Waging the Battle at Home

This Memorial Day, as we honor the brave men and women who defended our country throughout history, our thoughts will also be with our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the 35,000 here at home who have been physically injured since those conflicts began.

It's time to extend that honor to those who have sustained the hidden injuries of war.

Today, the wounds we see are often coupled with the ones we cannot. According to a RAND report, some 300,000 U.S. troops are suffering from major depression or post-traumatic stress; 320,000 have sustained traumatic brain injuries.

This isn't about politics, or about the war. It's about the warrior. Most troops wounded in combat are surviving their injuries. They fought our country's battles. Now they fight their own.

Returning from combat to civilian life, many face intense cognitive and psychological issues, fall into substance abuse, experience depression and anxiety. A growing number are severely rent burdened, 500,000 paying more than 50% of their income on rent. Their own personal struggles reveal the larger social issues like suicide and homelessness our nation will be required to address.

We must redouble our efforts to return our soldiers home to the assistance they need to reintegrate into society. We can do this in three ways.

First, education. After we raise the flag, we must raise awareness about the physical and psychological wounds of war, and what's required for injured service members and their families to have successful futures.

We've started talking about the tough issues. But we need everyone to lend an ear. From the halls of government, to community center bulletin boards, to online chat rooms, we must work through every channel to foster an open dialogue that empowers communities nationwide to take action.

Second, investment. We need more money, and proven places to put it.

Financial needs during recovery often exceed what the government is currently structured to provide, forcing those who give up their jobs to be the primary caregiver to bear undue financial burdens. We must move beyond deliberations and pilot programs and compensate those who care for our injured men and women.

Funding is also needed for transitions not covered by the DOD or VA, such as the periods between treatment and rehabilitation, or between active duty pay and VA benefits.

Outside these funding disparities loom larger questions over where precious dollars should be spent, and who should spend them. Local charities have been highly effective in meeting needs government alone cannot.

One charity built a state of the art Warrior and Family Support Center in San Antonio, TX, so injured service members and their families have a place for respite and recreation during their long rehabilitation.

Another in Jacksonville, NC is helping seriously injured soldiers in remote locations adapt their homes with accommodations for therapeutic treatment.

In New York City, a leader in supportive housing is building residences for homeless and low-income veterans, while another is training campus professionals to help student veterans deal with trauma and move on to productive college experiences.

Together, enterprising communities across the country are showing our injured soldiers the impact they can still have and helping them find reward in a life beyond recovery.

Third, collaboration. We must work together to identify, fund and replicate innovative programs like these to serve unmet needs, fill the gaps where government falls short and make existing programs better.

To do this well, we must bridge the chasm between the public and private sector, sharing information across civilian and military cultures and political lines to find solutions.

Changes in the Department of Defense and new leadership in the VA under General Shinseki are promising, but incomplete steps. The

DOD's new Wounded Warrior program will help us better address the needs of the wounded in the acute phases of treatment and provide much needed non-medical support to families. But funding to track and support injured service members for the long term is still lacking. As our troops come home, we will need fresh ideas, and the broadest level of collaboration, to solve the complex issues related to the return of service members to civilian life.

As we consider those who risked their lives to protect the freedoms we enjoy, we should consider this: Memorial Day shouldn't end when the last picnic is over. More than a holiday, it's an enduring symbol of the responsibility we share to ensure that "support our troops" -- including those with hidden injuries -- isn't just a slogan. When the general orders for Memorial Day were drawn up, it was written that the people should in their own way arrange such fitting services and testimonials of respect as circumstances may permit. The best memorial we could build to America's veterans is a homefront ready to support them.

Bob Woodruff is an anchor with ABC News and co-founder of The Bob Woodruff Foundation, which provides resources and support to injured service members, veterans and their families. Seriously injured by a roadside bomb while reporting in Iraq, he has returned to the air and covers a variety of issues from around the globe. To donate to the military through his Foundation, click on www.remind.org.

