Weight of Combat Gear is Taking Toll on Our Iraq and Afghanistan War Service Members

Posted on February 2, 2009 by Team VCS

February 1, 2009 – Carrying heavy combat loads is taking a quiet but serious toll on troops deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, contributing to injuries that are sidelining them in growing numbers, according to senior military and defense officials.

Rising concern over the muscle and bone injuries — as well as the hindrance caused by the cumbersome gear as troops maneuver in Afghanistan’s mountains — prompted Army and Marine Corps leaders and commanders to launch initiatives last month that will introduce lighter equipment for some U.S. troops.

As the military prepares to significantly increase the number of troops in Afghanistan — including sending as many as 20,000 more Marines — fielding a new, lighter vest and helmet is a top priority, Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway said recently. “We are going to have to lighten our load,” he said, after inspecting possible designs during a visit to the Quantico Marine base.

Army leaders and experts say the injuries — linked to the stress of bearing heavy loads during repeated 12- or 15-month combat tours — have increased the number of soldiers categorized as “non-deployable.” Army personnel reported 257,000 acute orthopedic injuries in 2007, up from 247,000 the previous year.

As injuries force more soldiers to stay home, the Army is having a harder time filling units for upcoming deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq, said Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, the service’s vice chief of staff.

“There is no doubt that [in] our non-deployable rates, we’re seeing increase,” he said. “I don’t want to see it grow any more.”

The number of total non-deployables has risen by an estimated 2,000 to 3,000 since 2006, putting the current figure at about 20,000, according to Chiarelli. “That occurs when you run the force at the level we’re running it now,” he said.

“You can’t hump a rucksack at 8,000 to 11,000 feet for 15 months, even at a young age, and not have that have an impact on your body, and we are seeing an increase in muscular-skeletal issues,” Chiarelli told reporters last month.

The top U.S. commander for eastern Afghanistan, where the bulk of U.S. troops in the country operate, has issued a formal request, known as an operational needs statement, for lighter body armor for troops there. The new equipment, called a “plate carrier,” would protect vital organs and weigh less than 20 pounds. It would not include additional pieces that troops currently use to shield sides, shoulders, arms, the groin and other areas — pieces that, with a helmet, weigh about 35 pounds.

Commanders would determine in what circumstances troops could wear the lighter gear, which would make it easier to maneuver when pursuing insurgents over rugged terrain at high altitudes.

“Our dismounted operations are occurring at very high elevations, 10,000 feet and higher, where the air is thinner and it is difficult already to maneuver. You add to that body armor, ammunition and the full load that soldiers carry — it is difficult,” said a military official familiar with the request. “You are operating against an enemy that is very agile — running around in tennis shoes, if that — and they are fleet of foot and can move faster and elude us,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the request had not yet been approved.

Pietro Tonino, chief of sports medicine at Loyola University Health System in suburban Chicago, agreed that the loads troops carry would “absolutely” predispose them to muscular-skeletal injuries over time. “They will get stress fractures or overuse injuries of the back, the legs, the foot,” Tonino said. “Recruits get these stress fractures in their feet all the time just from walking.”

The military has added to its protective gear in recent years to guard against improvised bombs and other threats common in Iraq and Afghanistan, but that has come with a trade-off, as soldiers and Marines routinely carry more than half their body weight into combat.

Individual Marine combat loads — including protective gear, weapons, ammunition, water, food and communications gear — range from 97 to 135 pounds, well over the recommended 50 pounds, a 2007 Navy study found.

In Afghanistan, soldiers routinely carry loads of 130 to 150 pounds for three-day missions, said Jim Stone, acting director of the soldier requirements division at the Army Infantry Center at Fort Benning, Ga. In Iraq, where patrols are more likely to use vehicles, loads range from 60 to nearly 100 pounds, he said.

“It’s like a horse: We can load you down, and you just don’t last as long,” Stone said.

Injuries — the bulk of them muscular-skeletal — are the main cause of hospitalizations and outpatient visits for active-duty Army soldiers, leading to about 880,000 visits per year, according to Army data. The injuries include sprains, stress fractures, inflammation and pain from repetitive use, and they are most common in the lower back, knees, ankles, shoulders and spine. They are one of the leading reasons that soldiers miss duty, said Col. Barbara Springer, director of rehabilitation under the Army surgeon general.

The overall injury rate for active-duty soldiers has increased slightly to 2.2 injuries per soldier each year, according to Bruce Jones, director of injury prevention at the Army Center for Health Promotion & Preventive Medicine at Aberdeen Proving Ground.

Jones confirmed that soldiers “are now carrying heavier loads on our back, so there is a greater opportunity for overuse injuries.” And with the rapid pace of deployments, he said, “you get a chronic back injury, then you don’t recover before the next cycle. . . . You have to go back to theater 100 percent fit,” able to wear the life-saving armor every day.

Sgt. Waarith Abdullah, 34, is struggling to recover at Fort Stewart, Ga., from a lower-back injury that he says was caused by the strain of wearing body armor for long hours each day during three deployments to Iraq and Saudi Arabia.

Abdullah’s injury flared up painfully during his most recent 15-month deployment to Balad, Iraq, where he had to maneuver to search vehicles and stand for 12-hour shifts in guard towers.

