Deployments to Iraq nears 3 million in 5 years

1,686,794
Personnel have deployed at least once
to the Operation Iraqi Freedom or
Operation Enduring Freedom theaters of
operations* through January 2008, with
24,852 service members deploying five
or more times. There have been
2,967,848 total deployments.*
*Breakouts for OIF and OEF not available.
Source: Defense Department

399,848
Medals awarded for service in Operation
Iraqi Freedom.*

Medal of Honor: Army, 1;
Marine Corps, 1
Distinguished Service Cross/
Air Force Cross/Navy Cross:
Air Force, 0 ; Army, 8;
Marine Corps, 17**; Navy, 1
Silver Star: Air Force, 11; Army,
385, Marine Corps**, 77;
Navy, 40**
Legion of Merit: Air Force, 3;
Army, 59; Marine Corps, 28**;
Navy, N/A
Distinguished Flying Cross: Air
Force, 269; Army, 96; Marine
Corps, 24**; Navy, N/A
Bronze Star: Air Force, 1,881
(91 for valor); Army, 58,877
(1,843 for valor); Navy, 2,258***
Marine Corps, 1,940**,***
http://www.militarytimes.com/static/projects/pages/tns_5yearsiniraq.pdf

Send them once and rate of PTSD is one out of three. Send them again and you raise the risk by 50%. 24,852 have been deployed 5 times or more. Is there any kind of statistical rate we could use for them?

What are we doing? What are we doing to them? To their families? I still get emails from soldiers and family members just finding out what PTSD is. How many more are in this country without any kind of clue what they are living with? Forget about the average citizen even knowing what it is. Most have no idea how many troops have died in Iraq or Afghanistan. For the record, as of today 3,991 in Iraq and 487 in Afghanistan according to ICasualties.org. These numbers do not come close to the true death count of our service men and women simply because if they kill themselves when they come home by suicide, suicide by cop or by crashing their cars, they are not counted. At least 6,000 per year have taken their own lives. This means that 34,478 have died as a result of Iraq and Afghanistan. As for the wounded, again, they are not really counted because while the official count is 29,314, the wounds of PTSD and TBI are not included in these counts. None of the backlog claims in the VA are counted among any.
We never count the family members in any of these numbers either.

What makes all of this even more terrible to fully grasp is that the Congress has yet to understand the full, far reaching price being paid on a daily basis, in Iraq and Afghanistan and here back home.





Chaplain Kathie Costos
Namguardianangel@aol.com
http://www.namguardianangel.org/
http://www.namguardianangel.blogspot.com/
http://www.woundedtimes.blogspot.com/
"The willingness with which our young people are likely to serve in any war, no matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive veterans of early wars were treated and appreciated by our nation." - George Washington