Military Suicide …outnumbers casualties

The Military’s Suicide Rate Is Much More Complicated Than Combat Stress

Lucy Westcott

Suicide rates have historically been lower in the military, because recruiting tends to weed out some at-risk people (like elderly men, for example, who have

Support the TROOPS….NOT the WARS

a higher suicide rate than the population at large). That changed in 2008, when the number of military suicides surged ahead. The suicide rate for civilians of similar age and demographics to the Army has remained relatively level at around 19 per 100,000 people. But during the last decade of war, that’s changed. In 2013, the Department of Veterans Affairs released the startling figure that 22 veterans were killing themselves every day, or one soldier every 65 minutes.  That’s 8030 in 2013!  …or over 15 times more than in 2012!!
524 suicides in 2012:
by Alan Zarembo
LA Times, June 17, 2013

In data compiled by the Defense Department on military suicides, perhaps the most surprising statistic is that between 2008 and 2011, 52% of service members who took their own lives had never been deployed to Afghanistan or Iraq.
That figure, which challenges the popular belief that exposure to war is the primary driver of a surge in suicides, became the basis for an L.A. Times story Sunday.
But another statistic in the story also deserves attention: 524.
That is the number of suicides in the military in 2012.
To those who have followed the issue, it may seem like a misprint. The Pentagon recently announced that the 2012 total was 349.
The Defense Department, however, has only tracked suicides of military personnel who were on active duty when they died.

SUICIDE CONTEST: Study Reveals Game Among Army Commanders to See Who Could Abuse their Subordinates the Worst

Former Army Anthropologist Looking at Suicide Causes Found Numerous Cases of Army Leaders Who Held Competitions to See Who Could “Smoke” their Troops the Worst … and Push them the Brink of Suicide

by Daniel Zwerdling
National Public Radio, Feb. 6, 2014

*Editor’s Note – This story perhaps explains better than any so far in the reporting of military culture, and why so many young men and women would rather die than continue serving in the military. The “toxic leader” issue has been mostly ignored by reporters and experts examining the circumstances behind military suicide. This report is shocking, and in this writer’s opinion, reveals criminal behavior among Army leaders charged with the health and welfare of their subordinates.

Army wife’s campaign highlights combat stresses

 

Broken by Battle
Wounded by War

My Love is Forever
To you this I swore

I Will Quiet your silent screams
Help Heal your shattered soul
Until once again
My Love

You are whole

– The Battling Bare Promise

!!WAKE PEOPLE UP!!  Support the veterans / soldiers…NOT THE WARS !!