NPR Commentator Ken Harbaugh's "Most Soldiers Return from War Just Fine" (NPR, All Things Considered, 12/6/07) misses the point

Email response to a story heard on NPR:

Commentator Ken Harbaugh's "Most Soldiers Return from War Just Fine" (NPR, All Things Considered, 12/6/07) misses the point and comes dangerously close to glorifying war.

As a psychiatrist who spent several years in the VA system treating veterans from every conflict from World War II to the Iraq, I can assure Mr. Harbaugh that the idea of a generation of traumatized veterans is no myth. The fact that none of his friends seem traumatized by war is anecdotal and misleading. Comprehensive studies conducted by the military and the Department of Veterans Affairs have shown that about a third of those exposed to heavy combat suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder. Many are ashamed of their symptoms, so may not confide them even to close friends, and others do not develop the disorder until years after the trauma.

War, particularly in its industrialized, high intensity, mass casualty modern form, is toxic to the human central nervous system. No one claims that 100% of soldiers are permanently traumatized by their experiences. In small doses, with proper support, training, and rotation, combat will not permanently traumatize most of those exposed, but repeated tours in a hostile foreign land with no clear front lines or rear areas is a recipe for a psychiatric public health disaster.

The fact that someone is proud of their service says nothing about whether they were traumatized. In fact, survivor guilt is more often the rule than the exception.

Mr. Harbaugh engages in some well-intentioned stereotyping of his own, when he implies that a veteran suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder could not be employed, out of jail, or grateful for having served.

As a West Point graduate, I am deeply appreciative of many aspects of military service, but let us never forget the words of President Carter that war, although sometimes a necessary evil, is always evil. I agree that caring for the traumatized veteran is a high moral imperative, but not starting unnecessary wars in the first place is an even higher one.