Coming Back Crazy

I know "crazy" isn't politically correct but one of my biggest concerns about the war is the condition of the troops when they come home. It is bad enough seeing the footage of maimed, limbless soldiers who smile for the cameras and tell reporters they "don't mind" not having legs or arms or full eyesight but there are going to be thousands coming back with wounds we can't see.

Jeremy Harrison sees the warning signs in the Iraq war veterans who walk through his office door every day — flashbacks, inability to relax or relate, restless nights and more.

He recognizes them as symptoms of combat stress because he's trained to, as a counselor at the small storefront Vet Center here run by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. He recognizes them as well because he, too, has faced readjustment in the year since he returned from Iraq, where he served as a sergeant in an engineering company that helped capture Baghdad in 2003.

"Sometimes these sessions are helpful to me," Harrison says, taking a break from counseling some of the nation's newest combat veterans. "Because I deal with a lot of the same problems."

As the United States nears the two-year mark in its military presence in Iraq still fighting a violent insurgency, it is also coming to grips with one of the products of war at home: a new generation of veterans, some of them scarred in ways seen and unseen. While military hospitals mend the physical wounds, the VA is attempting to focus its massive health and benefits bureaucracy on the long-term needs of combat veterans after they leave military service. Some suffer from wounds of flesh and bone, others of emotions and psyche.

I hope our Veterans hospitals are making extra efforts to accommodate these people. I keep hearing stories of facilities and services being backed -logged and sick (mentally and otherwise) soldiers not getting the services they deserve. It was one thing for the Bush Administration to underestimate the number of soldiers needed to "win the peace" in Iraq. It is for that reason that so many of our soldiers are being injured or killed. But there is positively no excuse for not having an adequate number of healthcare workers and administrative employees to win the wellness of our soldiers when they come home.