Shanti
True love
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Marriages Ruined by Iraq War -- great article
By Stacy Bannerman
< http://progressive.org/mag_bannerman0307 >
February 2007 Issue
I was folding fliers for a high school workshop on
nonviolence when my husband, a mortar platoon sergeant
with the Army National Guard 81st Brigade, walked into
my office and said, "I got the call."
We hadn't talked about the possibility of him being
deployed for months, not since President Bush had
declared, "Mission accomplished." But I knew exactly
what he meant; I didn't know then what it would mean for
us.
We weren't prepared, and neither was the Guard. The
Guard sent him into harm's way without providing some of
the basic equipment and materials, such as global
positioning systems, night vision gear, and insect
repellant, that he would rely on during his year-long
tour of duty at LSA Anaconda, the most-attacked base in
Iraq, as determined by the sheer number of incoming
rockets and mortars, which averaged at least five per
day.
Unlike active duty military, the National Guard had no
functional family support system or services in place.
While the Guard was scrambling to get it together, my
husband was already gone, and I was alone, just months
after we had moved to Seattle.
It is the soldiers, their families, and the people of
Iraq that pay the human costs. The tab so far: more than
3,000 dead U.S. troops, tens of thousands of wounded,
over half a million Iraqi casualties, roughly 250,000
American servicemen and women struggling with PTSD, and
almost 60,000 military marriages that have been broken
by this war.
Twenty-four hours after Lorin boarded the plane for
Iraq, I hung a blue star service flag--denoting an
immediate family member in combat--in the front window.
Then I closed the blinds, hoping to keep the harbingers
of death at bay. They still got in, through the phone,
the Internet, the newspaper, and the TV.
Each week, I heard of a friend's husband or son:
wounded, maimed, shot, hit, hurt, burned, amputated,
decapitated, detonated, dead. A glossary of pain. I
checked icasualties.org all the time, cursing and crying
as the numbers rose relentlessly, praying that Lorin
wouldn't be next.
I got involved with Military Families Speak Out, which
is exactly what the name suggests: an organization of
people with loved ones in uniform who are adamantly
opposed to the war in Iraq. We were breaking the
military's traditional code of silence by publicly
protesting this war, and the pushback was intense,
particularly for military wives. I was ostracized by the
women married to men in my husband's company, and my
husband was reprimanded by his superior officers. I was
an "unruly spouse," and Lorin could "expect adverse
career consequences."
I thought being forced to serve in a war based on lies
was itself an "adverse consequence." I said as much
during an interview on Hardball with Chris Matthews,
which just happened to be broadcast on the big-screen TV
during lunchtime in the mess tent at Anaconda. Lorin
didn't see it, but approximately 5,000 of the troops he
was serving with did. He heard about it for weeks, but
never asked me to stop. He had his own questions and
concerns about Operation Iraqi Freedom.
During the run-up to the war, when 76 percent of
Americans supported the invasion of Iraq, we protested
in the streets of Spokane. But he was contractually
bound and committed to his men. He clung to what he'd
been briefed on regarding the Guard's mission in Iraq,
which included building schools for kids.
Two months into his deployment, I got a call from him,
and he said, choking up, that there was an "accident."
Two Iraqi children were dead because he gave the order
to fire a couple of mortar rounds. Several weeks later,
he phoned again, his voice flat and emotionless, to tell
me that the men he had dinner with the previous night
had been killed by the same Iraqi soldiers that they
were training six hours earlier.
Days went by without any communication--anxious hours,
restless nights. I swerved between anger and fear.
His e-mails were sometimes delayed, or returned to him
as undeliverable, with portions blacked out by military
censors. The ones that got through asked for more
homemade treats, baby wipes, batteries, movies, and
magazines. One missive informed me about rockets landing
next to the trailer where he slept . . . while he was in
bed. Another ended abruptly because he was under attack.
Lorin spent hours loading coffins onto cargo jets; I
spent days on red alert.
Finally, the phone rang with the news that my husband
was coming home, after nearly a year in Iraq. They
didn't tell me he'd bring the war with him.
