I mentioned before that they were looking at this "positive thinking" program for vets with PTSD - something that seems like a way to cut costs rather than treat vets' trauma.

Now psychologist Bryant Welch says the program has no scientific validity:

Johnny had been with his platoon when they were attacked by enemy fire and pinned down for the better part of two days. Much of his face was blown off. His two closest buddies died gruesome and agonizing deaths while lying on top of him.

As a psychologist, my work with him was not medical. It was to address the psychological trauma, then newly labeled as Posttraumatic Stress Disorder [PTSD], that haunted him and to help him "grieve" that much of his life had been blown away along with his face.

The pain of his surgeries was nothing compared to the night terrors that undercut his every attempt at sleep. The flashbacks that occurred daily put him back in the jungles of Viet Nam and the noises in the hallways became the sounds of advancing Viet Cong. Nurses and doctors could suddenly become menacing figures who he believed had captured him and were about to torture him. He was terrified to take his medications and unexpected noises could leave him shaken for hours.

Emotionally, on the best of days Johnny fluctuated between agitated depression and complete numbness in which he was unable to feel at all. He felt cut off from his family and felt enraged and misunderstood when they tried to "cheer him up." Johnny was not actively homicidal, like some of the PTSD vets on his psychiatry ward, but he was consumed with thoughts of suicide.

Johnny showed me a picture of himself before the accident on a motorcycle with an attractive girlfriend. He said, "This was a guy who had everything." After four months on the psychiatric ward, I was transferred to a new rotation and Johnny remained.

With the President's announcement last Tuesday night, over one hundred thousand American troops will soon be in harm's way in Afghanistan. Estimates are that thirty thousand of them will come home with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, the same psychological condition that plagued Johnny.

This makes returning veterans a ticking time bomb for serious mental illness with a very real danger of violence to themselves, their loved ones, and the general public.

As a psychologist who has treated many serious cases of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, it was a jaw dropping experience to learn that under a new $119 million military program these young men and women who have sacrificed so much will have their PTSD addressed with a superficial, psychological treatment based loosely on Norman Vincent Peale's Power of Positive Thinking, known in this generation's iteration as "positive psychology" or the "psychology of optimism.

There is no evidence that the techniques of positive psychology can prevent or ameliorate the effects of PTSD. When its adherents' attempt to extrapolate simplistic studies done on normal junior high students to military combat troops struggling with military traumas they are misleading the military, the public, and, most importantly, the troops.

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December 14, 2009 CNN

BROWN: Tonight, we begin our special series "Band of Sisters," focusing on women at war and the challenges they face on and off the battlefield.

One in 10 American troops serving in Afghanistan and Iraq are women. And thousands of them are falling victim to an injury with all the power of a bullet or a roadside bomb, an injury that's long haunted men in combat, post-traumatic stress disorder.

In a few moments, we will talk about some of the reasons women may have it tougher than men when it comes to PTSD. But, first, I want you to meet some of the moms, wives and daughters who have faced the emotional and psychological anguish.

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Dear 24 Hour Cable News Channels:

I understand your dilemma, I really do. You have 44 minutes on the hour to fill with content. And it has to be compelling stuff, so that the viewer isn't tempted to channel surf to your rivals. In the situation like the Fort Hood shootings, where news is coming scattershot and conflicting, it's even more difficult.

See? I get it.

But having said that--and I say this with love and respect--PLEASE, SHUT. THE. F#@K. UP. Don't spend time guessing on motivations when there is so little information available. Don't surmise terrorist intent when you can't possibly know. And for the love of everything holy, don't go to criminal profiler Cliff "A Hammer Sees Everything As A Nail" Van Zandt (a crime of which Keith Olbermann is also guilty) to make up utter bovine excrement.

At the time that Van Zandt was waxing rhapsodic over possible terrorist inclinations, remember, the news was that there were two or three shooters, one of whom was dead (Hasan, the single shooter, was alive and being treated at the time). That Maj. Nadil Hasan was of Jordanian, Arab, or Palestinian birth (he was born in Virginia of Palestinian immigrant parents), that he was a recent Muslim convert (he had been a practicing Muslim his whole life), that he was suffering from PTSD, or secondary PTSD from his work with returning vets in Virginia, that he was sympathetic with suicide bombers, angry at bad evaluations, upset at being deployed to Iraq, frustrated by the Army's dismissal of the harassment he got at Ft. Hood about his faith and/or desperate to get out of his upcoming deployment.