“That takes a toll on you, because you have to maintain your center of gravity wearing all that stuff and doing your job,” said Abdullah, of Miami. He wore a Kevlar helmet, body armor with four plates, a throat and groin protector, and shoulder pads, while carrying 10 pounds of ammunition, a rifle, a flashlight and other gear.

“At times, I did think the equipment we were wearing was heavier than usual, but I’m a soldier and I still do my job,” he said. “I think it could be lighter and stronger at the same time.”

During the deployment, Abdullah was allowed to go without armor for 30 days, but the pain returned when he started wearing it again. He returned last July to Fort Stewart, where he is in physical therapy. He is still unable to wear armor but hopes to recover in time for his next deployment.

Maj. Neil Vining, an orthopedic surgeon at Winn Army Community Hospital at Fort Stewart, said many of those sidelined have debilitating lower-back pain. “If their condition makes them a danger to themselves or others, if they couldn’t wear their armor or extricate themselves or others from danger, then they are non-deployable,” he said.

After two tours in Iraq, Staff Sgt. James Otto, an Army mechanic, has undergone nine months of physical therapy, traction and medication for back pain. He hopes that in three to four months he will be able to wear his vest again and switch to a different job so he can stay in the Army. In November, an Army board gave him a six-month probationary period in which he has to prove he can “wear the vest and shoot a weapon again,” he said.

Further evidence of the frequency of the injuries, which have forced some to leave the military, has come up in studies of veterans.

Carroll W. McInroe, a former VA primary-care case manager in Washington state, said he has seen such injuries in hundreds of veterans from today’s wars. “Our infantry should not be going into battle carrying 90 to 100 pounds on their backs,” he said. “The human muscular-skeletal system is simply not designed for that much weight, and it will break down over time.”

Army experts say some units are adopting more strenuous exercise routines to prepare soldiers for the strain.

At Fort Drum, N.Y., the 10th Mountain Division readies its troops for Afghanistan using aggressive strength training. Command Sgt. Maj. Joe Montour said the training, which involves pull-ups and other drills while wearing full body armor, helped reduce injuries by 45 percent.

Also, the Army is now deploying a physical therapist with most active-duty combat brigades, said Lt. Col Nikki Butler, a senior rehabilitation specialist. And the Army recently held its first two-day summit devoted to tackling the issue.

“We refer to soldiers as tactical athletes,” Butler said. “You want to help take care of them early so they can get back in the game.”

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Soldier in Fort Carson Warrior Transition Unit Complete Suicide at Colorado Home

Posted on February 2, 2009 by Team VCS

Nearly 70 coldiers died in WTU’s first 16 months.

February 1, 2009 – The last person Spc. Larry Applegate is known to have spoken to before killing himself was a sergeant with the El Paso County Sheriff’s office in Colorado Springs, Colo.

His words, according to a spokeswoman, foretold a tragic ending.

“One of the sergeants talked with him briefly on the phone,” said the spokeswoman, Lt. Lari Sevene. “He was making suicidal statements.”

Applegate, according to Sevene, who cited preliminary deputies’ reports, was arguing with his wife around 10:30 p.m. on Jan. 16 in their two-story home in the Widefield area of Colorado Springs when he fired a couple of rounds, causing her to flee the house.

He pursued her, fired a few more rounds, then holed himself up inside the house. Using a .45-caliber handgun and an M16 rifle, Applegate fired multiple rounds inside the house, tearing up the couple’s belongings and firing shots through the front door, where sheriff’s deputies had surrounded the house in a standoff, Sevene said.

Agents with a special weapons and tactics team went into Applegate’s house at 12:25 a.m., about 30 minutes after the gunfire stopped, and found him dead with a gunshot wound to the head, Sevene said.

No one else was hurt and the case is still under investigation.

Applegate, 27, was an infantryman who had deployed to Iraq for a year in December 2005 with 1st Battalion, 68th Armor, 4th Infantry Division. Since February 2008, he had been assigned to the Warrior Transition Unit at Fort Carson for an undisclosed ailment.

Because of its public nature, his case is one of the most vividly detailed of the more than 70 soldiers who have died while assigned to one of the Army’s 36 WTUs, but suicide is not the leading cause.

According to data compiled by the Warrior Care and Transition Office, 68 soldiers died while assigned to a WTU between June 2007, when the wounded warrior care units were established, and Oct. 31, 2008.

Of those, nine were ruled suicides; six cases are still pending investigation; 13 were killed in accidents; and 35 were deemed to have been from natural causes.

“We do have warriors in transition who have died of cancer while under our care,” said WCTO spokesman Robert Moore, who said there have also been heart attacks.

Roughly 30 percent of the 9,000 soldiers currently assigned to WTUs live in barracks. The rest live in post housing or in private homes off-post with their families, he said. They are essentially outpatients who report to the WTU as most soldiers report to work each morning. Not all of the soldiers assigned to WTUs are there because of war wounds.

Of the 13 deaths that were ruled accidents, six were described as being the result of “combined lethal drug toxicity.”

“We have lots of safety procedures in place to ensure the proper medications are administered, but we’ve run into situations where soldiers go out and get medications of their own or get alcohol and that can be lethal,” Moore said. “Even though they’re counseled, some incidents do occur.”

Four soldiers were listed as having been victims of homicide because they died as a result of war wounds, and one homicide was listed as a non-war gunshot wound.

In addition to Applegate’s death, the Fort Carson WTU, whose population stood at 533 as of Jan. 22, has had two other deaths.

