The Left admit they did something wrong? 
Posted on 11/20/2012 8:34:10 AM PST by kristinn
CALLAWAY — Libby Busbee pounded on the window of her son’s maroon Dodge Charger as he sat in the driveway of their home earlier this year. Locked inside his car, U.S. Army Spc. William Busbee sat with a .45-caliber gun pointed to the side of his head.
“Look at me,” his mother cried out as she tried to get her son’s attention. “Look at me.”
He wouldn’t look.
He stared out the front windshield, distant, Busbee said, relating the story from an apartment complex in Callaway.
“I kept yelling, ‘Don’t you do this. Don’t do it.’ He wouldn’t turn his head to look at me,” she said, looking down at the burning cigarette in her hand.
A 911 call was made. The police pulled her away from the car.
William, Libby Busbee’s 23-year-old son, was talking with a police officer when he fired a shot through the front windshield of his car, according to the police report.
The police recoiled. William rapped on the window in apparent frustration, the report indicated.
Then the second shot was heard.
“I knew that was the one,” said Libby Busbee.
William Busbee took his life in March with his mother and sisters looking on.
Casualty of war?
William Busbee was no casualty of the war in Afghanistan. He was a casualty of his own mind, his mother said.
Libby Busbee bowed her head, talking as she sat next to a bird-of-paradise on the front porch of her apartment. She could no longer live in the home on 12th Street.
“They wouldn’t let me talk to him,” she said, referring to the day her son shot himself. “I know if he was able to see me he wouldn’t have done it.”
According to a Veterans Affairs report this spring, a veteran commits suicide every 80 minutes. More than 6,500 suicides have occurred since the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan began. For every service member who dies in battle, 25 veterans die by their own hands.
According to a Pentagon report, more American active service members have killed themselves in the first six months of 2012 than in the first six months of any of the previous 11 years, The Associated Press reported.
The report reveals 154 service members killed themselves in the first 155 days of 2012 alone. The number of deaths by suicide is 50 percent higher than combat deaths in Afghanistan during the same period and an 18 percent increase over active service member suicides in the first six months of 2011.
And, while only 1 percent of Americans have served in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, veterans of these conflicts represent 20 percent of all suicides in the United States, the VA reported.
SNIP
BTW, I think thee is a term that predates “shell shock,” during the Civil War and after, it was called “Soldier’s Heart.”
Not to be insensitive, one suicide is one too many, but this does not look like an epidemic. Data should be reported in #/100,000 on active duty in order to compare.
I’m not sure it’s reasonable with most suicides to hold commanders responsible. You can’t catch every signal, and you can’t watch everyone 24/7. There are some where signs and symptoms were so pronounced, and the command response so ignoring of what was taking place that you should hold a psych autopsy and then send letters to commander/nco files. I think that’s the exception rather than the rule, though.
I am interested in Guerra’s(sp) ideas, so if you find a link to them, please let me know. Once upon a time, I taught suicide prevention on a regional basis for the Army, but it was prior to Iraq/Afghanistan. I had a few months after 9/11 before I retired. (My posting from that time on FR probably can still be accessed.)
In any case, I’m coming down on the side of deployment tempo as a major culprit until I read something contrary. I think those periods of time when troops go from mind-blowing danger, back to near total safety, back to danger, back to safety mess with people’s heads and both lead them to think of death to much and of their own death and chance of buying it.
Then there are the other losses associated with year-long absences — broken marriages, relationships, financial opportunities,etc. Also, there are the images of horrifying deaths and wounds that accumulate in troops’ memories, and you have significant obstacles that they must deal with.
Couple that with the danger/safety cycle, and you have people whose heads have really been screwed with.
The last war we fought correctly was WWII. People were brought into service for the duration. It’s actually far more merciful to have the troops on active duty until the war is finished than to bring them in, take them out, bring them in, take them out.
Additionally, it forces the nation to either fight the war of get out.
I’m not sure it’s reasonable with most suicides to hold commanders responsible. You can’t catch every signal, and you can’t watch everyone 24/7. There are some where signs and symptoms were so pronounced, and the command response so ignoring of what was taking place that you should hold a psych autopsy and then send letters to commander/nco files. I think that’s the exception rather than the rule, though.
