Suicides and Combat: Who to believe?

Suicides and Combat: Who to believe?
Statesman.com
By Jeremy Schwartz
Aug. 30, 2013

Earlier this month, a much publicized Department of Defense study loudly proclaimed that there is no link between wartime deployments or combat and the sharp increase in military suicides since 2005. Instead, the authors blame an apparent increase in mental disorders among U.S. service members -- disorders stemming not from combat, but from “indirect cumulative occupational stresses across both deployed and home-station environments over years of war.”

On closer examination, the study has some obvious limitations. It studied service members between 2001 and 2008; for the beginning of that time period few of those who died of suicide would have deployed to war (troop levels were low in the first years of the war in Afghanistan and the Iraq war didn't begin until 2003). And despite making much of the fact that the study included 151,560 current and former military personnel, it analyzed just 83 suicides.

The study was published by the Journal of the American Medical Association, and careful readers of the publication can be excused for being thoroughly confused on the issue of military suicide. Just two months earlier the journal published another study that concluded that traumatic brain injuries – the signature wound of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts – are indeed associated with a greater risk of suicide and that the suicide risk increases with the number of brain injuries sustained by service members.
read more here
My comment

Thank you is not enough to say for writing this. The DOD wants us to believe combat has nothing to do with the suicides but no one ever asks them to explain things.

The most obvious question is "If they were not deployed but committed suicide, what is wrong with the mental health evaluations they give to recruits?" No one asks that or when they discharged troops with "personality disorders" instead of treating them. They don't talk about hazing, sexual assaults or training itself being traumatic. They don't talk about or have to account for the rise in OEF OIF veterans killing themselves after discharge even though their "resilience training" were part of what they had. They also don't want to talk about attempted suicides.

The DOD Suicide Event Report for 2012 has still not been released. For 2011 there were over 900 suicide attempts. Again, they don't have an answer for them or the fact 2012 was the deadliest year on record. So thank you very much for not being part of the problem. Truth is always part of the solution.

This got me thinking about all the stuff that keeps happening. Not even touching the suicides back here, the obvious is what has been happening all along. They are using muskets against tanks.

Military suicide research nothing more than pure bullshit! Can I prove it? The research proves it but after all these years what proves it even more are the questions not being asked.

In 2009 this report came out.

Officials: Army suicides at 3-decade high
The Associated Press
By PAULINE JELINEK – 1 hour ago
January 29, 2009

WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense officials say suicide among U.S. soldiers increased again last year and is at a nearly three-decade high.

The Army plans to announce figures later Thursday, but senior officials told The Associated Press that at least 128 soldiers killed themselves last year.

Obvious question: Since this happened right when the "resilience training" started, how did it get worse after this "record high" was reported?

According to the latest suicide report from the Army there were 185 suicides in the Army plus 93 National Guardsmen and 47 Army Reservists in 2012. For 2013 as of the end of July there were 94 suicides in the Army, 58 National Guardsmen and 32 Army Reservists.

So they went from 128 in 2009 to 325 in 2012 after spending billions a year on "preventing" them.

Obvious question: Since the number of suicides went up what is wrong with the training that has been pushed all these years to prevent them?

There are over 900 suicide prevention programs!

The survey by the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America were based on about 4,000 veterans who responded to a survey the association sent to its 120,000 members in February. About a third of respondents said they had considered taking their own life at some point. A slightly larger percentage said they knew someone who had committed suicide. Forty-five percent say they know an Iraq or Afghanistan veteran who has attempted suicide. Two-thirds say they have veteran friends who need mental health counseling.

The DOD claims most commit suicide without being deployed (as stated above) but the DOD has been clueless on what to do about military suicides and PTSD. Expecting them to be able to un-break soldiers is ridiculous because their job has been to break them down to train them for combat. It is in the DNA of the DOD.

Obvious question: Why hasn't the DOD been able to figure out what they have been doing, paying for and pushing has not worked?

Battlefield medicine has advanced so far there are several quadruple amputees along with single and double amputees.

Obvious question: Why hasn't mental health advanced a fraction of the way? Had the DOD received faulty weapons, the contracts would have been canceled however they do not seem willing to cancel contracts and funding for providers of their programs despite massive failures.

We know that billions have been spent on these failures but we don't know who is going to be held accountable for them. We know that the DOD shows no sign of changing what they do but we don't know why they refuse to acknowledge any of this.

The last obvious question: If they commit suicide without being deployed into combat, how lousy is the resilience training they can't even keep them alive here?