The death of Spc. John Conant on April 9 at his off-post home was determined to have been from natural causes and the death of Spc. Leland Tyrone on Dec. 20 is still under investigation. He was found dead in his barracks room, according to Fort Carson spokeswoman Karen Connelly.

At Fort Stewart, Ga., where the WTU had about 450 warriors in transition as of mid-December, the deaths of two soldiers found in their barracks rooms are still under investigation.

Spc. William Smith, 27, was found on Jan. 9, and the body of Pvt. Michael Bloomquist, 19, was found Jan. 17. They were both assigned to the WTU.

WTUs were part of the Army Medical Action Plan developed in March 2007 after reports revealed that wounded soldiers returning from the war zones were living in substandard housing at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., while they awaited evaluation by a board.

The soldiers assigned to WTUs are referred to as “warriors in transition,” and their numbers have fluctuated in the 19 months since the units were created to replace understaffed, peacetime-era medical hold units.

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NATO Figures Show Surge in Afghanistan Violence

Posted on February 2, 2009 by Team VCS

January 31, 2009 – Violence in Afghanistan soared by nearly a third last year, the highest rise since coalition operations in the troubled country began more than seven years ago.

According to new Nato statistics obtained by the Observer, violence rose by 31{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d}, taking levels of fighting to a new peak of intensity. In 2007 there were around 5,000 “violent incidents” in the 20 worst-affected districts of the country. Last year the total rose to around 7,000.

Nato officials said the sharp rise was “in large part” due to more international troops pushing into areas that were previously without any military presence – such as the major deployment of US marines to the southern province of Helmand where UK forces are based – provoking more combat.

But the officials admitted that Taliban insurgent activity, particularly the targeting of the softer targets of Afghan government officials, soldiers or loyal tribal elders was also a factor. Incidents involving remote-controlled bombs were up 33{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d} in 2008 and constituted the single largest cause of casualties among coalition troops, among whom the number of deaths rose by 11{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d}.

“We have seen a tactical shift with the insurgents using [remote controlled] roadside bombs and similar tactics against western troops while attacking local forces, such as policemen or elders, more conventionally,” one Nato official said. “However it is important to stress that the violence remains geographically limited.”

The new figures underline the enormous challenge facing the Kabul government and its international allies as the Taliban insurgency continues to consolidate its hold over large parts of the east and south of the country. Last week critical presidential elections, scheduled for May, were postponed to August due to the threat of violence.

The new Nato statistics reveal that in several areas that had been relatively calm the number of incidents doubled or even trebled. Though the total of attacks, ambushes and other military contacts in provinces such as Wardak or Logar remained relatively low, it is recognised that Taliban power and influence has grown.

Typically the insurgents establish a “parallel administration” in target areas, intimidating local officials, dispensing rough justice, killing opponents and even sometimes collecting taxes before starting military operations against Afghan government and coalition forces.

Nato spokesmen stress that the most intense violence has remained largely within the same 10{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d} area of Afghanistan as in previous years and still only effects an estimated 6{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d} of the population.

However Antonio Giustozzi, author and expert on the Taliban at the London School of Economics said the statistics ignored increasingly widespread reports of Taliban propaganda, intimidation and the presence of small groups of armed men. Equally there was often no violence because “there was no one for the Taliban to fight against”.

“It does not mean the Taliban are not active; it means that the district is under their complete control,” he told the Observer.

The Nato statistics do however show a sharp drop in violent incidents in Kabul itself and the province around the capital, though officials admit that crime in the capital has risen.

“The attacks that we have had in Kabul have been very spectacular but that has disguised an overall drop in the level of violence,” said one Nato official. Last year saw high-profile strikes on the city’s only luxury hotel, a military parade and the Indian embassy. Nato spokesmen cite polls late last year showing that 24{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d} of Afghans felt security was improving. Only 19{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d} believed it was getting worse.

The US president, Barack Obama, has pledged to refocus efforts on Afghanistan and neighbouring Pakistan rather than Iraq and to “surge” between 20,000 and 30,000 extra soldiers into the battle against the Taliban over the next 12 to 18 months. International forces have already expanded from 5,500 in 2003 to a current total of around 55,000, including 36,000 Americans.

The US defence secretary, Robert Gates, has made it clear that the new administration has abandoned ambitious plans to build “a central Asia Valhalla” in favour of more a pragmatic, security-based agenda. Such views are increasingly held by soldiers, defence officials and diplomats in European capitals and London. “We have to ask what our bottom line in Afghanistan is. And that is that it does not pose a security threat to us. Beyond that everything is a bonus,” said one western diplomat interviewed in Pakistan last month.

The new American commitment of resources is unlikely to be matched by European Nato partners. The British government has so far only said it will dispatch a further 300 soldiers, requested by commanders last year, and it is unlikely that the French, German or Dutch will send more than token forces to a war that is extremely unpopular at home.

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DoD Confirms Role Combat Plays in Suicide Epidemic

Posted on February 2, 2009 by Team VCS

January 29, 2009, Washington, DC – The Army is committed to finding out why more soldiers committed suicide in 2008 than ever recorded, Army officials told reporters during a media roundtable today at the Pentagon.

“[Suicide] is not just an Army problem,” Army Secretary Pete Geren said. “It’s a national problem – we’re committed to doing everything we can to address [the issues] better [and] put programs in place.”

In past years, the Army, which consists of 1.1 million active and reserve troops, has been just below or on par with the national suicide rate, Geren said.