I am interested in Guerra’s(sp) ideas, so if you find a link to them, please let me know. Once upon a time, I taught suicide prevention on a regional basis for the Army, but it was prior to Iraq/Afghanistan. I had a few months after 9/11 before I retired. (My posting from that time on FR probably can still be accessed.)
In any case, I’m coming down on the side of deployment tempo as a major culprit until I read something contrary. I think those periods of time when troops go from mind-blowing danger, back to near total safety, back to danger, back to safety mess with people’s heads and both lead them to think of death to much and of their own death and chance of buying it.
Then there are the other losses associated with year-long absences — broken marriages, relationships, financial opportunities,etc. Also, there are the images of horrifying deaths and wounds that accumulate in troops’ memories, and you have significant obstacles that they must deal with.
Couple that with the danger/safety cycle, and you have people whose heads have really been screwed with.
The last war we fought correctly was WWII. People were brought into service for the duration. It’s actually far more merciful to have the troops on active duty until the war is finished than to bring them in, take them out, bring them in, take them out.
Additionally, it forces the nation to either fight the war or get out.
The modern military is a reflection of the society and its members reflect the increasingly secularized population from which they are drawn.
Excellent points. And there are studies out there that confirm that soldiers from traditional families adjust better than those broken homes. And why should that surprise anyone? If children from broken homes are less likely to be educated and less likely to suceed in life; then if those same young people enter into the horrors of war coupled with an inept military?
It's a wonder the suicide rate is as low as it is.
hint-hint... If such things are going on, I desire not to know. Lowering ourselves to the level of an evil opponent will only create more turmoil for us. We must always take the high road, even though the other is often tempting.
My comments were general, based upon observations, not specific statements by individuals. However, it is not hard to see and understand the bigger picture.
The military gets volunteers who are patriotic American-Americans, heterosexual and have a Western moral and ethical world view.
The military under a leftist regime, is the opposite of that and is hostile to American-Americans.
It’s probably terrible to end up risking your life for leaders who are your opposite and who don’t mind you dying in preference for the Muslims you are supposed to be fighting in a war. This “war” has been misrepresented to soldiers. They are being treated like social workers in service to the gross and hateful mentality of the Taliban/Muslim Brotherhood. Their politically correct leaders are amoral, delusional idiots.
Then, when they get home, they are harassed by ignorant leftist pigs who name their normal recovery and reintegration period, mental illness, and name them dangerous to society. This is worse than the way soldiers were treated after Nam. At least then the amoral leftist pigs were on the outside of society and you had some normal people to deal with when you got home. Now the leftists run society and they hate Americans - especially soldiers.
The suicide rate for military had been half of that for the same age group civilian. It is now approaching equal numbers.
I had two back to back tours in Iraq and am now 100% disabled from PTSD and nerve injuries to my back which requires leg braces to walk. I have to confess that the thought of suicide did cross my mind as a release from horrible memories and the pain of physical disabilities. Being exposed to the blood and guts of combat was bad enough but I still have nightmares at the sight of a woman holding her baby, both shot in the head with the infant having a pacifier in his mouth. This was in one of the mass graves South of Baghdad where tens of thousands of people were massacred. The two factors that kept me from taking my life was the love of my family and my belief in God.
I stood in a hospital room with several special forces guys and one of their own that was shot up pretty bad, including a couple of bullets to the face. The base commander walked over to the wounded soldier, pointed his finger in this young man’s face and said, “I got you covered.” “I got your backside.” Shortly thereafter, this same commander started dishonorable discharge papers against this young man.
Betrayed like this and you wonder why they want to commit suicide. The commander was following his orders from above or he would have lost his job. How can these people sleep at night?
Thank you for serving and for sharing.
Everything was fine. Marriage good, finances good, work going very well, feeling good with God, nothing haunting me, but I wanted to end it. Thank God I thought about everything and questioned "Why?, everything is really good!"
Then I realized the only thing different was the meds. I stopped taking them and was back on an even keel two days later.
It sure surprised me.
I'd rather hurt a little than be in that frame of mind, any day.
Consider, too, I really did not have any problems--which to me only emphasizes the danger of an unforseen side effect.
There is no doubt that the military has its share of jerks in positions of authority. They don’t help the situation, that’s for sure.
Citation, please?
The Left admit they did something wrong?
Well for one thing they didn't have a JAG tagging along on every mission. We are putting fighting men in jail for acts that would have got them decorated in the past.
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