Sgt. Robert J. Barrett touched the lives of many

The casket containing the body of Sergeant Robert J. Barrett, who was killed in Afghanistan, was carried by an honor guard into the Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Assumption in Fall River. (Photos By Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Staff)

Guardsman touched the lives of many
Barrett is called devoted to his family, country

By Jeannie Nuss
Globe Correspondent / May 2, 2010

FALL RIVER — Sophia Barrett, yellow ribbon in her hair, black ribbon on her sweater, cried at her father’s funeral yesterday when a priest waved incense over the flag-draped coffin, when a uniformed officer wiped away tears, and when her great-uncle read aloud a letter her father wrote.

The 2-year-old cried until a comforting hand showed her a photo of her father, Sergeant Robert J. Barrett.

“My dad,’’ she whispered and pointed to the casket at the front of the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption in Fall River.

Barrett, a 20-year-old member of the Massachusetts Army National Guard’s 101st Field Artillery Regiment, was killed in a suicide bombing on April 19 in Kabul, Afghanistan, where he was training new recruits for the Afghan National Army.

Sophia was her father’s pride and joy, said friends and fellow service members. Since Barrett deployed to Afghanistan in January, he calmed her restless nights on the phone and online.
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Guardsman touched the lives of many

Valley son, veteran succeeds as Iraq war poet

Valley son, veteran succeeds as Iraq war poet
By Michael Doyle / Bee Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- Combat was a good career move for award-winning war poet Brian Turner, though it came at a price.

The San Joaquin Valley native and Fresno State graduate now has a deep, dark pool of memories to draw from. He dips down, if he dares, and there they are.

"I [have been] learning how to write about the ghosts that live among us, whether we recognize them or not," Turner said.

Now, the former Army sergeant is out with his second volume of poems influenced largely by his year in Iraq with the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team. The collection called "Phantom Noise" follows up on "Here, Bullet," which changed Turner's life irrevocably.

Called the first collection of poems by an Iraq War veteran, "Here, Bullet" helped Turner win the 2009-2010 Amy Lowell Traveling Poetry Fellowship.

Read more: Valley son veteran succeeds as Iraq war poet

Police Sergeant Joseph Bergeron killed in the line of duty

Police Officer Killed Was 26 Year Veteran

By KSFY Staff

A suburban Saint Paul police officer shot and killed Saturday morning was a 26-year veteran of the force.

Maplewood police say Sergeant Joseph Bergeron was responding to a carjacking when he was ambushed by two men while sitting in his patrol car at about 6:45 am.
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http://www.ksfy.com/news/local/92604224.html

Iraq vet was in a tailspin before he died in a hail of police bullets

Depressed, Steve Bours lost interest in everything and turned to methamphetamine. (April 2, 2010)

Iraq vet was in a tailspin before he died in a hail of police bullets at home


A woman’s death in combat was a turning point. Depressed after returning home, he lost interest in everything, his marriage dissolved and he turned to drugs. And then things got worse.


By Sam Quinones, Los Angeles Times

May 2, 2010

Gerry Chicorelli was driving north on Paramount Boulevard in Downey in late March when he spotted a man holding a hatchet and walking into southbound traffic.

The man had a glazed look. Drivers braked and yelled at him, peeling away as they spotted the raised hatchet in his hands.


Chicorelli realized he knew the man.

It was Steve Bours, a handsome kid who'd once worked for him in his roofing business.

Bours, 30, had joined the Army Reserve and was sent to Iraq in 2004 with a supply unit based near Fallouja, site of the war's most brutal battle.

Chicorelli was the third or fourth to call 911. As he slowed his car to a crawl, he watched Bours march, hatchet raised, into traffic for what would be the last hundred yards of his life.

The whole time, Chicorelli recalled, "he never said a word."

Athletic and muscular, he was quiet and sweet-natured — a "gentle giant," people called him.

In Iraq, he spoke little, listened a lot and was intensely loyal. "You always knew he had your back," said Jennifer Kramer, a friend from the 208th.

His fellow soldiers say Bours' manner helped them endure the war.

"You have the quiet people like Steve who didn't say much, but when it came time [for missions] they'd volunteer," Danny Rivas said.

Bours' room became the place to hang out.

"You could tell Steve anything," Rivas said, "but I think Steve felt like he was there to listen and he didn't have an outlet, people he could talk to about his problems."

........On Dec. 13, 2004, a unit sergeant, Tina Time, was killed when the supply truck she was driving collided with an oncoming U.S. military vehicle in a sandstorm.

Time, the first Samoan American woman killed in combat, was beloved in the 208th. Her death was "a turning point," Kramer said. "People just lost it. You'd see all these really tough guys breaking down all the time."