But this year, with 128 confirmed and 15 pending, an estimated 20.2 suicides occurred per 100,000 soldiers, the highest since the Army began recording the figure in 1980. The figure is higher than the national suicide rate, which is less than 20 victims per 100,000 people.

Also, the number of Army suicides increased for the fourth consecutive year, according to the Army’s 2008 Suicide Data report released today.

Army researchers admitted that at least 90 percent of pending suicide cases turns out to be actual suicides. But they explained that there’s no one cause or consistent formula for suicide prevention.

Multiple factors make up the risks and no two reasons are the same, Geren said.

A high mission tempo clearly can place strain on a military, and with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, 12 months or longer deployment rotations and 12 months or less downtime at home, the Army certainly has been busy, Army Vice Chief Of Staff Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli said.

“We all come to the table believing stress is a factor,” Chiarelli told reporters. But he added that 2008 statistics show 30 percent of suicide victims this year were deployed, 35 percent had recently redeployed and 35 percent had no deployment experience at all.

“I think those statistics have to be looked at, and more questions have to be asked,” he said. “But there’s no doubt in my mind that stress is a factor in this trend we’re seeing.”

Chiarelli said it’s important to take a step backward to evaluate what the Army and research facilities already know about suicide and prevention and review them.

Army researchers have come together with the National Institute of Mental Health and the Department of Veterans Affairs to increase the nation’s awareness and understanding in suicide prevention, Dr. Philip S. Wang, director of the Division of Services and Intervention Research at the National Institute of Mental Health, said.

The five-year partnership is the largest research initiative on suicide ever conducted in the civilian and military sectors, Wang added.

“The National Institute of Mental Health is honored and committed to working with the Army to understand the urgency, to identify risks and prevention factors, to develop new and better intervention,” he said. “The knowledge will not only extend to soldiers and their families, but to the civilian population as well.”

Army leaders and researchers agree that reducing the number of suicide victims is a long-term goal, but in the near term, they’ve initiated an Armywide “stand-down” to take place on a day between Feb. 15 and March 15, Col. Thomas Languirand, Army deputy chief of staff for personnel, said.

The stand-down day will offer an opportunity for individual units and soldiers to address problems head on, and will include the latest training videos, materials and methods to identify symptoms and prevent suicide, Languirand explained.

The stand-down will be followed by another 120 days of a “chain-teaching” program, which is intended to be leader-led suicide prevention training, cascaded across the entire Army, he said. The stand-down period and chain-teaching program are mandated training in addition to quarterly and other suicide awareness and prevention training that may occur at the unit level already.

“The Army is concerned regarding where we are with our numbers,” he said. “Any loss of life, especially by suicide, is a tragedy. That tragedy impacts the unit, it impacts morale on that unit – and it impacts the families. It’s extremely important that we get out in front of this – nobody in the Army is satisfied as to where we are with our [past] programs.”

The Army will conduct its next suicide update in April.

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Study: Iraq and Afghanistan War Veterans Feel Disconnected Upon Returning Home

Posted on January 31, 2009 by Team VCS

January 31, 2009, New Britain, CT – Some of the veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan are feeling disconnected from their loved ones, having trouble readjusting to work or school and failing to seek medical care for fear of being stigmatized, researchers from Central Connecticut State University found in a recently completed study.

Findings from the state’s first “needs-assessment study” of recent Iraq and Afghanistan veterans – commissioned so officials can understand this unique generation of veterans and better formulate state programs and policies – were released Friday at Central.

State officials said it was too early to say what specific changes could result from the study, but Linda Schwartz, the state’s veterans’ affairs commissioner, said the data will “help us think out of the box.”

“The war is not over and we don’t know when that will happen,” Schwartz said, “but this needs assessment can help drive some of the actions of the Department of Veterans Affairs.”

Marc Goldstein and Jim Malley, the principal investigators from Central’s Center for Public Policy and Social Research, began the study in January 2007 by meeting with service providers who work with veterans to get their perspectives on veterans’ needs.

One of their top concerns was that veterans’ medical needs were not being adequately addressed, particularly for those suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

“Veterans tend to not want to seek medical care because of the stigma associated with it. If there is one pattern we saw working with all the veterans it’s that they don’t want to be de-normalized. They want to come back and live a normal life,” said Malley, adding that veterans were worried about the confidentiality of their medical information and were unsure of how to navigate the VA system.

Researchers then met with small focus groups of veterans, who said they felt misunderstood and were more comfortable talking with fellow veterans than those who did not serve.

“There was a profound sense of being disconnected form one’s community,” Malley said.

The last phase of the study was a survey mailed to veterans, with 557 veterans completing it for a response rate of about 27 percent.

The surveys were mailed in two sets, with the second batch asking questions about Traumatic Brain Injury. Of the 285 people who responded to that version, nearly one in five would most likely test positive for TBI, Goldstein said.

And 120 of the veterans had symptoms that would “reach diagnosable levels for PTSD” Goldstein said.

These veterans also reported that their jobs could sometimes feel mundane after serving in combat and that school could be a challenge when their classmates had such different life experiences. Those in school were upset that they were told that they would get a free education for their service but then had to pay expensive school fees.

Researchers used this information to compile a profile of a veteran who could have trouble readjusting to civilian life – a person who is young, with less education and no close personal relationship, like a spouse, who served on active duty.

