Is the DOD trying to make it worse for military men and women?

Is the DOD trying to make it worse for military men and women?
Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
July 27, 2013

On July 18, 2013 the Department of Defense released the April and May suicide report. This was done when they should have been releasing the June report.

In April the DOD said there were 11 "potential" suicides. Think about that. That means the families are left wondering what happened. For May it was 12 "potential" suicides. So far this year there have been;

For calendar year 2013, there have been 64 potential active-duty suicides: 31 have been confirmed as suicides and 33 remain under investigation.

They also revised the total of Army suicides to 183.

Updated active-duty suicide numbers for calendar year (CY) 2012: 183 (162 have been confirmed as suicides and 21 remain under investigation).

The most forgotten group has been the National Guards and Reservists.

For April 2013, among that same group, the Army reported 16 potential suicides; however, subsequent to the report, one more case was added bringing April’s total to 17 (14 Army National Guard and 3 Army Reserve).

During May 2013, among reserve component soldiers who were not on active duty, there were 10 potential suicides (8 Army National Guard and two Army Reserve).

For CY 2013, there have been 70 potential not on active duty suicides (45 Army National Guard and 25 Army Reserve)

Updated not on active duty suicide numbers for CY 2012: 140 (93 Army National Guard and 47 Army Reserve)

So far as of the last week of July, they have not released the Suicide Event Report for 2012. Why? Why on earth would it take this long to release what they have been tracking all along?

The headline from DVIDS is that "Army's Comprehensive Soldier and Family Fitness program spreads the importance of resiliency"

Secretary of the Army John McHugh announced the formal beginning of the Comprehensive Soldier Fitness Oct. 2, 2009, according to www.army.mil.

The Army-wide implementation of this program focuses on enhancing the performance and improving the overall strength and resiliency of soldiers, family members and Army civilians. In July 2012, Comprehensive Soldier Fitness was re-named Comprehensive Soldier and Family Fitness to incorporate family members.

This is the claim they are still making.

“The purpose of launching CSF2 was to increase people’s emotional strength, equip them with coping skills, and give them the ability to bounce back from any situation life may throw at them,” said Army Col. Kenneth Riddle, CSF2 director. “As well, the CSF2’s vision is to have a total Army team of physically healthy and psychologically strong soldiers, families and Army civilians whose resilience and total fitness enables them to thrive in both the military and civilian sector and to meet a wide range of operational demands.”

While this all sounds good the trouble is coming from not actually looking at the history of this programming. Are they trying to make it worse for the military men and women on purpose? If that is their intention, then they succeeded. If they are trying to save lives, then they failed miserably. The numbers prove it.

The suicides they have to count have gone up since they started this program.

2008 Army suicides at 3-decade high 128

But that was followed up by this

7 soldiers committed suicide in January of 2009 and the cause of death in 17 other cases is still pending, Army officials announced Thursday, marking a significant increase in soldier suicides from the same time period in previous years.

Last month’s numbers are six times higher than those from January 2008 and eight times higher than in 2004.

They said they didn't know why and then tried to blame it on winter.

"This is terrifying," an Army official said. "We do not know what is going on."

Col. Kathy Platoni, chief clinical psychologist for the Army Reserve and National Guard, said that the long, cold months of winter could be a major contributor to the January spike.

Then they tried to explain it away by pointing the finger at repeated deployments, which had been shown to raise the risk of PTSD according to an Army report in 2006.

"US Soldiers serving repeated deployments are 50 percent more likely than those with one tour to suffer from acute combat stress, raising their risk of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder according to the Army's first survey exploring how today's multiple war-zone rotations affect soldiers' mental health. (Washington Post 2006)

It wasn't that they were not trying. They were still pushing what was called Battlemind in 2009.

Battle Mind must be eliminated from what they are trying to do. There is no doubt in my mind that they really want to save the lives of the troops but they are the last to learn shooting with rubber bullets may be good for target practice but it in no way resembles or prepares them for the real thing. In other words, they are usually the last to learn what the rest of the country already knows. When it comes to PTSD, they are still shooting with blanks.

In March of 2009 William McMichael, staff writer for Army Times reported this.

But calls by troops and former troops to a Veterans Affairs help line indicate that the problem may be even larger that the alarming statistics provided at the hearing.

In calendar year 2008, the Army reported 140 confirmed or suspected suicides. That’s 20.2 suicides per 100,000 troops — an all-time high that is nearly twice the national average of 11.0 suicides per 100,000. The service’s suicide rate has more than doubled since 2004.

The Navy reported 41 suicides in 2008, a rate of 11.6 per 100,000. The Marine Corps lost 41 Marines last year to confirmed or suspected suicides — up from 25 two years earlier — a rate of 19.0 suicides per 100,000. The Air Force lost 38 airmen in 2008, a rate of 11.5 suicides per 100,000.

More ominously, 780 callers to a national Veterans Affairs suicide prevention hotline in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, 2008, identified themselves as active-duty troops, said Kathryn Power, director of the Center for Mental Health Services in the Department of Health and Human Services.

It was already proven to not be working when in February of 2009 the other bad reports were followed up by these.

U.S. Marine Corps, 1 suicide every two days, attempted ones, every 2 hours!

As many as 18 soldiers killed themselves in February, Army officials announced March 5.

Over at Fort Carson there was a recording of a psychologist saying "I am under a lot of pressure to not diagnose PTSD"

The Army counted 64 possible suicides in the first four months of this year, 11 of those were at Fort Campbell, Ky. — four suicides in January, three in February and four in March.

All of this is bad but what followed was even worse.

Eight soldiers committed suicide in eight days of New Year of 2010

Then by November of 2010 172 soldiers committed suicide this year—surpassing last year’s total of 162 for all of 2009.

Fort Hood’s 22 confirmed suicides, meanwhile, doubled its 2009 mark and was eight more than Fort Bragg, N.C., which had the second-largest tally.

For the beginning of 2011 it got worse

2 Marines killed themselves in February, raising to 4 the number who have committed suicide in 2011.

Another 17 Marines attempted suicide, according to the latest figures from the headquarters of the Marine Corps.

Military Suicides while enlisted are only part of the story. When you factor in how many the DOD no longer has to count, the numbers prove more deadly evidence that Battlemind and "Comprehensive Solider Fitness" do more harm than good. While most of the veterans committing suicide everyday are Vietnam veterans, reports from across the country are about Iraq and Afghanistan veterans taking their own lives even after having all this "training" plus getting involved in standoffs with law enforcement and showing up in veterans courts.

Psychologist and true researchers, including RAND Corp, have exposed this attempt as doing more harm than good. If you want to know more then read The Warrior SAW, Suicides After War and see what caused all of this. Every report in it gives you the source to where the news report came from, the government reports and everything you need to know the DOD doesn't want to tell you.

They can keep saying they are doing something about it but with these results it should leave you wondering why they would push what has made it worse and why the media has not even asked them to explain these results.

What are they doing about it now? They are pushing it harder.

Army's Comprehensive Soldier and Family Fitness program spreads the importance of resiliency