He'd been back for almost two months, but he was still
checking to see where his weapon was every time he got
in a vehicle. He drove aggressively, talked
aggressively, and sometimes I could swear that he was
breathing aggressively. This was not the man I married,
this hard-eyed, hyper-vigilant stranger who spent his
nights watching the dozens of DVDs that he got from
soldiers he served with in Iraq. He couldn't sleep, and
missed the adrenaline surge of constant, imminent
danger. The amateur videos of combat eased the ache of
withdrawal from war, but did nothing to heal my
soldier's heart.
At a conference on post-deployment care and services for
soldiers and their families, a Marine Corps chaplain
asked, "How do you know if you're an SOB? Your wife will
tell you!"
Har-de-har-har-har. The remark got the predictable round
of applause from the capacity crowd, which, with one
exception, wasn't living with anyone who had recently
returned from Iraq. I was that exception, and it
infuriated me that this was a joke. The Pentagon's
solution for the constant stress endured by those of us
who felt bewildered and betrayed was: "Learn how to
laugh." With help from the Pentagon's chief laughter
instructor, families of National Guard members were
learning to walk like a penguin, laugh like a lion, and
blurt "ha, ha, hee, hee, and ho, ho."
Emotional isolation is one of the hallmarks of post-
combat mental health problems. The National Guard didn't
conduct follow-up mental health screening or evaluations
of the men in my husband's company until they had been
home for almost eight months. Nearly a year later, in
August of 2006, my husband was informed of his results:
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). It was obvious
that he was suffering, but when I brought it up, he
parroted what the military told him: "Give it time."
Time wasn't a panacea for Jeffrey Lucey, Doug Barber, or
the dozens of other Guard members and Reservists who
have committed suicide after serving in Iraq. Time
hasn't helped the hundreds of homeless Iraq War veterans
wandering lost in the streets of what military families
are assured is a deeply grateful nation. Time is most
definitely not on our side.
My husband has served his time with the Guard. He's got
more than twenty-three years of actual service, and
almost twenty years of "good time" that qualifies him
for retirement benefits.
But then he learned about a few loopholes. Now, if he
serves as a member in good standing for 364 days in a
year, instead of 365, that year isn't credited as time
served toward his retirement. If he's deemed
irreplaceable--he's one of a handful of mortar platoon
sergeants who've seen combat--the Guard can retain him
for several more years after his contract expires.
He is surprised by this, but I'm not. I no longer expect
that the Department of Defense will keep its promises to
the soldiers or their families. I don't pretend that the
Pentagon will adhere to its policies. And I know from
experience that "support the troops" is a slogan, and
not a practice.
On January 11, 2007, the Pentagon discarded the time
limit that prevented Guard members and Reservists from
serving more than twenty-four total months on active
duty for either the Iraq or Afghan wars. The Pentagon's
announcement came in the wake of President Bush's
decision to deploy an additional 21,500 troops to Iraq.
The escalation contradicts the advice of top U.S.
military officials. Although the majority of Americans
are opposed to the "surge," most members of Congress are
reluctant to block the supplemental appropriations
request that will fund it, claiming that they don't want
to abandon the troops. Congress has abandoned the troops
for nearly four years.
It is the soldiers, their families, and the people of
Iraq that pay the human costs. The tab so far: more than
3,000 dead U.S. troops, tens of thousands of wounded,
over half a million Iraqi casualties, roughly 250,000
American servicemen and women struggling with PTSD, and
almost 60,000 military marriages that have been broken
by this war.
Including mine.
It was hard to reconnect after more than a year apart,
and the open wound of untreated PTSD made it virtually
impossible. Lorin is still the best evidence I have of
God's grace in this world, but we just couldn't find our
way back together after the war came home.
Stacy Bannerman is the author of "When the War Came
Home: The Inside Story of Reservists and the Families
They Leave Behind." She is a member of Military Families
Speak Out, www.mfso.org, and can be contacted at her
website, www.stacybannerman.com.
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