to soldier funds, things like that.

Part of the problem IMO is, and I quote from that threads article.

He said veterans return home to find an "understaffed, under-funded, under-equipped" Veterans Affairs mental health system. "Many just give up trying," he said.

Now theres some meat for discussion

Silver

It's all here.

I met someone Wednesday who has a son in Afghanistan. He is on second tour, and I listened to a story about some of the soldiers who took an alternate way out than returning to the theater. Is it any wonder? Well, that may seem superficial as a stand alone question, but there is still Iran.

I imagine everyone has thought or at least thought about thinking of suicide. I would never ever do away with myself;

However, take me back to an age when life is beginning. When adulthood has finally been obtained, and visions of Adventure, Love, Power, Success and Notoriety are conceived in the mind, from the Hood, to the White house, then Train me in the art of survival, killing, disassociation, and following orders. Gather myself and thousands of others like me and send us over to fight war for a year or two or three, and while the gore and horror become the norm, give me my dear john letter from my wife of three years who, pregnant when I left, now has my child and is leaving me for reasons that are only letters on a page, for no meaning is attached to them. Now send me out to secure a village and let me vent on those who do not comply with commands in a harsh way, allowing me to vent my frustrations, hate, surreal life I find myself living, and take my revenge out on those villagers that I don't understand but must pay for what I am going through in my minds misery. Then, when I am too tired to shed any more blood, bring me home for awhile. What am I going home too? Lost love, Child Support, Humility and utter lonely pain. After months in the bottom of a bottle, Send me a letter of redeployment. By now, I know I am nothing, I know I've done wrong, I know I've been wronged. I still have a glimmer of light in my soul, but I can not kill any more people. I still have the power to chose. In my despair, I know how to right my wrongs and to pay for my crimes. I know what must be done. There is no longer a redeeming quality to cling to, I tell myself that my statement of never doing away with myself was not real. Life is not real. Nothing is real except for it all to end. Just let it end...

That is my opinion of a struggle between sanity and the senseless utterings of an unwell man that fought in Bush's war.
other links...

www.democracynow.org...
www.buzzflash.com...
www.democracynow.org...

and why are more veterans dying at their own hands than in the War arena?

www.fpif.org...