Army Cost Reduction, Give Bad Discharge to PTSD Vets

Revelations like this reinforce the reasons why veterans need legal representation at every stage of interaction with the military and VA.

Sep-19-2009 17:50
Full Article: Army Gives Bad Discharges to Thousands of PTSD Vets
Gordon Duff Salem-News.com

(CINNCINATTI, Ohio) - "It all began as a Bush era program, promoted by Dr. Sally Satel, the famed "PTSD denialist" putting thousands of soldiers at risk and pushing hundreds to suicide.

Thousands of veterans lost all benefits, GI Bill, medical care and more through Army discharge scam, part of Neo-con "cost saving program"

How did it work? Simple. A very large percentage of combat vets with PTSD are problem drinkers, self medicating in the only way they can and, in the process, getting worse and worse. Redeployments of soldiers needing treatment only adds to the problem.

When vets with severe PTSD demonstrate severe symptoms, including alcohol abuse, they are put in short and unproven "quit" programs with an extremely high failure rate. This is all part of a game, one invented to trap soldiers and cut costs.

Step 2 in the game, the Army "orders" the soldier not to drink, knowing the order itself is absurd. Real treatment for PTSD is denied. When the soldier drinks, and they always do, the soldier is arrested, jailed and charged, now get this, with disobeying a direct order, Article 34 and disrespect to an officer or non-com.

Sometimes even more charges are piled on. In the end, the deal is the same. Leave the army with nothing but years of honorable service now labeled as "dishonorable" or "bad conduct" and face civilian life crushed and abandoned by the country you risked your life to serve.

The Army learned the game from the VA. The VA denied PTSD diagnoses to Vietnam veterans used alcohol, claiming they couldn't be diagnosed. Problem is, almost all PTSD vets use alcohol or drugs as self medication. End result, tens of thousands of Vietnam vets were denied diagnosis, treatment and compensation for decades with thousand dying as a result.

The basis of the Army policy is the Dr. Sally Satel "theory" that PTSD does not exist and all vets are fakers. Her beliefs, fringe "neo-con medicine" comes from a theory that soldiers and veterans are part of a non-productive social class that taxes a nations economic health as soon as they leave a combat zone. The end analysis supports the supposition that a disabled veteran and an illegal alien on welfare contribute exactly the same to the overall welfare of society."