The study recommends starting a public awareness campaign about veterans’ services, developing an early identification and outreach system, creating more support organizations within veterans’ communities, addressing veterans’ concerns about educational costs and continuing a dialogue among service providers about these issues.

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After Campaign Push, Obama Cultivates Military

Posted on January 31, 2009 by Team VCS

January 30, 2009 – The outreach began more than a year ago when Barack Obama, the antiwar candidate who had never served in the military, turned to a group of young officers just out of active duty for a fresh perspective on America’s two wars.

“He asked a lot of questions,” recalled one of the officers, Craig M. Mullaney, a former Army Ranger in Afghanistan who in campaign travels with Mr. Obama told him how his platoon of 35 men had vaccinated camels, worked with tribal elders and been in charge of security for a province the size of Vermont.

That early outreach has since given way to a carefully planned campaign by Mr. Obama to build trust with the military and avoid the mistakes that hobbled Bill Clinton, the last Democratic commander in chief. By Thursday, when the president met for the first time with the Joint Chiefs of Staff in “the tank,” the secure Pentagon conference room, the campaign had progressed to the point that participants left “comforted,” as one put it, about Mr. Obama’s willingness to work with them.

Pentagon officials say they have been relieved that Mr. Obama has so far proceeded slowly on two campaign promises: to pull all combat troops out of Iraq within 16 months and to allow gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military.

Mr. Obama’s aides have signaled that they will avoid an early conflagration involving the military and will wait for months before moving to repeal the 16-year-old “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that requires gay men and lesbians in the services to keep their sexual orientation secret.

“It’s moving prudently,” said Denis McDonough, a top foreign policy aide to Mr. Obama. “I think we’ve seen what happens when you address important policy issues imprudently. It’s not in our interest and it’s not the style of this president.” (Mr. Clinton’s push in 1993 to have gay men and lesbians serve openly created a storm at the Pentagon; “don’t ask, don’t tell” was the compromise.)

Mr. Obama’s cultivation of the military has reached the point that it is already causing unease among some members of his liberal base, who say they will hold him to his promise on troop withdrawals and pressure him to move more quickly on “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

The nation’s largest gay rights lobbying group has called on the president to develop a plan to end “don’t ask, don’t tell” within his first 100 days, and another group is asking that Mr. Obama push for repeal by the end of the year.

“I’d be very concerned if they don’t seize this opportunity in 2009,” said Aubrey Sarvis, the executive director of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, an advocacy group that represents gay men and lesbians in the military. “We take the president at his word, and we plan to keep his feet to the fire.”

The military is not a monolith, but it is safe to say that Mr. Obama was not its candidate in the 2008 election. His antiwar comments ignited the left but struck many in the armed services as naïve. His Republican opponent, Senator John McCain, was a war hero.

Late last year, a survey by The Military Times, while not representative of the military as a whole, found much uncertainty and even pessimism about Mr. Obama among 1,900 active-duty respondents. Not only had Mr. Obama never served, he had one of the most liberal voting records in the Senate and a background that seemed culturally at odds with the more conservative traditions of the armed forces.

And although Mr. Obama’s grandfather served in Patton’s Army during World War II – a fact the candidate brought up on the campaign trail – his own exposure to the military was scant. To educate himself and to establish credentials, he reached out during the campaign, as candidates traditionally do, to retired generals, among them President George W. Bush’s first secretary of state, Colin L. Powell, who endorsed him.

But Mr. Obama also embraced a group of younger officers, all veterans of Iraq or Afghanistan, who provided him with on-the-ground accounts of those two wars and helped build his military fluency.

The group included Mr. Mullaney, 30, a former Rhodes scholar and the author of a coming book about Afghanistan, “The Unforgiving Minute,” who worked as an Obama campaign national security aide in Chicago; Matthew Flavin, 29, an Amherst graduate and former Navy intelligence officer who served in Iraq, Afghanistan and Bosnia and who worked as a campaign national security aide in Washington; and Phillip Carter, 33, an Army veteran and adviser to the Iraqi police in Baquba in 2005 and 2006, who was in charge of veterans’ outreach for the Obama campaign.

The three answered to Mr. McDonough, 39, and Mark W. Lippert, 35, a longtime Obama foreign policy adviser and a former intelligence officer for the Navy Seals in Iraq.

The group is now beginning to spread through the new administration. Mr. Lippert is chief of staff of the National Security Council at the White House; Mr. Flavin is a staff assistant on the National Security Council legal team; Mr. Mullaney and Mr. Carter are waiting for jobs.

Military officials say that a big step in Mr. Obama’s campaign to build their trust was his retention not only of Mr. Bush’s defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, but also his appointment of three other military men to top positions. Gen. James L. Jones, a retired Marine commandant, is Mr. Obama’s national security adviser; Gen. Eric K. Shinseki, the retired Army chief of staff, is secretary of veterans affairs; and Dennis C. Blair, a retired admiral, is director of national intelligence.

“He has in his cabinet a soldier, sailor and marine,” Gen. James T. Conway, the Marine Corps commandant, told reporters last week. “I find that pretty encouraging.” (Technically, General Jones is not a member of the cabinet.)

