EXIT WOUNDS
Taking my seat on the flight leaving Kabul, I am not alone in breathing a sigh of relief as the plane begins moving away from the terminal for takeoff. After a month in-country I’m feeling pretty frazzled and a surge of emotion runs through; a mix of fear, fatigue and relief the job is done.
It seems fitting that after embedding with Pacific island troops in various armies, I end up queuing for the Dubai connection with a gaggle of Australian and Fijian military contractors, all in civilian clothes. Their body language gives them away, and I soon learn that they are all ex-Special Forces guys, now doing private security contracts to provide “close body protection” jobs – ie bodyguards – for Afghan leaders. Their 2 month gigs, on rotation, are high risk but also highly paid – hence the attraction. But it comes at a cost.
I see frayed nerves in all their eyes and a hunger to be up in international airspace, safe and away. When the pilot threatens to turn the aircraft back to the terminal because some Afghan passengers keep getting up to adjust their overhead baggage when the plane is readying for takeoff, one of the Aussie contractors jumps up from his seat and yells “sit down!” with such force that the message seems to get through. At this point, all the contractors can think about is getting up and away from here, downing their first beer in two months, and moving into a new headspace. Kabul’s dry, mudbrick sprawl disappears below as we ascend to the clouds and you can feel the anxiety of weeks and months begin to fall away. Characteristically, the Aussies order themselves drink after drink from the flight stewardess while their Fijian colleague retreats quietly into a book.
“Bloody good soldiers those Fijians” says the Aussie next to me, nodding in his mate’s direction. After a few drinks he opens up more, talking about his risky job and how he misses the beach at home. I remark how tough it must be on his wife and family when he goes away – and comes back.
“Yes it is hard on everyone. The problem is you can never really talk to your missus about what goes on when you are deployed to places like this. I have tried before and she tries to understand, but the gulf of understanding is just too big and I realized there is just no point in talking about what we go through with anyone who hasn’t been there, done that. I know that it creates distance between us and it hurts, but I just can’t find anyway around it so we don’t talk about it much. You just have to carry the experience with you and learn to live with yourself and not shut yourself off from those closest to you.”
Wars don’t end when a soldier comes home. It is often the start of a whole new psychological battle for soldiers to cope with their experience, to find peace within themselves long after their deployment has finished. Too often this internal struggle impacts on those around them, among friends and loved ones trying to reach through the fog of PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) to connect with their returned friend who isn’t quite “there” when they come back.
Many soldiers are resilient and will get on with their personal and professional lives, feeling strengthened by their military experience. But a growing number of returned vets are not coping, particularly those who have returned from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are shocking statistics coming from the US on veteran suicide, with reports suggesting 22 vets every day are taking their own lives in the US, but this figure has been put into better context in followup reports.
Underlining the tragedy is that more vets have killed themselves in recent years than the 4000-plus killed in combat in Iraq. Australia has also seen a spike in PTSD cases flowing from its involvement, mirroring the US. There have been sad cases like the ADF captain who mysteriously went up a mountain in the US and froze to death, deliberately, as if in a trance. These wars since 2001 appear to have caused more PTSD cases than before and psychiatrists are trying to work out why.
Some speak of the “accumulative effect” that several deployments create. Others speak to the impact of being involved in “wars of choice” like Iraq and Afghanistan compared to the experience of vets who fought “wars of necessity” like in WW2.
Given such statistics on vet suicide, there is little doubt modern armies like the US, UK and Australia are putting much more resources into helping vets cope. They are trying to alleviate the stigma attached to mental health issues and recognize PTSD as an ongoing duty of care, not something to be hidden away and ignored. To that end there have been some interesting new methods, ranging from treating depressed soldiers with drugs like MDMA (ecstasy) in the US, to giving army dogs to depressed Aussie vets to look after once home.
How do the Guam Battalion troops cope and Pacific island soldiers more generally?
Before leaving Kabul, I interviewed the Battalion Commander, Colonel Michael Tougher and asked him about this.
It is something I am concerned about and constantly monitoring. The army has got better at dealing with this and we have deployed a unit psychiatrist to keep an eye on the soldiers and see what they go through in the field. Anecdotally our island troops seem to cope better than mainland (US) troops. There seems to be an island thing, part of their culture, that makes islanders very open and they feel they are all part of a family and those close-knit bonds will remain when they go home. That probably helps them process what they have gone through.
I half joke that the island way – having a few drinks over a bbq and talking it through with your mates – might actually be better than having islanders sit alone on a shrink’s couch in a faraway city, especially when the psychiatrist has no experience of war and keeps asking “profiling” questions to fit their diagnostic box.
Yes I think you are right. As long as our guys have their strong sense of community around them and a chance to process their emotions, even over a few drinks, they will be ok. Islanders also pride themselves on their warrior tradition so there is a long history of them engaging in war and then going back to their island life and singing and laughing with family and friends. We will obviously be keeping an eye on our guys when they return so they can readjust to life back home again.
It turns out that there have been a few incidents in-country and a couple of guys sent home with “issues” but on the whole, Guam Battalion is unlikely to see the same terrible suicide statistics as others. 6 months after their deployment finished, however, there are still a number of Guam Battalion soldiers still receiving treatment in Hawaii for PTSD and other issues. There has also been concerns raised about the functioning of Veteran’s Affairs in the US, while in Australia, some have questioned funding priorities when hundreds of millions of dollars are to be spent this year on WW1 commemorations when many Aussie vets of recent wars like Afghanistan are struggling with health and employment issues. Private organisations like Soldier On are doing important work to fill the gap and raise awareness.
Many Pacific island nations already struggle with providing public health care. How are they able to cope with an influx of damaged vets and contractors? This is a public policy issue for governments in Micronesia, Hawaii and Fiji to look deeper into as the true cost of involvement in recent wars touches Pacific communities well beyond the battlefield.