Bottom line: we didn't know enough. It was irresponsible of you to try to make suppositions when the information (including the fact that he was alive) was so sketchy.

And to focus on the one known of his name and then presuming his faith (A lot of 2nd and 3rd generation immigrants don't necessarily practice the religions of their grandparents, yet still have Middle Eastern names, and I will reiterate, in those early hours, WE DIDN'T KNOW) to then suggest jihadist and/or terrorist sympathies was to give legitimacy to all those hate-mongers like Michelle Malkin and Fox & Friends anchors Doocy and not-Doocy to once again, call into question ALL Muslims.

Don't you get it? "Terrorism" is not defined as "any violence by any Muslim anywhere at any time for any reason." If it's true that Hasan had been the victim of harassment because of his religion and that contributed to his state of mind, then those who create and foster an environment that makes it acceptable to demonize and dehumanize Muslims were right there with him, pulling the trigger. To focus on Hasan's faith as you did in those early hours was the lazy approach and avoids the deeper reasons:

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Two Army generals talked to CNN's Barbara Starr about their experience with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in hopes that it will convince more suffering soldiers to come forward.

CNN's Barbara Starr reported:

Brig. General Gary S. Patton and Gen. Carter Ham have both sought counseling for the emotional trauma of their time in the Iraq war.

"One of our soldiers in that unit, Spec. Robert Unruh, took a gunshot wound to the torso, I was involved in medevacing him off the battlefield. And in a short period of time, he died before my eyes," Patton told CNN in an exclusive interview. "That's a memory [that] will stay with me the rest of my life."

Ham was the commander in Mosul when a suicide bomber blew up a mess tent. Twenty-two people died.

"The 21st of December, 2004, worst day of my life. Ever," Ham said. "To this day I still ask myself what should I have done differently, what could I have done as the commander responsible that would have perhaps saved the lives of those soldiers, sailors, civilians."

Both generals have been back from Iraq for years, but still deal with some of the symptoms of the stress they experienced.

One of the reasons I thought this war (in addition to being immoral) was so very stupid is that I remember the veterans from the Vietnam era - how many of them were a mess when they came home, and how many stayed that way. The power to send soldiers to war is a sacred trust, and it should not be used for anything less than the most compelling reasons.

As bad as it is for soldiers, recruiters have a uniquely stressful job in which they're expected to somehow turn their own war experiences into happy talk for potential converts:

Morning Edition, January 2, 2009 · The Army is investigating a cluster of suicides in the Houston Recruiting Battalion, where five soldiers have taken their own lives since 2001. Nationally, 17 recruiters have committed suicide during the same period.

Back in March of 2007, Aron Andersson locked himself in the cab of his Ford 150 pickup, called home to say he was going to kill himself, shot up the dashboard radio, and then put a bullet in his head. He had threatened suicide five months earlier, and back then his father, Bob Andersson, reported him to the military.

"I don't know if that was the right thing to do, but I called a major and told him his girlfriend had said he threatened to commit suicide, and she told me he was going through night terrors and a bunch of other things. And he'd get up to go to work in the morning and tell his girlfriend he was exhausted, and she'd say, 'Yeah you've been jumpin' over the couch, hidin' behind the chairs and stuff, like you're in battle,' and he wouldn't even realize it in the morning," Andersson says.

Aron Andersson served two tours in Iraq, and he was furious with his father for reporting him, saying his Army career would be ended.

"And I just simply told him, 'Well, Aron, if you don't talk to me ever again, I can live with that. But if I didn't turn you in and something happened, I don't think I could live with that,' " Bob Andersson says.

Andersson says his son had trouble delivering the required two recruits a month, especially after his experience in Iraq.

"How could you be over there and see some of the things he saw and dealt with, and try to hire people to go over there and do that?" he says.

NOW on PBS:  

Of the thousands of U.S. troops getting discharged from the Army each year, many who are suffering from post traumatic stress disorder and brain injuries aren't getting the vital care they need. The Army claims these soldiers have pre-existing mental illnesses or are guilty of misconduct. But advocates say this is a way for the Army to get rid of "problem" soldiers quickly, without giving them the treatment and benefits to which they're entitled.
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This week, NOW travels to Fort Hood in Texas to meet traumatized soldiers fighting a new battle, this one against the army they served. Are soldiers being wrongfully discharged for honorable service?

The entire episode is available for streaming on the NOW website, as well as web-exclusive interviews with Jonathan Norrell and David Chavarria (above) about their heart-breaking experiences.