I had been covering veterans' issues for several years and thought I'd developed a thick skin. But the pain on the other end of the telephone line was difficult to stomach. Sergeant Chuck Luther, now back from Iraq, was describing his journey to hell and back. The worst part, he said, wasn't battling insurgents or even the mortar blast that tossed him to the ground and slammed his head against the concrete — it was the way he was treated by the U.S. Army when he went to the aid station and sought medical help.
In gruesome detail, Luther described what happened to him at Camp Taji's aid station. He thought he would receive medical care. Instead he was confined to an isolation chamber and held there for over a month, under enforced sleep deprivation, until he agreed to sign papers saying that he was ill before coming to Iraq and thus not eligible for disability and medical benefits. "They wanted me to say I had a 'personality disorder,'" Luther told me.
Luther's call did not come out of the blue. For two years I had been investigating this personality disorder scandal: how military doctors were purposely misdiagnosing soldiers, wounded in combat, as having this pre-existing mental illness. As in the civilian world, where people can be locked out of the insurance system if they have a pre-existing condition, soldiers whose wounds can be attributed to a pre-existing illness can be denied disability benefits and long-term medical care.
My reporting began with the case of Specialist Jon Town, who was wounded in Iraq, won a Purple Heart and was then denied disability and medical benefits. Town's doctor had concluded that his headaches and hearing loss were not caused by the 107-millimeter rocket that knocked him unconscious but by a pre-existing personality disorder.
The spotlight on Town prompted military doctors to step forward and talk about being pressured by their superiors to purposely misdiagnose wounded soldiers. One doctor spoke of a soldier who returned from Iraq with a massive chunk missing from his right leg. The doctor quit after he was pressured to diagnose that soldier as having personality disorder.
Since 2001 more than 22,600 soldiers have been discharged with personality disorder (PD), saving the military billions in disability and medical benefits.
My articles on the scandal sparked a Congressional hearing, a Law and Order episode, and before leaving office, President Bush signed a law requiring the Pentagon to investigate PD discharges. In the wake of those developments, I was flooded with calls from soldiers who had fractured bones and been pierced by grenade shrapnel, only to be told that their wounds came from a problem with their personality — a pre-existing illness that had somehow gone undetected with each military screening and only popped up now, after they returned wounded from combat.
Luther was one of thousands severely wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan now facing a lifetime without medical care. I had spoken to dozens of soldiers in his shoes. But his call haunted me. He sent me photos of the isolation chamber. It was the size of a walk-in closet and was crammed with cardboard boxes, a desk and a bedpan. Armed guards monitored him 24 hours a day. Luther told me how they stopped him from sleeping, keeping the lights on and blasting heavy metal music at him all through the night: Megadeth, Saliva, Disturbed. When he rebelled, Luther was pinned down and injected with sleeping medication.
"This was an aid station," he said, "but it felt a lot more like enhanced interrogation than medical care."
After a month, Luther was willing to sign anything — and did. Soon after he signed his name to a personality disorder discharge, he was whisked back to Fort Hood and informed about a PD discharge's disastrous consequences. No disability pay, no long-term medical care, and because he didn't serve out his contract, he'd have to pay back a portion of his signing bonus. "They told me I now owed the Army $1,500."
I would spend the next two years investigating Luther's case: reading the stacks of medical records written by Luther's doctors, which document his confinement; talking with a fellow soldier who visited Luther during his month in the aid station; and interviewing his commander, who confirmed all the details.
This week Sergeant Luther's hellish struggle is featured on the cover of The Nation. As word of his story and the larger personality disorder scandal spreads, my phone is ringing again, this time with people asking what they can do to help these soldiers. I tell them: Share the article with friends, family, colleagues, your representatives in Congress.
America needs to know what is happening to our soldiers.
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I've always thought that the real cure for our culture of war is the experience of living with the consequences. And we unfortunately have to do that through the stories of those who've gone through it.
You don't have to do it through stories... you can experience it firsthand!
www.goarmy.com
Just last year, the Pentagon changed its definition of "combat-related disabilities," in contravention (in spirit, if not in content) to the "wounded warrior" law passed by Congress this past January of 2009.