Bours told his family he had had to retrieve Time's severed torso when no one else wanted to. It was the one event from the war that he later spoke of, his family recalled.

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Iraq vet was in a tailspin before he died in a hail of police bullets

A home fit for a Marine

A home fit for a Marine

By Chris Cobb
The Herald-Zeitung
Published May 2, 2010

MARION — Jose Ivan Perez was trying not to get too emotional. He’s a strong man. After all, he’s a Marine.

But the 24-year-old wouldn’t be blamed for letting emotions get the best of him Friday, as dozens of volunteers were pounding nails and cutting lumber, working to build a new house for the wounded veteran.

“It’s hard to believe it’s actually happening,” he said. “I’m a very proud person. I’ve always done things for myself and kept my feelings in check, but this is just amazing.”

Marine Cpl. Perez, along with the Army Sgt. Nathan Hunt and Marine Cpl. Neil Frustaglio, will all have new homes built for them in a Marion subdivision this weekend by volunteers for Homes for Troops.

The nonprofit uses community donations to build houses for troops who have been severely wounded in the line of duty, many of them amputees. They provide special custom homes to tailor to their needs, and they do so at no cost to the veterans.
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A home fit for a Marine

Marine sacrifice gets national level honor

Marine's sacrifice gets national level honor
Sunday, May 02, 2010
By FRED CONTRADA
fcontrada@repub.com
HOLYOKE - When Marine Lance Cpl. Clayton K. Hough Jr. came home from Vietnam without his legs, he could have spent his time feeling sorry for himself.

Instead, Hough put his considerable energy into working with teenagers who aspired to be Marines like him.

Hough, who died in 2004 at the age of 55, earned the Bronze Star, the Purple Heart, and the National Defense Service Medal among other honors for his stint in Vietnam.


This month, the U.S. Department of Defense will bestow upon him one final honor by adding his name to the national Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.

The 35th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War was Friday.

Hough is among six veterans whose names are being added to the monument, which is dedicated to those who lost their lives in the Vietnam war. Six years after his passing, the government has concluded that Hough died of the wounds he suffered in Vietnam.

"Medical evidence submitted by the Department of the Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery indicates that Lance Cpl. Hough qualifies as having 'died as a result of wounds (combat or hostile related) sustained in the combat zone' due to the amputations that he received as a result of his wounds," reads the defense department's conclusion. His "date of casualty" is listed as Feb. 22, 1969.
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Marine's sacrifice gets national level honor

UK:The true cost of the Afghan war in mental illness

The true cost of the Afghan war in mental illness for our soldiers revealed
May 2 2010
by David Williamson, Wales On Sunday

THE true cost of the war in Afghanistan to our troops can be revealed today.

Figures exclusive to Wales On Sunday show that hundreds of troops are suffering with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or other mental health issues that often leave them plagued by nightmares and turning to drink.

And it is claimed our soldiers do not receive the help they need as they fight to cope with what they have seen and experienced.

Figures show that since 2007, 260 British Army soldiers have been assessed as having PTSD.

Almost one in 10 of those were medically discharged from the British Army over a 30-month period.

A total of 5,000 other army personnel were given assessments for “other mental health” issues between January 1, 2007 and June 30, 2009. The Army said that 170 were medically discharged – 90 of them because of “mental and behavioural disorders”.

But the total number of soldiers suffering from mental health issues as a result of the war in Afghanistan is far higher. The war started in 2001.

Plaid Cymru, which obtained the figures, is now calling for systematic stress counselling to help soldiers come to terms with the trauma of the war. It is concerned that a “macho culture” stops people seeking help.
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The true cost of the Afghan war in mental illness

How to kill a veteran without really trying

UPDATE 5/2/2010
I'll admit it that after reading the AP piece, I popped my cork. Not so much online but in the privacy of my office. Anyway, another sleepless night thinking about how much harm this can do to the veterans we've been trying to reach since Vietnam. Between this blog and my older one, Screaming In An Empty Room, there are over 20,000 post. On this one alone there are over 9,000. I would be shocked to discover more than 2 percent of the posts were about frauds. I do not bury those stories. I spotlight them because they are causing more problems for real veterans with real claims waiting for their claims to be processed.

There is one thing I beg you to keep in mind and that is the simple fact that it is harder to get them to go for help in the first place, yet we watch them suffer as their lives fall apart when we know they could be healing instead. Don't give up on fighting for them just because someone decided to blame the veterans yet again instead of the system that let them down.

