07-29-2009, 07:56 AM
http://www.gazette.com/articles/iframe-590...idge-audio.html
This article (I read a translation in a dutch newspaper first) handles about murders commited by soldiers coming home from a tour in Iraq.
The brigade that was mentioned served in one of the most violent period in Iraq and while there were told to basically shoot at anything. (I think we had some discussion about that before).
Because of the high chance of becoming victim of an attack their 'defence mechanism' became 'kill them first'. Besides making many innocent victims this brigade also lost a very high amount of men during that time (114).
Now back home 10 soldiers from that brigade were responsible for 14 murders or manslaughter in Colorado springs (114 times the normal murder rate) cases and several have commited suicide or tried to.
The point of discussion here is (but it will probably become something else after two posts) is if the US government is responsible and more important what they should do about it.
This article was about one particular brigade but similar things happened on a smaller scale with soldiers from other brigades. Of course things are quieting down in Iraq so this problem will likely stop, but the great social and psychological problems of soldiers coming back from dangerous war zones have always happened.
In terms of safety of the american people the US army would have been wiser to invest in a few 100 shrinks to support soldiers that came home from Iraq instead of 5 apache helicopters.
In Holland we had similar problems (but on smaller scale of course) with soldiers returning from Srebenica and Afghanistan. In Holland many people (say 50 %) don't agree with us sending troops to these zones and it seems extra sour if you become a victim of a soldier that has been psychologically scarred by a mission you were against in the first place.
This article (I read a translation in a dutch newspaper first) handles about murders commited by soldiers coming home from a tour in Iraq.
The brigade that was mentioned served in one of the most violent period in Iraq and while there were told to basically shoot at anything. (I think we had some discussion about that before).
Because of the high chance of becoming victim of an attack their 'defence mechanism' became 'kill them first'. Besides making many innocent victims this brigade also lost a very high amount of men during that time (114).
Now back home 10 soldiers from that brigade were responsible for 14 murders or manslaughter in Colorado springs (114 times the normal murder rate) cases and several have commited suicide or tried to.
The point of discussion here is (but it will probably become something else after two posts) is if the US government is responsible and more important what they should do about it.
This article was about one particular brigade but similar things happened on a smaller scale with soldiers from other brigades. Of course things are quieting down in Iraq so this problem will likely stop, but the great social and psychological problems of soldiers coming back from dangerous war zones have always happened.
In terms of safety of the american people the US army would have been wiser to invest in a few 100 shrinks to support soldiers that came home from Iraq instead of 5 apache helicopters.
In Holland we had similar problems (but on smaller scale of course) with soldiers returning from Srebenica and Afghanistan. In Holland many people (say 50 %) don't agree with us sending troops to these zones and it seems extra sour if you become a victim of a soldier that has been psychologically scarred by a mission you were against in the first place.