DOD claims 85% of discharges for personality disorder were right?

Military Works to Improve Personality Disorder-Based Discharge Process
By John J. Kruzel
American Forces Press Service


WASHINGTON, Dec. 20, 2007 – The military is working to improve the way it implements a policy of discharging troops based on pre-existing personality disorders, Defense Department health officials said today.

Several articles in summer 2007 claimed that some 22,500 troops had been discharged -- in some instances, wrongly discharged -- after being diagnosed as having personality disorders. In response, the Defense Department launched a “secondary review.”

In the ongoing investigation thus far, officials have reconfirmed that 85 percent of servicemembers initially determined to have personality disorders were correctly diagnosed. Roughly 1.5 percent, however, were misdiagnosed, officials said.

“We have looked at most of them, and some, on review, have been incorrect diagnoses,” Dr. S. Ward Casscells, assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, told reporters at the Pentagon today.

Casscells denied the most inflammatory claim made in the articles: that the military was shirking its responsibility to those affected. “When the articles first came out, the tenor was, ‘Military is labeling people (with) personality disorders so they don’t have to pay benefits,’” he said. “We did not find any evidence of that.”

Echoing Casscells’ comments, Air Force Col. Joyce Adkins, director of psychological health and strategic operations, defended the policy, but acknowledged possible flaws in implementation.

Adkins clarified that a personality disorder does not necessarily bar an individual from serving in the armed forces. “Certainly there are many people who have personality traits that we would characterize as a disorder who have stayed in the military,” she said. “It’s only when their personality doesn’t fit well with the job that they are separated.”

Moreover, Adkins said a “separation,” or discharge, on the basis of a personality disorder can benefit the discharged servicemember because it serves as a “safety valve,” freeing the servicemember from further obligation to military service.

“If you have a job and you don’t fit well with that job, you can quit,” she said. “In the military, you can’t just quit that easily. This is a way to say that this person doesn’t fit well with this job and to allow them to pursue other employments.”

Adkins added that the “large majority” of such discharges occur within the first two years of military service.
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=48489
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Then this would mean they let in people with personality disorders and all their pre-enlistment test are not worth crap. It would mean that they have a lot of soldiers running around with mental disorders. Wouldn't it? So what do you think the DOD should really be releasing in these case? That they are wrong 85% of the time, or they were right and their test make sure those who enlist are in fact fully capable of carrying out their orders? We're talking about 25,000 veterans here. Somehow I doubt they all took the test and bluffed their way through them. I really doubt they were rightfully dishonorably discharged. If they are trying to save money by admitting combat causes trauma and some develop PTSD, then they not only lost their reputation for taking the best and the brightest, they also dishonored the military as a whole by trying to pull a stunt like this. kc