Pentagon officials also point to early gestures by Mr. Obama that have been symbolic but important to them. Anyone in the military could tell that Mr. Obama took the time to practice the first, crisp salute that he executed on Jan. 20. That evening the new president spoke by video feed to American troops in Afghanistan at the Commander-in-Chief Ball; the weekend before, he laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery and visited wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

There are, of course, difficult times ahead. Not least, Mr. Obama will have to make tough choices about cuts in the military budget. “The services are going to be told ‘no’ a lot more often,” said Andrew F. Krepinevich Jr., a military expert at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a research group. And the president must make even harder decisions about how to meet his promise to have combat troops out of Iraq within 16 months.

Many at the Pentagon consider the 16-month timetable too risky, but the left expects Mr. Obama to deliver.

“We have no reason to believe that he is backing off of his pledge, and we don’t think that’s incompatible with having a good conversation with the generals,” said Eli Pariser, the executive director of MoveOn.org, a liberal group that opposed the war.

Still, Mr. Pariser said, “he knows that there are millions of Americans who voted for him on his pledge to bring the troops home.”

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When War’s Violence Comes Home

Posted on January 31, 2009 by Team VCS

January 29, 2009 –  The Army reported Thursday that at least 128 soldiers took their lives last year – the most since they started keeping records, three decades ago. But sometimes soldiers direct their anger at others – cases of assault against wives and girlfriends are on the rise, and critics say the army is not doing enough about it. CBS News anchor Katie Couric reports in a CBS News investigation that the results can be tragic.
Sgt. James Pitts was a decorated soldier, part of the early ground offensive that stormed Baghdad.

He had spent a year serving with a combat engineer group providing Army operational support.

It wasn’t long before the horrors of war became his daily reality.

“The only thing you could predict was that you were gonna get attacked,” he said. “The worst part of it was … smelling the dead bodies, because it lingers forever.”

The terrifying images began to take a toll.

Pitts began abusing prescription drugs as a way to escape, and reached out to his command for help. He says they did nothing.

When it was time to come home, he hoped the joy of seeing his wife and 9-year-old son would make everything okay.

“I’m just overwhelmed,” Tara Pitts, James’ wife, said at the time. “Excited and relieved.”

But the excitement and relief didn’t last. Her husband was drinking heavily, experiencing flashbacks, having nightmares.

“I can’t sleep, I can’t get the war out of my head. I got my wife saying she doesn’t love me anymore – I got no one in the military I can trust,” James Pitts said.

Family members say despite some obvious problems, no one in the Army required, or even encouraged, Pitts to get psychological treatment when he returned to Fort Lewis in Washington State.

According to a police report obtained by CBS New, Pitts was “increasingly agitated” and had threatened to “put a bullet” through his wife’s head.

Afraid for her life, Tara Pitts obtained a restraining order. She notified his command, who promised to help. But that help never came.

A week later, Pitts murdered his wife, drowning her in a bathtub. They had had a fight – and her screams, he said, set him off.

“It reminded me of those screams of fear with the mortars,” he said. “I grabbed her and she bumped her head – bad. And when I looked down, she was under the water.”

He was sentenced to 20 years without parole.

Pitts feels betrayed by an Army that once applauded his bravery.

“Not only did they turn their back on me, not only did they talk me out of counseling four times, but then they flew in from other units to testify against me,” he said.

Lynn McCollum is the Army Director of Family Affairs.

Couric asked her: “Doesn’t it make you angry to hear these stories about wives who are being killed by soldiers who are actually calling out for help?”

“There’s a tremendous amount of effort going into providing that safety network and assistance for those folks,” McCollum said. “It’s very frustrating and disturbing when we don’t reach everyone.”

The numbers are alarming. In the last decade, there have been nearly 90 domestic homicides and 25,000 substantiated cases of domestic violence at U.S. military installations.

When CBS News looked at the small town of Killeen, Texas, – home of Fort Hood – another disturbing trend became clear. Of the 2,500 domestic violence cases reported to police last year – half of them involved military personel.

The Army developed a “Battle Mind Training” program to help soldiers transition back into life at home and has pledged to increase funding for family advocacy.

Most agree that all the systems and services the military may offer are only as effective as the people willing to use them to help both traumatized soldiers and their potential victims.

Only then, they say, will double tragedies like the case of James and Tara Pitts be prevented.

“Everything that I thought I was, everything that I had lived for a decade – gone,” Pitts said. “Gone.”

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Homelessness Surges as Funding Falters

Posted on January 31, 2009 by Team VCS

January 30, 2009, Seattle, WA – As snowstorms blew into this Northwest city and the economy iced over in December, the occupants of a shelter nestled among industrial buildings on the north side prayed for divine intervention.

“We were hoping for the Christmas miracle,” says Glen Dennis, 41, who was working his way through a residential drug-treatment program at the CityTeam Ministries shelter. Dennis and the other 11 guys in the long-term program -dubbed the “disciples” – also worked each day to prepare for some 50 to 60 overnight shelter guests, and dish up free hot meals to about 100 people. “We kept doing what we were doing, and hoped someone would come by and drop off a big check.”

But the check did not come – even after a coalition of other shelters, nonprofits and local churches tried to pull together a rescue package to keep the shelter open. On Dec. 27, CityTeam Ministries, based in San Jose, Calif., closed the Seattle facility – leaving scores of people to seek food, shelter and sobriety elsewhere. For Dennis, who had been free of crack cocaine for nearly 11 months, the upheaval led to another painful relapse out on the streets.