Let's take a look at two people directly affected - or infected, as the case may be - by the Pentagoons.
Marine corporal James Dixon has been wounded twice in Iraq; once by a land mine and again by a roadside bomb. His injuries include a dislocated hip, hearing loss, concussion and traumatic brain injury in addition to PTSD.
Army Sgt. Lori Meshell received a shattered hip, crushed back and broken knees incurred while diving for cover when her unit came under mortar attack.
The Pentagon, in its wisdom, has ruled that in both cases, the injuries were not combat related.
OK - this is cretinous in the extreme. How exactly then did these two soldiers receive their wounds? Who planted the roadside bomb and the mine that blew Cpl. Dixon out of his socks? The Navy SEALs? How, precisely, do you get mortared except but in combat?
Chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Carl Levin (D - Mich) was quoted in an article in the LA Times by David Zucchino as saying that the Pentagon's "more conservative definition" was "not our intent" when Congress passed the act in January 2009.
ratings that these channels must have. Example: Faux noise.
The day of journalism is over. Newspapers are folding all over the country. Battles that are won, and make Americans feel good about ourselves are the only news.
Since the era of Richard Nixon,. all journalists seem to have the investigator complex, but want to destroy the lives of politicians, public figures, and pound on sports/movie stars...but no real news stories.
We could complain to the FCC. It is my understanding (someone correct me if my information is wrong) that this agency cannot control cable news...only broadcast media. ALL cable has to be broadcast somewhere, even if the feed is only to satellites. The American People own the airways, and the FCC controls broadcast waves.
It is time the FCC steps up. Fox, under the First Amendment can have their opinionated show, with rude and outright stupid staff. But call it what it is...or is not
Community standards have truly fallen since the rise of cable TV, and that should stop. Cable does not go from studio to house without going through the airways somewhere.
This story will never be known if true or false until a real journalist writes on a defined and stable platform..Otherwise...don't plan on TV or Radio for news. Not in America!
Anyone else feel as I do? Speak up!
David
Anyone with more than a passing familiarity with the War clearly knows what Suicide Watch at the Aid Station looks like. Every Aid Station has one designated as part of their SOP just like they have a place to wash hands and a place to dispose of Med Waste.
It's also a requirement that the lights stay on (a logsheet is required to keep eyes on the patient) and, well... have you ever pulled all night CQ or Staff Duty? There is loud music. And coffee. And storytelling. It's tons of fun in a time-moving-backwards kind of way.
This sad sack is a disgrace to himself and his unit, and it's very clear that this is a fraudulent story with a sensational headline. And why is there no mention of his previous grip about not being allowed to go home after being medicated for depression? (Army Times- "You Can Deploy on Anything"). And what of his organization that helps Soldier with Bad Conduct Discharges.
To think that this person was ever a Non-Comissioned Officer in charge of young Soldiers makes me cringe...
This is not an isolated incident. Prematurely impugning his service does ALL of us a disservice.
The thought that a callous, knee jerk reactionary with only one side of the story, and no thought to any other side, can speak out so vehemently, could actually BE a member of the Armed Forces gives me pause.....
The photos attached to this story indicate that this Soldier clearly has issues with standards and discipline. As an NCO, he had a duty to his subordinates which he failed to honor. He's a no-go in at least 6 of the 7 Army Values. And this was a Combat Arms soldier???
Upon arrival to theater, he couldn't wrap his head around the light and sound of the place, so he was given a radio to watch. He was medicated, complained about not being allowed to go home (I guess he wasn't having fun?), and eventually was put on suicide watch. Now he wants the world to know that he failed himself and his mission and he's not getting compensated?
This person deserves nothing but public shame for his behavior.
This is a disgrace for all of us!
I think Afghans, Americans and Iraqis are all better off if we pack and leave ME immediately.
What brought down former USSR was not Gorbachev, but it was financial problem that Afghan war was created for USSR.
We have to learn from history and leave ME before it is too late.