Comments

[Bruce Findlay]

Mr. Woodwards assertion "One charity built a state of the art Warrior and Family Support Center in San Antonio, TX, so injured service members and their families have a place for respite and recreation during their long rehabilitation..." is very misleading...unless the US Army is a charity. It is too bad that a reporter of his standing makes such comments without fact checking.

http://www.army.mil/-news/2007/09/24/4994-new-san-antonio-center-for-wounded-warriors-to-replace-current-facility/
FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas (Army News Service, Sept. 24, 2007) - A new Warrior and Family Support Center being built here will be 10 times the size of the current facility.

[Lavina]

What we need to do is change our foreign and domestic policies. What we have stinks.

[zitlight73]

The way this country has treated its veterans is a disgrace. Using them for props for presidential photo ops, then trying to cut their benifits or in many cases denying benifits altogether for bogus claims of "pre-existing conditions" that would have or should have kept them out the military to begin with if they were true. On Coast to Coast AM Dr. Ann Blake Tracy reported how many of these troops are coming home and given these, I think dangerous, serontonergic drugs, with very little if any consuling. One man whose lost two sons one In Afghanistan and then another who was on these drugs just died in his sleep once he returned to civilian life. This man has since found out this case wasn't an isolated one.

[ProfessorDuh]

Patriotism is, often, a societal recidivism to primitive tribal bloodlust, no more admirable than the howls of support for one’s team at a football game.
 If we were to effectively demand that our nations’ governments work in the interest of justice, honesty, humanity and democracy, patriotism would be justified but unnecessary. And if we don’t demand those things from our nations’ governments, what we get won’t justify patriotism.

[provgrays]

Sadly, "Support Our Troops" for many is only a magnetic car badge near the check out lane at WalMart.

[Lellie]

Mr. Woodruff!
I saw you and your wife interviewed on TV last week regarding your foundation and want to thank you for not trying to reinvent the wheel, but for making sure money raised goes to already existing, solid organizations ... a great idea.
I'm so glad to see how well you've recovered from your devastating injuries and wonder how your camera-man­/videograp­her is? I may be mistaken, but I believe he, a Canadian, was also injured.
I'm neither a veteran, a spouse of one, nor an American, but I wish you the very best with this worthy endeavour and hope it might inspire a similar concept here in Canada (for our returning injured soldiers from Afghanistan and elsewhere) where our health-care system doesn't fill a need.
Congratulations and thank you for the inspiration!

[robert234]

To avoid the Orwellian militarism that spews forth every Memorial Day, I begin celabration by reading portions from journalist Edwin Black's and historian Howard Zinn's books. Then at our family picnic, we open with Mark Twain's "The War Prayer". We end the celebration without the blood of innocents on our hands.

[Spud777]

Actually Mr Woodruff, taking care of Veterans is just a slogan for far too many people (except on Memorial Day and Veterans Day. Just watch and read the news and see almost daily how the military and the Department of Veterans Affairs treats injured veterans. Go to a VA Medical Center and see far too many workers have an apathetic view of Veterans. Most employees are not Veterans themselves and many of them think Veterans are "getting something for free" and it shows in their attitude. For many of them it is simply a job to suffer through and go then go home. I know I have seen it all first hand for many years.

[donnajr]

and it's 1,2,3 what we fighting for? don't ask me,i don't give a damn.next stop is Pakistan.

[recorsini]

With all due respect to Mr. Woodruff -- the first thing we should hear from him is an apology for having been part of the propaganda aparatus that delvered America into a state of war. Mr. Woodruff needs to address the soldiers, many of whom were infused with irrational patriotism by the pathetic mainstream news media acting as boosters for Bush and his pack malfeasant minions. If Mr. Woodruff has any digninty and'or compassion for the soldiers who served and are serving -- he should radicalize himself and chain his body to the White House gates until the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan are initiated. I'm truly sorry for what happened to Woodruff -- but I think it's time to end the charrade of Bush and Cheney's war on terror, bring the armies home immediately and start healing the nation and world from these horrific crimes. The longer we wait, the more people will die needlessly. Mr. Woodruff is well positioned to facilitate this, if he has the courage.