“It’s a real loss,” says Herb Pfifner, executive director of the Union Gospel Mission shelter in downtown Seattle. “We’re all scrambling to try to handle the growth of homelessness because of the economic situation –  and then the closing of another mission adds more pressure.”

The CityTeam closure is a piece in the expanding problem of homelessness across the nation: Shelters and related services for the homeless are facing funding shortfalls as the downturn takes its toll on state budgets and corporate donations. And while individual donors in many cases are keeping up gifts – or even digging a little deeper for charities that help with urgent needs like food and shelter – the service providers say they are faced with a rapidly growing demand from people losing jobs and homes in the economic crisis.

Less funding, more demand
“A downturn in (overall) funding in this case is accompanied by a surge in demand, so a homeless shelter, food pantry, or job-training program is going to feel it first,” says Chuck Bean, executive director of Nonprofit Roundtable of Greater Washington, in the District of Columbia. “Even if they have 100 percent of their budget compared to last year, they now see a 50 percent surge in demand. Then (they) get into the tough decisions: Do you thin the soup, or shorten the line?”

Even as census-takers fan out in cities across the country this week in an attempt to count homeless populations, advocates and experts point to a bevy of evidence that homelessness is rising and will continue to, most notably among families with children.

Shelters across the country report that more people are seeking emergency shelter and more are being turned away. In a report published in December, 330 school districts identified the same number or more homeless students in the first few months of the school year than they identified in the entire previous year. Meantime, demand is sharply up at soup kitchens, an indication of deepening hardship and potential homelessness.

“Everything we are seeing is indicating an increase,” says Laurel Weir, policy director at the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. “And homelessness tends to lag the economy. So we’re probably seeing the tip of the iceberg here.”

In the foreclosure crisis, the people being displaced from homes won’t likely be on the street immediately, explains Michael Stoops, director of National Coalition for the Homeless.

“The people who have lost homes or tenants in homes that were foreclosed … have downsized, and if that doesn’t work they will move in with family and friends,” says Stoops. “After a while, they will move into their RV in a state campground. The next step is a car. And the worst nightmare for a working, middle-class person or even a wealthy person who has never experienced homelessness is knocking on a shelter door.”

Services teeter on brink
As the case of Seattle’s CityTeam shelter illustrates, many nonprofits serving the poor are working on a shoestring, even in better times. Seattle-area donations to the shelter had to be supplemented from general funds, said Jeff Cherniss, chief financial officer of CityTeam, which operates shelters and food programs in five other U.S. cities.

“We were hoping (the Seattle shelter) could become self-sustaining,” says Cherniss. CityTeam Ministries, a Christian organization funded by donations from individuals, corporations and churches, kept the Seattle facility afloat with help from its general fund for most of a decade, but the 2008 crisis prompted them to retrench.

Every major source of funding is under pressure in the current environment: Charitable foundations – which rely on corporate profits for their seed money and investments to preserve and build those funds – have been forced to pull back grants after taking a massive hit as corporate earnings faltered and stocks plunged.  The National Council of Foundations recently estimated that philanthropic foundation endowments have lost $200 billion in value during the economic crisis.

A few of the largest foundations have, despite losses, promised to maintain or give at higher levels in the face of the crisis. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation this week said it would increase its giving to 7 percent of its assets from 5 percent. And the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation announced three gifts totaling $34 million to help homeowners in Chicago avoid foreclosure and keep renters in homes.

Still, the casualties are mounting. Among them: Atlanta nonprofit Nicholas House, which closed a shelter for families in mid-January so it could safely keep other housing services open. Nearly all corporate donors gave to the organization at lower levels this year, says Dennis Bowman, executive director of the 26-year-old agency. The final straw came when a corporate donation ended, and was not renewed.

“It was directly because of the economy – the business has suffered in this economy, and so can’t provide the funding, which was well over $100,000 a year,” says Bowman.

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Scott Gould Named VA Deputy Secretary

Posted on January 30, 2009 by Team VCS

January 30, 2008, Washington, DC – Today, Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki praised President Barack Obama’s intent to nominate W. Scott Gould as next Deputy Secretary of Veterans Affairs. Gould is currently vice president for public sector strategy at IBM Global Business Services and a former intelligence officer in the naval reserve. He has public service experience at both the departments of Commerce and Treasury.

Shinseki said, “Scott and I share a reverence for those who have served in uniform. He is fully committed to fulfilling President Obama’s vision and my goals for transforming the Department of Veterans Affairs into a 21st Century organization, and he understands the fundamentals that will drive that transformation: Veteran-centric, results-oriented and forward looking.”

Shinseki further said that Gould possesses a unique and wide-ranging set of skills in information technologies, acquisition, budget, human resources and leading the modernization of large, complex organizations. “Scott’s expertise in these areas, as well as his broad experience in the public sector, the private sector and the military, will prove invaluable for better serving our Veterans,” Shinseki added.

Gould worked in the public sector as the chief financial officer and assistant secretary for administration at the Commerce Department and deputy assistant secretary for finance and management at the Treasury Department from 1994 to 1999. As a White House Fellow, he worked at the Export-Import Bank of the United States and in the Office of the White House Chief of Staff.

Prior to his job at IBM, he was chief executive officer of The O’Gara Company, a strategic advisory and investment services firm, and chief operating officer of Exolve, a technology services company.

