Another story of just how much we as a society appreciate the contributions of our Military once they are done doing what we ask of them:
Quote:
The War Inside
By Dana Priest and Anne Hull
Sunday, June 17, 2007
Army Spec. Jeans Cruz helped capture Saddam Hussein. When he came home to the Bronx, important people called him a war hero and promised to help him start a new life. The mayor of New York, officials of his parents' home town in Puerto Rico, the borough president and other local dignitaries honored him with plaques and silk parade sashes. They handed him their business cards and urged him to phone.
But a "black shadow" had followed Cruz home from Iraq, he confided to an Army counselor. He was hounded by recurring images of how war really was for him: not the triumphant scene of Hussein in handcuffs, but visions of dead Iraqi children.
Jeans Cruz lives with his family in a Bronx housing project, where a shooting left a door perforated with bullet holes, above. Among the family photographs on their living-room wall, below, hang plaques honoring Cruz for his service and his role in helping capture Saddam Hussein. What the former soldier remembers most about the war, however, is death; he recalls moving the bodies of Iraqi children.
Jeans Cruz lives with his family in a Bronx housing project, where a shooting left a door perforated with bullet holes, above. Among the family photographs on their living-room wall, below, hang plaques honoring Cruz for his service and his role in helping capture Saddam Hussein. What the former soldier remembers most about the war, however, is death; he recalls moving the bodies of Iraqi children.
In public, the former Army scout stood tall for the cameras and marched in the parades. In private, he slashed his forearms to provoke the pain and adrenaline of combat. He heard voices and smelled stale blood. Soon the offers of help evaporated and he found himself estranged and alone, struggling with financial collapse and a darkening depression.
At a low point, he went to the local Department of Veterans Affairs medical center for help. One VA psychologist diagnosed Cruz with post-traumatic stress disorder. His condition was labeled "severe and chronic." In a letter supporting his request for PTSD-related disability pay, the psychologist wrote that Cruz was "in need of major help" and that he had provided "more than enough evidence" to back up his PTSD claim. His combat experiences, the letter said, "have been well documented."
None of that seemed to matter when his case reached VA disability evaluators. They turned him down flat, ruling that he deserved no compensation because his psychological problems existed before he joined the Army. They also said that Cruz had not proved he was ever in combat. "The available evidence is insufficient to confirm that you actually engaged in combat," his rejection letter stated.
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...l?hpid=topnews
Truly we are a broken society if we cannot even live up to the protection of our protectors. This is but one story of thousands to come over the next decade if we continue to fail these soldiers. The type of warfare, combined with advances in technology meant to save lives has increased the number of trauma victims exponentially, and we have not adjusted for this reality in the way we treat mental, and physical damage in the system. I fear we are about to witness an onslaught of returning soldiers who will not be helped as they should be.
We look to the failures in planning for the aftermath of this invasion with dismay, yet we ignore the inevitable failure in planning we might be able to avoid still. The recent Walter Reed scandals should have indicated issues in need of attention, yet I have seen little other than window dressing directed toward the underlying problems.....and it worries me very much.