SUPPORTING THE TROOPS THE BUSH WAY

I have just read something I can’t believe. Our government is cheating our wounded soldiers out of their disability and medical benefits.

Yes, I guess I can believe it knowing how the Bush administration operates, but it’s hard to think that our government can treat our soldiers in such a harsh, non-caring way after they have put their lives on the line for this very same government..

In the April 9, 2007 issue of “The Nation” magazine I learned that the government is trying to renege on paying wounded soldiers their disability pay. According to Regulation 635-200, Chapter 5-13 they can shirk their responsibility by stating that the wounded soldier has a Personality Disorder. This is a quick and cheap method for a cash-strapped military to cheat the soldiers out of a lifetime of disability and medical benefits and save billions in expenses.

In Ramadi, Iraq, one soldier, Jon Town survived a 107 mm rocket that hit just two feet from his head. He was knocked unconscious, bleeding from his ears, shrapnel cutting into his neck and his hearing gone.

He spent the next three years struggling with deafness, memory failure and depression. The army finally agreed he was no longer combat-ready. Instead of sending Town to a medical board and discharging him they claimed Town’s wounds were actually caused by a “personality disorder”. Under a personality disorder discharge, he would never receive disability or medical benefits. And this was a soldier who was honored twelve times in seven years

The military says that soldiers discharged under 5-13 can’t collect any benefits because a personality disorder is a pre-existing condition and the VA is only required to treat wounds sustained during service.

Many soldiers have returned from Iraq to find the same thing happening to them. This has infuriated many in the military community, including the injured soldiers and their families, veterans’ rights groups and even military officials required to process these dismissals.

Wait, there’s more. If a soldier dismissed under 5-13 hasn’t served out his contract, he has to give back a slice of his re-enlistment bonus as well. After being discharged, a soldier can find that he owes the government several thousand dollars.

Military doctors are aiding in this subterfuge by telling the soldiers that if they go along with a 5-13 discharge, they not only will get out quicker, they will retain their bonus and benefits. To avoid going back to Iraq, a soldier will take the offer in a heartbeat.

In the last six years more than 5,600 soldiers have been discharged under 5-13 and the numbers keep rising. Across the entire armed forces more than 22,500 soldiers have been discharged because of Personality Disorder.

It is estimated that soldiers discharged under 5-13 are saving the government $8 billion in disability pay and 4.5 billion in medical care.

The Military Diagnostic Manual says that a pattern of erratic behavior in traumatized soldiers cannot be labeled a “personality disorder” if it’s from a head injury.

One soldier said “They put me out on the street to rot; there was no way I could have survived. I would have had to take myself out or had someone do it for me. It’s like a mental rape. That’s the only way I can describe it.”

One lawyer described it as “Right now, the army is eating its own”.

Anyone in favor of supporting the troops the Bush way?

The California Curmudgeon