Used up and spit out
I recently saw, and was sickened by, Bob Woodruff's ABC report on Personality Disorder Discharges, the military's way of dumping soldiers who suffer psychiatric damage during war by claiming that their problems are merely pre-existing conditions that they'd had all along.
Discharged soldiers are denied all future benefits and VA care, and in some cases are even required to pay back re-enlistment bonuses they've previously received.
Yep, you read right. Soldiers who are suffering from PTSD and traumatic brain injuries -- TBI, the signature injury of this Iraq war and one Woodruff suffered himself -- have been discharged from service under Regulation 635-200, Chapter 5-13: “Separation Because of Personality Disorder.”
According to the Department of Defense, since 2001, more than 22,000 servicemen and women from all branches of the military have been separated under the personality disorder discharge.
They suffered brain injuries in combat, and our glorious troop-loving-and-supporting government uses 5-13 to just kick them out. Even when they have received service commendations like Purple Hearts .. even when they have been allowed to re-enlist, and received re-enlistment bonuses, they find out when they are out-processing that they will have to repay thousands of dollars of their re-enlistment bonuses.
See .. these bonuses carry with them a commitment to serve the entire enlistment. If it isn't served, they leave with NO benefits, NO care for their injuries, and in debt for the portion of their bonus that the military paid for and the soldiers didn't serve out.
Thank you Bob Woodruff and ABC for bringing this to light .. for showing what goes on when the GI's come home after daring to get wounded. TBI and PTSD are wounds. To say they aren't facing a lifetime wound because of the trauma they received in combat is the equivalent of telling a GI with his legs blown off it was his fault he drove over an IED.
And how many soldiers are afraid to seek treatment because they don't want to be kicked out for being mentally deficient?
I am fuming mad and have called and written my Congress critters.
Here .. a video is worth a thousand words:
After serving our country honorably and going to war, they are simply thrown away.
Doesn't it make you proud to be an American?
