Less Than Honorable When Military Turns Against PTSD

All Things Considered, December 20, 2007 ·
"Our military families deserve better," President Bush declared in October as he sent a proposed bill to Congress. The legislation, he said, would make it easier for our troops to receive care for PTSD, "and it will help affected service members to move forward with their lives."
But veterans advocates say that even if the military and the Department of Veterans Affairs became models for helping troops with mental health problems, it wouldn't help a large category of vets who are already wounded and forgotten. These soldiers and Marines came back from combat, couldn't get adequate help, "flipped out" and misbehaved in some way — and as a result, were kicked out of the military without all the financial and medical benefits that veterans usually receive.
"I think it's an outrage that we have not taken proper care of them," said Sen. Christopher "Kit" Bond (R-MO), one of the most influential voices on veterans' affairs. "Too many of these people have been kicked out because of the results of the stress they've been under."
'Head and Shoulders Above His Peers'
NPR has tracked down dozens of vets across the U.S. to put a face on the problem.
Until he got PTSD, Patrick Uloth was a poster boy for the Marines in Iraq. He enlisted right out of high school, fought two tours and quickly was promoted to lance corporal. His commander hailed him as "head and shoulders above his peers." He received an award for valor, for helping save his unit one night near Fallujah.
But, like just about every Marine and soldier who has fought in Iraq, Uloth saw violence and death in ways that most people can barely imagine. During one patrol, for instance, a suicide bomber's vehicle exploded in front of Uloth's convoy.
Uloth said that the explosion left one of his Marine buddies decapitated. He remembers that he and two other Marines "scooped the Marine into bags, because he was in pieces." When Uloth rushed to another victim, he realized it was one of his best friends. "There was a large hole in the back of his head," Uloth says.

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Uloth says that if he had benefits, he'd check himself into a psychiatric hospital because, although he can seem charming and cheerful on the surface, he says he is in deep emotional trouble.


Uloth's Superior Speaks
Letter from Uloth's Platoon Sergeant

(Requires Adobe Acrobat)

Uloth says that when he went to the mental health center at Camp Pendleton's hospital to ask for help, they were so overwhelmed by returning troops with mental health problems that he couldn't book a therapy appointment for months. The staff eventually gave him sporadic counseling, and prescribed a cocktail of powerful medications, but Uloth complained that the drugs made him feel worse.

So, he took off from Camp Pendleton without permission: Uloth went AWOL, as it's commonly called. (The Marines call it UA for "unauthorized absence.")

But he didn't disappear. Instead, Uloth checked himself into a psychiatric center he had heard about at an Air Force base in Mississippi. He started getting intensive therapy, which he couldn't get at his own base.

When Uloth's commanders learned where he was, they sent two guards to arrest and restrain him with handcuffs and metal shackles. They locked him in a jail cell at Camp Pendleton for almost two months, even though a military medical staff member concluded that he was "unfit for confinement."

Listen: Matt McLauchlen explains to NPR's Daniel Zwerdling how
he has "fallen through the cracks" of the military system.

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Read Letter to President Bush
Letter: Sen. Bond Calls for Special Discharge Review Program
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How many more reports do we have to read to understand these men and women risked their lives for us, were wounded in the process, and then they were betrayed by less than honorable treatment of them? When are we going to get this right for all of them? Are we even really trying? I've heard testimonies for years about PTSD and the way the veterans have been treated and I've heard a lot of promises to change what is wrong but have seen very little evidence of it.

Is anyone in Washington giving these veterans the same sense of urgency they did when they issued the orders to deploy them and get them there? It seems only logical and honorable to take care of them when they are wounded. So what's the problem? It can't be money because in the long run taking care of them now saves a lot of money. Is it still ignorance? After years of testimonies by experts and over 30 years of studies, there isn't that much more they have to know before they figure out they have a serious problem. How many more times do they have to hear the figures of the ever growing number of veterans with PTSD not being taken care of, committing suicide because they are not being taken care of or about the numbers of the wounded being kicked out of the military with dishonorable discharges? Seems like we have a bigger problem with the congress being less than honorable to them than the other way around.