Gays and PTSD

No, the two aren’t related - as far as I know. These are two issues that have been on my mind lately and I don’t feel like writing two separate posts about it.

“I want to know why you think that American men and women in uniform are not professional enough to serve with gays and lesbians.”

This was a planted question raised during the recent CNN/YouTube Republican debate by retired Brigadier General Keith Kerr, an openly gay man. First of all, the question was posed to Republican candidates about a policy created by a Democratic president. Allow me to tell you a story.

I leave the house each morning at 0500 in the morning for PT. The reason I leave so early is so that I can get my PT in before my troops so that I can monitor and/or participate in theirs. My workday starts at 0800 instead of 0900 because my Battalion HQ is on the East Coast - one hour ahead. By coming into work one hour early our company is synched up with Battalion. I don’t have time after PT to go home, take a shower and change, and get back to the office in time. So, I shower at the gym. In the men’s locker room, it’s not uncommon for us to walk to and from the showers naked or wrapped in just a towel (calm down ladies).

As uncomfortable as that is to begin with, at least I have no idea if anyone in that locker room with me is gay. I don’t feel like I have to worry about being seen as having a sexy ass or perfect abs. It’s possible that it may be happening and I don’t know it, but the point is that I don’t know it and I like it that way. Some on the pro-gay side of things may use the argument that “it’s not like gays are mindless, sex driven maniacs just looking for the next butt to tap”. I find that hard to believe. Being attracted to the opposite sex I know exactly how I’d react if I were permitted into a locker room where women are walking around naked. So, that argument doesn’t hold water with me.

The general asks an interesting question. I would ask him this: “Are we?” After all, if we’re so professional - to the point of being able to accept homosexuality - why not just come out earlier? I don’t think it has anything to with being professional at all. I think it has to do with values. The fact is that most people who join the military have high standards and morals. You have to if you’re going to sacrifice so much in the service of your country. You have to believe also that the people around you share similar morals. When I’m walking around in that locker room without any clothes on, I can say with a reasonable certainty that the guys in there with me would rather see a naked woman walking around instead of me.

A few mornings ago as I was getting dressed, a couple of drill sergeants walked in after the morning PT session with their privates. One drill sergeant was talking to another about a Soldier who refused to run and told had told him “you can’t make me run”. The drill sergeant went off on the private and got in trouble for doing so. “We’re not allowed to yell at them,” he told me. “No matter what.” You have got to be kidding me. They can’t stress them out at all as a matter of fact. Contrary to popular belief, there is no such thing as a “stress card”. They don’t need one since they’re not supposed to be stressed out anyway. If a Soldier is disrespectful to an NCO, you simply counsel that Soldier, provide corrective training (tenderly), and/or recommend them for UCMJ (Uniform Code of Military Justice) action like an Article 15 or Article 91 (Insubordinate Conduct Towards and NCO). That might or might not work.

This leads me to my second point about PTSD. For the most part, I believe that PTSD is a sham. Yes, I said it. It’s a sham!! Before I go any further, I want to make it perfectly clear that there ARE legitimate cases of PTSD in the military. Obviously, this article does not refer to those people. You know who they are and they know who they are. I just happen to think that there would be far fewer if we weren’t trying to tap dance with privates during their training and start preparing them better for combat. How can we expect our troops to handle the stresses and rigors of combat if we can’t train as we fight? Combat is not easy and shouldn’t ever be taken lightly. It is not natural for humans to kill humans. Therefore, you have to train them to be able to do so on command. This takes a sort of “deprogramming” that can only come from tough, realistic training - training that is absent in today’s basic combat and advanced individual training environment. Soldiers cannot be yelled at. Soldiers cannot be touched. Soldiers cannot be forced to run.

The military is not like the rest of society. Our jobs are difficult and require a level of discipline and competence unneeded in the normal workforce. We need to be able to instinctively react to an ambush when it happens. That is a stressful moment, and if a Soldier is not trained to deal stress - real stress - they are not going to know how to deal with reality. An ambush should be a relatively easy thing: the enemy attacks, we react, we move on. During all that, numerous training focuses come into play as weapons are aimed and rounds squeezed off with utter accuracy in the midst of utter chaos. Movements are made flawlessly and it is the enemy who should have trouble dealing with our professionalism and meticulous training. Our goal should be to ensure THEY are the ones dealing with PTSD issues.

I have seen and heard of Soldiers claiming PTSD who have never left the FOB. They were never mortared, never ambushed, never fired a round, never had a round fired at them, and who’s biggest stress was deciding between steak and lobster. The media, our elected officials, and the American public have created this illusion that if I’m not the EXACT same person I was when I left for combat, I’m suffering from PTSD. PTSD has become an excuse and battle cry by the left for why this war needs to end. Convince the force they are suffering from the disorder and then shove it in our faces as a reason we need to pull out. OUR SOLDIERS ARE BROKE!!, they cry when there is nothing wrong with them. I can’t get into specifics, but it’s literally something that I have to deal with at my level as well.

Before we crossed the border into Iraq, I ran my Soldiers into the ground training for combat. We were low-crawling across rocky dirt, shooting hundreds of rounds into targets and clearing mock rooms and trenches. By the time we came home, not one of my Soldier had escaped being fired at, had all needed to fire their weapons, had artillery shells go off near them, vehicles explode as we passed by, or some other life-altering event. But, I can proudly say that not one of my Soldiers deals with PTSD to this day. Why? Because I gave them tough, realistic COMBAT training. Some complained that “we’re MI Soldiers, why do we have to do this? We’ll never need this stuff.” Then later thanking me for doing so. This doesn’t mean that we weren’t affected by our experiences. I don’t think I’ll ever be the same. That doesn’t mean I have PTSD, but that’s exactly what we’re being told it should mean. All it means is that we have things we all need to deal with individually. And if we can’t deal with them ourselves, we need to talk to someone to help us deal with them.

When I was in Ecuador, I was robbed at knifepoint by a group of young hoodlums in their late teens or early twenties. It was a traumatic experience and one that to this day has altered the way I live my life. I no can no longer casually walk in dark places. I don’t like being in large groups of people. And I cringe any time I see people approaching me on a sidewalk. I carry a knife with me everywhere I go for self-defense. I’m on edge constantly. That experience screwed up my head for a long time. I couldn’t trust anyone and became a very difficult person to live with in some ways. I was diagnosed with Post Traumatic Syndrome at the time.

Unfortunately, there are Soldiers who will abuse the system in any way they can. They’re always looking for an easy way out. In the past it was the “temporary profile”. You could always count on Soldiers to shop for a profile when they didn’t want to take a PT test or wanted to get out of field time (they still do). Now, our excuse is PTSD.

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