10 Suicides a Month at Ft. Hood -- War Stress Is Taking Soldiers to the Brink
Responding to the allegations in the media that the attack was based on his Muslim faith, Kern told IPS that he did not know of anyone on the base who felt this was the case.Military retains religious zealot, boots gays
"We all wear the same uniform here, it's all green. I've seen the news, but most folks here assume it's just a soldier that snapped," Kern explained. "I have not talked to anyone who thinks what he did has anything to do with him being a Muslim. There are thousands of Muslims serving with dignity in the US military, in all four branches."
Fort Hood, located in central Texas, is one of the largest US military bases in the world. It contains up to 50,000 soldiers, and is one of the most heavily deployed to both occupations.
Tragically, Fort Hood has also born much of the brunt from its heavy involvement in the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. Fort Hood soldiers have accounted for more suicides than any other army post since the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. This year alone, the base is averaging over 10 suicides each month - at least 75 have been recorded through July of this year alone.
In a strikingly similar incident on May 11, 2009, a US soldier gunned down five fellow soldiers at a stress-counseling center at a US base in Baghdad.
Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the US military's Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at a news conference at the Pentagon at the time that the shootings had occurred in a place where "individuals were seeking help".
Mullen added, "It does speak to me, though, about the need for us to redouble our efforts, the concern in terms of dealing with the stress ... It also speaks to the issue of multiple deployments."
Commenting on the incident in nearly parallel terms, US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said that the Pentagon needs to redouble its efforts to relieve stress caused by repeated deployments in war zones that is further exacerbated by limited time at home in between deployments.
The condition described by Mullen and Gates is what veteran health experts often refer to as post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.
While soldiers returning home are routinely involved in shootings, suicide and other forms of self-destructive violent behaviors as a direct result of their experiences in Iraq, we have yet to see an event of this magnitude on a base in the US.
To many, the shocking story of a soldier killing five of his comrades did not come as a surprise considering that the military has, for years now, been sending troops with untreated PTSD back into the US occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.
President Obama correctly stated that people should not "rush to judgment" regarding the motivation of Nidal Hassan -- the individual who killed 13 people at the Fort Hood military base. Unfortunately, the public often races to assign a collective narrative to extremely violent events. Typically, the earliest narratives rest on gross stereotypes and, consequently, miss the mark. For example, many commentators assumed that Arab terrorists bombed the Oklahoma federal building, until they learned that Timothy McVeigh -- a disgruntled, white, former member of the military -- committed the heinous crime.
Recent acts of mass violence have pitted liberals and conservatives against one another. Both sides have argued that the killers' ideologically laced statements prove the bankruptcy of the others' political views. Neither side, however, seems to understand or appreciate the deep psychosis that causes acts of mass violence.
While mass murderers often embrace extreme political or religious views, mental illness makes them susceptible to extremism in the first place.