As a naval reservist, Gould served at sea aboard the guided missile destroyer Richard E. Byrd and as assistant professor of naval science at Rochester University. He was recalled to active duty for both Operation Noble Eagle and Enduring Freedom as a naval intelligence reservist.

During President Obama’s campaign and after his election, Gould was co-chair of the National Veterans Policy Team, Obama for America, and co-chair of the Veterans Agency Review Team for the Presidential Transition Team.

A fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration, Gould is a former member of the National Security Agency’s Technical Advisory Group and the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Board of Overseers. He has been awarded the Department of Commerce Medal, the Treasury Medal and the Navy Meritorious Service Medal and is coauthor of The People Factor: Strengthening America by Investing in the Public Service. He holds a bachelor of arts degree from Cornell University and a masters in business administration and a doctorate in education from the University of Rochester. Gould is married to Michele A. Flournoy, and they have three children: Alec, Victoria and Aidan.

SOURCE U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

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Military Investigates West Point Suicides

Posted on January 30, 2009 by Team VCS

January 30, 2009 – Two West Point cadets have committed suicide since December and two others attempted suicide in the past two weeks, prompting the military academy’s leaders to summon an Army surgeon general’s suicide team to the campus today to investigate the causes.

The suicides are the first since at least 2005. The academy is passing out prevention cards, putting up posters and reviewing its procedures, and it has ordered fresh suicide-prevention training to be completed by today, said Col. Bryan Hilferty, spokesman for the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y.

Some West Point students blamed the problem on the high stress of life at the academy as well as hazing and said there have been as many as five suicide attempts since November. Officials said the two cadets who died had psychological conditions.

“This is a stressful place. It’s the United States Military Academy,” Hilferty said, but he added that “nothing is more stressful here than it has been.”

On Saturday, a freshman cadet took an overdose of medication and collapsed near the gymnasium wearing his full combat gear, according to students and officials. On Jan. 15, a junior put a belt around his neck in an effort to hang himself and later tried to jump out a window, but he was stopped in both instances, they said. Both young men survived.

On Jan. 2, cadet Gordon Fein shot and killed himself while at home in North Carolina on leave, and on Dec. 8 cadet Alfred D. Fox, a junior, took his life at a motel near campus by allowing a helium tank to empty in the room while he slept.

“He never woke up,” said a cadet familiar with the case who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.

The Dec. 8 suicide was counted among the 128 confirmed cases for 2008 announced by Army officials yesterday. An additional 15 await final determination by the armed forces medical examiner.

For the Army overall, the high pace of deployments contributes to an active-duty suicide rate that has steadily risen since 2004.

“There is no doubt in my mind that stress is a factor,” Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli said at a news conference yesterday announcing the 2008 figures as well as new prevention initiatives.

The 2008 suicide rate of 20.2 per 100,000 marked a historic high for the Army, and for the first time since the Vietnam War era it surpassed the overall U.S. rate for people of similar ages and backgrounds: 19.5 per 100,000 in 2005, the latest year for which the statistic is available. It marks a jump from the Army’s rate of 12.7 per 100,000 in 2005, 15.3 in 2006 and 16.8 in 2007.

“Why do the numbers keep going up? We can’t tell you,” Army Secretary Pete Geren said at the Pentagon news conference. But, he said, “every suicide is a crisis we take personally. This is a challenge of the highest order for us as an Army.”

In a prevention effort, the service will conduct a “stand-down” from Feb. 15 to March 15 to identify soldiers at risk for suicide, following an extensive education program on suicide prevention that will last until June, Chiarelli said.

The Army also announced a $50 million, multiyear study on suicidal behavior among soldiers to be conducted with the National Institute of Mental Health — the largest single suicide study undertaken by NIMH, according to Phillip S. Wang, the institutes’ director of research.

The Army has also hired 250 new psychotherapists, psychologists and social workers and 40 marriage therapists, because relationship problems within the family or military are the leading factor in suicides, followed by financial and legal problems.

About 30 percent of the soldiers who committed suicide were deployed overseas, and 78 percent of them were on their first deployment. About 35 percent took their lives after deployment. The majority, 53 percent, did so within a year of returning. Another 35 percent of the soldiers had no deployment history, according to Army data.

The number of suicides in Afghanistan, which had ranged from none to two a year, increased to seven last year, corresponding to an increase in anxiety and exposure to combat, said Col. Elspeth Ritchie, an Army psychologist.

None of the West Point cadets who committed or attempted suicide had combat experience, but some students said they believed the intense pressures of life at the academy, as well as constant hazing by classmates, contributed to the tragedies.

For example, they said the freshman, also known as a plebe, who attempted to take his life on Saturday had been mercilessly teased by older students after he sent them an e-mail suggesting he had worked as a private security contractor, according to one of his psychology classmates.

“A lot of guys gave him a lot of crap. No one beat him up, but kids called him” cruel names, the classmate said. “That kind of mentality grows here; once someone gets ostracized, it snowballs.”

The freshman cadet had taken a potentially lethal dose of sleeping medication and painkillers and dressed in his body armor and helmet. He had spoken of wanting to die as an infantry commander in combat, classmates said. Some also pointed to the lack of freedom and days off at West Point as stressors. “Starting in the fall this year, we have only been allowed to have one three-day weekend,” one student said.

Perceived stigma for those who seek help is a continuing problem throughout the Army and also exists at West Point, officials and students said. “They have programs here, but they are so unfriendly, and people are afraid it will affect their careers,” the student said.

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