Sad Statistics of Soldier Suicides

Spotted this article today on RT news discussing the shocking statistics of US soldiers who have killed themselves.

Sad state of affairs when the figures show more soldiers died by suicide than during actual combat.

Was soldier suicides as prevelant during WW2. For some reason the US only started taking records of such things in 1980 as far as I believe.

RT News

From your link

For the second year in row, more US soldiers killed themselves than were killed in combat. In 2010, 468 soldiers took their own lives, compared to 462 killed in fighting.

I really have no words to describe how I feel about that. I typed quite a few paragraphs, but I just couldn't find the right words. So here's what I got. Wow. Just wow.

Bring the soliders home.
Simple as that, They are taking orders they do not want to take. The soliders have no outlet for their mental anguish caused by what their job entails. After seeing a few hundred people blown to bits, i'de probably want to off myself too.

Its sad..really sad.. BRING THEM HOME FFS

Originally posted by AzureSky

mental anguish

To do a quick, "best-of" from conspiracy theories I've read here over the past three years is there is a good chance that the suicides are evidence of personality profiling by the army.

Normally one profiles the nice and friendly kind hearted type too duty back in the States, say as a recruiter or public liaison. And the sociopaths who will actually kill someone, given a chance, are sent to the frontiers. I remember one post by some hysterical-passing-through-member that said all the hardened killers are here in the states waiting for rebellion, and the kind hearted types are all in the desert experiencing hell.

So I'm not so sure a generic "bring the troops home" is the medicine called for.


David Grouchy

Originally posted by davidgrouchy
To do a quick, "best-of" from conspiracy theories I've read here over the past three years is there is a good chance that the suicides are evidence of personality profiling by the army.

It's much more likely, and factual, that the high rate of suicides is due to the amount of soldiers who have a mental break due to the harsh realities of war coupled with multiple deployments and little, if any, mental health treatment. Of the ones who return and seek therapy to deal with the mental and emotional trauma, they have to deal with the VA who often makes them wait more than two weeks for treatment. (Source) According to the Army Times, that wait can end up being two months. Then you have things like this which, while intended to make sure soldiers are stable before being deployed, ends up influencing them not to bother seeking mental health treatment to begin with.

There is also a stigma attached to seeking help. A lot of soldiers refuse to seek treatment even when they are feeling suicidal because of the fear of what it may do to their career if anyone finds out.

Source

Why the secrecy? Many service members fear that seeing a psychologist will sink their careers, says Navy Cmdr. Anthony Arita, PhD. They worry—often needlessly—that their problems will get back to their bosses, endanger their security clearances and even result in their separation from the service, he notes.

"There is the perception that if I do step forward there will be dire consequences," says Arita, the director of clearinghouse, outreach and advocacy at the Defense Centers of Excellence for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury (DCoE).

Those fears have fueled a mental health crisis, where about a fifth of people returning from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are reporting symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder or major depression, and only about half seek treatment, according to a 2008 Rand Corp. study.

If all the soldiers who need mental health services would actually seek treatment, the suicide rates would go down. Instead they avoid it for fear of being discharged or losing security clearances and the ones who do try to seek treatment end up waiting anywhere from two weeks to two months. Someone who is suicidal can't wait that long, but they're not likely to just come out and say "Hey, if I don't get seen now I might go off myself." Especially if they're worried that saying that will harm their career.

To pass it off as the military profiling soldiers and intentionally choosing those more likely to develop mental illnesses is as insensitive as it is ludicrous.

Is it possible that our troops are just following orders that they later can't live with? And if so, what does that mean when some folks argue that US troops would never fire on US citizens? OP, if I'm derailing, feel free to scold me, but your post just caused my brain to discharge the following:

This just makes me wonder how common it is for troops to obey command, and reconcile their conscience after-the-fact. I for one, am sincerely concerned when anyone contends that US military would protest a command to demolish their own. Read up on Stanley Milgram for empirical evidence of this. And the capacity for independent thought present on day one of boot camp is all but beaten out of the troop in lieu of that "follow, follow, follow" mentality. This suicide rate potentially speaks volumes about US civilian safety. I'd need statistics on how involved these poor troops were in foreign civilian combat, as in killing innocent civilians. But I'll also say that there are certainly other factors contributing to the suicide rate, such as how often they witnessed the death of fellow combatents. And in no way do I intend any disrespect toward either the original intent of our military to protect its citizens, nor enlisted military who fight in that spirit. The intent of both have my utmost respect.

