It is seeing the horrors of war and then coming home to a government that ties your hands. I would imagine that WWII vets who saw the horror of war, could at least take comfort in the fact that the good guys won, and it only took 5 years to win. These poor guys today, see the horror of war and they must ask themselves, “what was the point”. Now, there probably is a good point for their being in combat; some good has probably come from their sacrifice. Good luck finding someone who will actually report on that good.
I just separated from the Army and I spent 11 years on both active duty and reserve status. I’ve been deployed to Kosovo, Iraq, and Afghanistan. I think a problem stems from the long continuous deployments. Some soldiers like it, but a majority of the senior career soldiera despiae it as they have families and lives to attain to. Another large problem are the DoD contractors that make $200,000 a year doing jobs that soldiers used to fill or could fill. Intermingling civilians into the Army has caused a problem with moral that no one speaks of because of the high business costs that these large influential corporations have. My last tour was a mox of 5-6 civilians and 6 soldiers in my shop. When soldiers are disciplined and made to sjave and adher to basic rules they wonder why they are doing their job when they can get out and be a civilian and make loads of cash. The.other issue is that less than 1% of the population serves and when a service member returns home he cannot relate to the rest of society.
Let me apologize in advanced for my grammar, I’m typing this from my cell phone.