[Garybot]

You're going to have to face the fact that it now is OBAMA'S war on terror - so I guess that also makes it his "charade". So why don't you go and chain yourself to the White House gates?

[recorsini]

I agree it's now Obama's pile of steaming crap. The fact of the matter is that nothing will change unless people of notoriety take the step into civil disobedience. Mr. Woodfruff could have a huge impact by condmeing the media andcalling the the war out as a monumental lie and an utterly disaterous waste of huge amounts of money which coiuld be used to repair damage, rather than generating more of it.

[mergina]

Right this minute, as I watch Sunday Morning's spot of the disfigured men and women returning from our wars, I can think of NOTHING but bringing to justice ALL WHO WERE RESPONSIBLE for lying, thieving, and murdering to get us into those wars. Let JUSTICE be the guiding light for our war dead and disfigured because of those wars this Memorial Day and beyond UNTIL JUSTICE IS SERVED.

[MikePatronSaintofTruth]

Support our troops even if they have wreaked unimaginable havoc on a third world country for the purposes of stealing that country's oil --and causing the deaths of over 600,000 innocent men, women and children and 4 million refugees. That's how the rest of the world sees what you Americans have done in Iraq. Your nation is on a willful flight of delusion because to look squarely at what you did, and why you did it is simply too horrific.
Mr. Woodward went to Iraq as part of your government's propaganda to drum up support in the US for Cheney's war --erroneously calling it a war against terror (there were no terrorist threats against the US coming from Iraq)-- for dominion over the world's oil. That's the truth people. I don't blame the vets because they were fed a line of lies from the Bush/Cheney oil lobby. I am not sorry for what happened to Mr. Woodruff ... he was part of the propaganda machine that made the enormous war crimes in Iraq possible. Today, the only reason why Cheney is trying to convince people that America is still in grave danger is because he still needs to cover the war crimes he committed in the name of getting Iraqi oil. That's why he won't release the info about the "energy policy" meetings he had with oil people before the invasion of Iraq.

[BobABooey]

Ummmm, the largest recipient of Iraqi oil sir is Russia and France. Although I agree with you the, US government has been doing wrong around the world for many years, as has a majority of the industrialized nations of the world. But don't forget who some of the biggest beneficiaries of the stabilization of the Iraqi oil fields.

We here in America have been aware of the BushCo. agenda long before G'Dub and Cheney came to power. We the people just don't have the pull around here like we used to. Your statement is not appropriate for this article either. I know Mr Woodruff, I know his family, and they are good people, and I assure you sir, Woody does propaganda for no one.

[researcher]

support our troops while they fight an illegal war

interesting concept

nationalism and patroitism can overwhelm the rational mind

[superstition]

"Support our troops" definitely isn't just a slogan. Maybe it's time for the Pentagon to realize that with regard to Don't Ask Don't Tell.

[sensiblethinking]

Wow. A well thought out, well written article that is not full of radicalization or hate. I'm glad you address the fact that their are limits to government spending on this issue.

While you penned these words calling for additional funding and sources of funding, the president was informing the nation that we are broke and laid the foundation for a massive increase in taxation. That an irresponsible government has spent us broke and over promised and over borrowed. Which leaves me with little hope those the irresponsible people who spent us broke and massively expanded and are still expanding our government have what it takes to reverse it. They believe the only way out is economy stagnating taxes. They have learned that they cannot fund a socialist utopia solely on the backs of the rich.

The vets no doubt deserve more. But we have run out of money for them, for everyone.

[Spud777]

The people that "spent us broke and laid the foundation for a massive increase in taxation" as you state was the GOP. One of the ways they "spent us broke" was massive tax cuts for the ultra rich. I must admit, you do have the "republican talking points down pat", especially nice touch was the socialist utopia you mention. You must really love Boss Limbaugh.

[Garybot]

"They have learned that they cannot fund a socialist utopia solely on the backs of the rich"


Unfortunately, I don't think they are even close to having learned this. The only thing they are really interested in is their power grab, and the best way to get power is to ruin the country in every way and make them dependent on the government.

Makes for an especially sad Memorial Day.