Veterans suffering PTSD are normally prescribed drugs but a growing body of research suggests service dogs offer an effective alternative. (New Africa/Shutterstock)
According to PR Newswire, a Harris poll conducted in June 2021 indicated that a majority of Americans believe most veterans have PTSD. That’s a problem, and based on more recent data, it does not appear to be getting better.
The survey of 2,000 respondents indicated a belief by most Americans that most veterans have PTSD (wrong; the real figure is a still-concerning but much lower 11–20 percent). It also found that around a quarter of respondents believe that most people with PTSD are violent (not true, unless they are also abusing alcohol or drugs) and that PTSD is untreatable (definitely untrue—in fact sometimes it goes away on its own). Of course, 40 percent of the poll’s respondents don’t even know what the acronym PTSD stands for (it’s Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), so maybe we shouldn’t take the results too seriously.
Nonetheless, the numbers represent a worrisome trend. Not only are the views represented in the poll highly erroneous, they are also damaging to veterans and to the nation. It does the veteran community no favors for everyone to believe that we have PTSD and that we are therefore violent, especially if they don’t even know what the term means. The facts about veterans and PTSD are as follows: 1) very few veterans have PTSD, although a number of us do have it, and many others have other conditions with similar symptoms. 2) Most people with PTSD are not violent, and veterans can be violent (or not) with or without PTSD. 3) PTSD is VERY treatable.
An Army paratrooper descends from the sky during Exercise Forager 21 at Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, on July 30, 2021. (Master Sgt. Richard Ebensberger/U.S. Air Force)
Further compounding Americans’ perception of military veterans is a “dysfunctional veteran“ subculture within the veteran community, that seems to revel in being somehow ”broken“ or unredeemable, or who are unwilling to re-assimilate into the civilian world from which we all came. This type of behavior, which includes veterans wearing shirts warning others to ”stay back,” exacerbates the perception problem America has with our veteran service members.
PTSD is, of course, not a problem unique to military veterans. In fact, some studies have found that as much as 70 percent of the entire U.S. population has experienced traumatic events that could have caused PTSD. But PTSD is often considered the signature wound of post-9/11 wars, to the point where it has become a bit of a badge of honor for a small element within the veteran community. Compensation for PTSD claims, and disabilities of all types, is high enough to encourage over-diagnosis and sometimes outright fraud when it comes to PTSD claims. This, in turn, takes resources and attention from those who truly need them. And make no mistake—PTSD and suicide are real issues within the veteran community.
But the problem of military PTSD, and its attendant subsequent effects, is not as big as America seems to think it is. Some of us are sick. Some of us are broken. Some of us do need help. And we owe it to those individuals to get them what they need in order to go on to lead healthy, happy, and productive post-military lives. But it is not good for our nation to believe that most of us veterans are sick with an incurable disease that makes us both violent and mentally unstable. And it does us no good to believe that because we served in combat, we get a pass for bad behavior for the rest of our lives.
There are no easy solutions to the problems mentioned above. It will take a team approach to addressing PTSD, both for military veterans and the general public. But it has to start with a better understanding of the problem, which most of America apparently does not yet have.
The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own, and not those of the United States Military Academy or the U.S. Army. This article originally appeared in The Havok Journal.
Lieutenant Colonel (Ret.) Charles Faint served 27 years as an officer in the U.S. Army. During his time in uniform he served seven combat tours in Afghanistan and Iraq while assigned to the 5th Special Forces Group, the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, and the Joint Special Operations Command. He holds an MA in International Affairs from Yale University and in retirement serves as the Chair for the Study of Special Operations in the Modern War Institute at West Point. This article represents his personal reflections on the war in Afghanistan and is not an official position of the United States Military Academy or the United States Army.
