It is our fault that this happened to them. When I say 'our' I mean everyone who is a citizen of the United States. It is in our name that they are there fighting. I know that certain segments of our nation deserve more of a share of the blame, namely those who were in favor of this war from the beginning, but it does not mean that the rest of us do not still share some of it.
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Our troops in Iraq are under an immense amount of psychological pressure. Our troops wear uniforms that clearly designate them as members of the US Armed forces. Anyone in Iraq desiring to attack or kill members of the American military do not have to guess about their targets. Our troops, however, do not have the same ease in identifying friend from foe. US Service People on patrol in Iraq are like sitting ducks with bull's-eyes not just painted on their front, or back, but on every surface and edge. Bullets can come at anytime and from any angle. Improvised Explosive Devices or IEDs can be hidden under any car, in any garbage can, in any store-front and exploded by remote control when our troops come near.
Our troops have seen bullets and shrapnel kill and eviscerate hundreds and thousands of their friends. They have had to work under the constant pressure that this same fate could befall them at any time. Many of our GIs have served two or more six month tours in Iraq under these conditions. A large percentage are mentally collapsing under the strain.
A UPI article "10% at Army Hospital had Mental Problems" quotes Colonel Rhonda Cornum, commander of Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany as saying (at the time of the article, February 18, 2004) 'Between 8 and 10 percent of the nearly 12,000 soldiers from the war on terror, mostly from Iraq, treated at [the hospital] had "psychiatric or behavioral health issues"', http://www.upi.com/...
That was after one year of the war. After nearly four years, how much more has the cumulative effect of the conflict torn at the fabric of our troops' mental health?
We see three clear indications that there is a serious problem:
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