WASHINGTON – U.S. soldiers are committing suicide at record levels, young officers are abandoning their military careers, and the heavy use of forces in Iraq has made it harder for the military to fight conflicts that could arise elsewhere.
Unprecedented strains on the nation’s all-volunteer military are threatening the health and readiness of the troops.
While the spotlight Wednesday was on congressional hearings with the U.S. ambassador and commanding general for Iraq, Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Richard Cody was in another hearing room explaining how troops and their families are being taxed by long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the prospect of future years of conflict in the global war on terror.
“That marathon has become an enduring relay and our soldiers continue to run — and at the double time,” Cody said. “Does this exhaust the body and mind of those in the race, and those who are ever present on the sidelines, cheering their every step? Yes. Has it broken the will of the soldier? No.” –more–
How can they contend that this isn’t breaking the will of the soldier? No defined objective, continual redeployment, loss of life, loss of family, no end in sight. Suicide. Isn’t suicide an ample measure of breaking the will of the soldier? Their rhetoric is muck, as in stuck in it. Enough said.
