[Peace-discuss] Military suicides still increasing

[Ron Szoke]

WAR-ZONE COUNSELORS IN SHORT SUPPLY
Morale Sags Among U.S. Troops in Afghanistan Amid Soaring Violence and Scarcity of Mental-Health Workers
By YOCHI J. DREAZEN

The Army has a serious shortage of mental-health workers in Afghanistan, where morale has fallen among soldiers charged with beating back the resurgent Taliban, according to a new survey.

The Army has roughly 43 psychiatrists, psychologists and other counselors in Afghanistan, but estimates that it needs at least 60 more to ensure that soldiers serving there have ready access to help.

Those shortfalls will likely worsen if President Barack Obama decides to order tens of thousands of fresh troops to Afghanistan next year.

"Everyone acknowledges that there's a shortage of behavioral health providers," said Lt. Col. Paul Bliese, who helped oversee new surveys in Iraq and Afghanistan released Friday.

The repeated deployments of soldiers to both war zones is significantly affecting their overall mental health, according to the surveys.

More-experienced soldiers used antidepressants and other medications at a "significantly higher rate" than soldiers doing their first tours, the surveys said.

The surveys come as the military's mental-health system is facing new scrutiny in the wake of last week's lethal shootings at Fort Hood, Texas, which left 13 people dead and dozens wounded.
[military health]

The suspected shooter, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, is an Army psychiatrist. His relatives say he was unnerved by stories of battlefield horror heard over six years working at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in suburban Washington.

In the days since the shootings, some of Maj. Hasan's former colleagues have said that he performed substandard work and occasionally unsettled them with his fervent religious views.

That is prompting questions about whether hospital authorities should have alerted law-enforcement personnel months ago to concerns about Maj. Hasan.

The surveys were released as the Army confirmed that 16 American soldiers took their own lives in October, as reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal. Last month's unusually high suicide toll has fueled high-level Army concern about the mental health of many soldiers after more than eight years of warfare in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The October suicide figures mean that at least 133 active-duty soldiers have taken their own lives so far this year, putting the Army on pace to break last year's record of 140 active-duty suicides.

The number of Army suicides has risen 37% since 2006. Last year, the suicide rate surpassed that of the U.S. population for the first time.

The new surveys made clear that changing battlefield conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan are being reflected in the well-being of the troops serving in the two countries.

Morale is down in Afghanistan, where violence has soared in recent months.

But troops serving in Iraq, where there has been comparatively little bloodshed of late, have better mental health than they had in the recent past, according to the surveys.

The Army suicide rate in Iraq, for example, stayed steady for the first time since 2004, the report found.

The surveys found that giving soldiers more time at home between overseas deployments dramatically improved their overall mental well-being, an issue that has become increasingly central to the Obama administration's continuing deliberations over Afghanistan.

At a recent White House meeting, the Joint Chiefs of Staff urged Mr. Obama to send to Afghanistan only those troops who have had at least a year in the U.S. between overseas tours.

If Mr. Obama agrees to that condition, many potential Afghan reinforcements won't be available until next summer.

Write to Yochi J. Dreazen at yochi.dreazen at wsj.com
Printed in The Wall Street Journal, 11/14/09, page A5