Barack Obama

Many Soldiers Get Boot for 'Pre-Existing' Mental Illness

Sunday, September 30, 2007

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: by Philip Dine

Working behind the scenes, Sens. Christopher "Kit" Bond, R-Mo., and Barack
Obama, D-Ill., have written and inserted into the defense authorization bill a
provision that would make it harder for the Pentagon to discharge thousands of
troops....

Obama said the practice is "deeply disturbing" because "it means that those who
have served this country aren't getting the care they need. …"

WASHINGTON — Thousands of U.S. soldiers in Iraq — as many as 10 a day — are
being discharged by the military for mental health reasons. But the Pentagon
isn't blaming the war. It says the soldiers had "pre-existing" conditions that
disqualify them for treatment by the government.

Many soldiers and Marines being discharged on this basis actually suffer from
combat-related problems, experts say. But by classifying them as having a
condition unrelated to the war, the Defense Department is able to quickly get
rid of troops having trouble doing their work while also saving the expense of
caring for them.

The result appears to be that many actually suffering from combat-related
problems such as post-traumatic stress disorder or traumatic brain injuries
don't get the help they need.

Working behind the scenes, Sens. Christopher "Kit" Bond, R-Mo., and Barack
Obama, D-Ill., have written and inserted into the defense authorization bill a
provision that would make it harder for the Pentagon to discharge thousands of
troops. The Post-Dispatch has learned that the measure has been accepted into
the Senate defense bill and will probably become part of the Senate-House bill
to be voted on this week.

The legislation sets a higher bar for the Pentagon to use the
personality-disorder discharge, and also mandates a review of the policies by
the Government Accountability Office. Bond said it also would "force the
Pentagon to stop using this discharge until we can fix the problem."

Bond said he learned of the practice from returning Iraq veterans. He called it
an "abuse" of the system and "inexcusable."

"They've kicked out about 22,000 troops who they say have pre-existing
personality disorders. I don't believe that," Bond said in an interview Friday.
"And when you kick them out, they don't get the assistance they need, they
aren't entitled to DOD or Veterans Administration care for those problems."

Obama said the practice is "deeply disturbing" because "it means that those who
have served this country aren't getting the care they need. …"

Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Todd Vician declined Friday to discuss the matter
because it was related to current legislation.

Defense Department records show that 22,500 cases of personality-disorder
discharges have been processed over the last six years.

Jon Soltz, an Iraq war combat veteran who founded the group VoteVets.org, said
untreated psychological problems were contributing to the highest military
suicide rate in a quarter-century and to growing homelessness among veterans,
he said.

If such widespread mental problems really existed before people joined the
military and saw combat, they would have been uncovered when the recruits were
enlisting, Soltz said.

STRESS FACTORS

The issue of personality-disorder discharges is a window into the broader
problem of psychological damage to Iraq veterans, which experts say has three
main causes:

— Multiple and longer deployments.

— The stress of fighting an insurgency with no breaks and everyone always on
the front line.

— Better and faster medical care that helps troops survive horrific physical
injuries that often leave psychological scars.

"You land in Iraq, and you're on the battlefield, whether you're a
quartermaster or a medic or a cook," said David Segal, director of the Center
for Research on Military Organizations at the University of Maryland. "All you
have to do is get on the highway to go somewhere from the airport."

The military and lawmakers are only slowly coming to grips with the
consequences, Segal said.

"I think we have failed to recognize the extent of the problem," he said.
"We've produced a problem that's going to be plaguing us for generations."

Past wars, through the Persian Gulf war, produced three casualties for every
fatality, while now in Iraq "we're up to about 16-to-1," Segal said. Those
killed are "really the tip of the iceberg" as far as the toll on soldiers, he
added.

One Republican congressional staff member who works on military issues said the
rationale behind the Pentagon's practice was: "We didn't break you, you were
already broken. You're not our responsibility."

"One soldier I know received a diagnosis for a personality disorder after a
45-minute talk," said the staffer, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "He'd
been in the military 10 years, had made it his career, and then he was told he
was being shuffled out in a couple of weeks. We keep getting these stories."

In the House, Rep. Phil Hare, D-Ill., is leading the effort to get similar
legislation approved.

"It defies logic to think that tens of thousands of our servicemen and women
slipped through the cracks during the pre-screening process," Hare said. "We
have a moral obligation to review the discharge process and ensure we are
getting it right."