Suicides at 10-year high in US military

[alp227]

Source: AP

Suicide is on the rise in the US military, averaging almost one every day, according to statistics.

In the first 155 days of 2012 there was 154 suicides among active troops, around 50% more than the number killed in action in Afghanistan, according to Pentagon statistics obtained by Associated Press. This is the highest number in 10 years.

The numbers reflect the burden of conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to experts. The military is also struggling with increased sexual assaults, alcohol abuse, domestic violence and other problems.

Suicides had levelled off in 2010 and 2011, but this year's surge has caught officials by surprise.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jun/08/suicide-rise-us-military

[emilyg]

1. Very sad.

[flamingdem]

2. Here's the communication people don't want to hear

A war that was a shameful, with horrific consequences.

[sakabatou]

3. Almost every war, if not all, has that.

[Festivito]

4. Sounds like official incompetence. Surprised by something normally seen.

They should increase availability of help as a war winds down.

"caught officials by surprise" and "We've seen before that these signs show up even more dramatically when the fighting seems to go down"

[era veteran]

5. But I put a magnet on my car a couple of years back.

Chickenhawks start shit and throw away Vets.

[Baitball Blogger]

6. Thank you George Bush.

This just doesn't happen over night. That pinhead Bush thought he was going to Shock and Awe and get Sadaam in the first hour of the strike using the element of surprised. He told all his pinheads cronies that nobody would die. And when it all went to hell, instead of taking responsibility for his mistake, he made us all feel unpatriotic for realizing the obvious. Perpetual War is not a strategy.

Why has history not been more unkind to Bush?

[FiveGoodMen]

8. "Bush thought he was going to Shock and Awe and get Sadaam in the first hour of the strike"

OR

Bush's handlers -- Rove and Cheney -- thought that would be a good way to talk Americans into what they always knew would be a never-ending war.

[marions ghost]

7. Says it all, doesn't it?

What a shameful, stupid enterprise.