"There is also a stigma attached to seeking help. A lot of soldiers refuse to seek treatment even when they are feeling suicidal because of the fear of what it may do to their career if anyone finds out."

I agree, A lot of soldiers refuse to seek treatment but it has little to do with fear .... when you feel you've crossed the point of no return, or its too late...your career is hardly of any concern. The only people who can prevent this is the others in your unit not a shrink. Now were at war and actually doing the job, not sitting stateside, playing games and going through the motions we see some people are not cut out for the job. Since unit cohesion takes a back seat to political correctness and equal opportunity there is no way to weed these people out.

How can you feel compassion for what is more machine than man? I don't feel sorry for these people at all.

I've read all the responses and I cant say for certain the exact cause but I deffinatly think all this fighting with long deployments is going to cause alot of mental stress. Having to wait and jump through hurdles to get mental health care is just absurd to and its just the morons at the top not caring and not seeing it as a "priority".

I don't even understand how we have vets who are starving and going through all this BS and they freaking put their lives on the line and worked their arses off for their country? They can give a few trillion to banks but to make sure people who bled to make this corrupt mess work is not a "priority". I just dont understand anything these days.

I am in the Navy. I sought psychological help due to the stress of my personal and career. Not to go into details, I on nuclear reactors. I was first in my class in A school and received a military excellence award. I my second school right afterwards, I was top tier of my class and received another military excellence award. The third school, I had the highest test scores out of my group and was picked up to be an instructor. When I came to my sea command, I just got married to woman whom I have a child with. We went through a cancer scare, suicide attempts from my mother, foreclosure on my childhood home, identity theft without about 50,000 worth of charges made by my mother. All this while working 12 hour days at least, mixed in with duty days, also excelling in my quals on the boat, then also having to pay for food, lodging, and travel without compensation for training states away from where I was stationed at the time. Also, the unfortunate truth is that those who are suppose to have integrity, don't always have integrity when it comes to log-taking, maintenance and having to do work. With the stress of all this, I was having problems with my wife and I was exhibiting anger issues at home. It started off with yelling, then cursing, then smashing things in my house. I talked to my chain of command about my issues. My chain command literally said that maybe I should just divorce my wife and get it over with. They also stated that any problems I have better be solved on my own time. And the money I spent for training was taking one for the team and if I should take that up any further, I might my find myself hard pressed to have any free time or advance in my rate. Needless to say, I had choice words for my chain of command and I will admit, I crossed a line a bit when I lost my temper and told the XO some choice words. Although they did try to mast me, they ultimately failed, but I had to see shrinks for depression and anger issues. I lost my NEC in the Navy and now I technically do not have a viable career. They will not approve me for a rate change, will not let go to back to my rate, and will not separate me from the Navy. I am currently paying back a bonus I recieved at $700 a month and if you know anything about military pay, an E-5 does not make the best living, although not the worst.

My situation is not that bad compared to some of the others I have seen. When I went through my schooling and my time as an instructor, I knew of well over 10 people who committed suicide. And we don't even hit the front lines. I can't imagine what those soldiers go through. The military and government act as though they care, but they do not. We are just tools, property to the government. The leadership is apathetic and anemic. I am not proud of my military service, nor do I think it made me a better man. I didn't need the military to know what integrity is or how to work hard. I do it because it what I think is right, Unfortunately, it depends on which way the wind is blowing when it comes to it being the Navy way. I truly do believe that the programming of the military is breaking down and we are realizing the waste, fraud, corruption, and abuse that is going on within the government, Many of the military are just trying to survive day to day and many of us are not proud the wear the uniform. As I have stated in other posts, exercise your rights and get this government changed out. We'll protect the country as soldiers and sailors because it is our duty. American citizens should protect theirs and our freedoms and liberties by voting and getting involved. If it comes to do revolution, I have no doubt that the majority of the military will stand on the side of the people if it came to government sending us after the citizens.