AP: VA Makes It too Easy for Veterans to File Claims … Seriously
May 2, 2010 posted by Michael Leon

By Michael Leon

As PTSD claims soar, the systemic problem at the U.S. Dept of Veterans Affairs is the ease with which veterans file for disability benefit claims, in the view of Allen Breed, a national writer for the Associated Press. This is a hit job on veterans and the progress being contemplated by some at the DVA to help veterans.

Do you have that? Things are too easy for veterans dealing with the VA now, asserts the AP’s Breed.

Moved by a huge tide of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with post-traumatic stress, Congress has pressured the Department of Veterans Affairs to settle their disability claims — quickly, humanely, and mostly in the vets’ favor.

Continues Breed in his piece, PTSD cases rise and rules for claims ease, VA warned that more frauds will slip through: “The problem: The system is dysfunctional, an open invitation to fraud. And the VA has proposed changes that could make deception even easier.”

That’s the issue and it’s political.

No deny-delay-and-hope-you-die culture at the DVA, just too many veterans taking advantage of “profitably working the levers of sympathy for the wounded and obligation to the troops, and exploiting the sheer difficulty of nailing a surefire diagnosis of a condition that is notoriously hard to define.”

No years waiting on a claim, it’s the ease with which veterans navigate the system now that is the real issue. This is just crazy.
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VA Makes It too Easy for Veterans to File Claims

Since 1982 it has been nearly impossible to get the PTSD veterans to seek help at all and now this comes out all so familiar. Accusing veterans of making things up for a claim to be approved. Does it happen? Sure it dose and many times you've read it right here on this blog. It does happen but then there are always some unscrupulous people wanting to take what they did not earn or deserve, above all, never paid the price for. Compensation for PTSD is something they would rather not have to even think about when the price is paid by years of nightmares, flashbacks, destroyed relationships, strings of jobs they cannot keep, fractured families and roller coaster emotions out of control. When you think of the fact they are basically dying a slow agonizing death, you begin to understand why they would rather deny they have PTSD than face the fact. It happens all the time.

So, now we arrive at a time and place where PTSD is no longer some dirty little secret the government tries to keep away from the calculations of combat debt and we now see the veterans attacked yet again! So what happens now? How many years does this set us back when so many are finally telling their stories? Generals, majors, servicemen and women, veterans, are all of them now going to be suspected of being frauds because "it's too easy to fake" so they all must be lying? DO THEY EVER STOP TO THINK THAT IT'S THE INFORMATION THAT IS FINALLY GETTING OUT ? Do they ever think it is the fact we've finally gotten to the point where we are killing off the stigma of admitting they need help? Do they ever stop to really think? If they did then they'd also add in to all of this the very simple fact that the redeployments increase the exposure to traumatic events as well as the risk of PTSD deciding to travel back home with a Solider or a Marine on their 5th tour!!!!

Great way to kill off more veterans without really trying.

In tide of new PTSD cases, fear of growing fraud
By ALLEN G. BREED (AP) – 7 hours ago

Moved by a huge tide of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with post-traumatic stress, Congress has pressured the Department of Veterans Affairs to settle their disability claims — quickly, humanely, and mostly in the vets' favor.

The problem: The system is dysfunctional, an open invitation to fraud. And the VA has proposed changes that could make deception even easier.

PTSD's real but invisible scars can mark clerks and cooks just as easily as they can infantrymen fighting a faceless enemy in these wars without front lines. The VA is seeking to ease the burden of proof to ensure that their claims are processed swiftly.

But at the same time, some undeserving vets have learned how to game the system, profitably working the levers of sympathy for the wounded and obligation to the troops, and exploiting the sheer difficulty of nailing a surefire diagnosis of a condition that is notoriously hard to define.

"The threshold has been lowered. The question is how many people will take advantage of that," said Dr. Dan G. Blazer, a Duke University psychiatrist who has worked with the military on PTSD issues. PTSD, he adds, is "among the easiest (psychiatric) conditions to feign."

Mark Rogers, a longtime claims specialist with the Veterans Benefits Administration, agrees. "I could get 100 percent disability compensation for PTSD for any (honorably discharged) veteran who's willing to lie," said Rogers, a Vietnam-era vet who is now retired. "I just tell him what to say and where to go."
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In tide of new PTSD cases, fear of growing fraud

US Army captain becomes king in Afghanistan

US Army captain becomes king in Afghanistan
By SEBASTIAN ABBOT (AP) – 5 hours ago

HUTAL, Afghanistan — In the U.S. Army, Casey Thoreen is just a 30-year-old captain. Around here, he's known as the "King of Maiwand" district — testimony to the fact that without the young captain and a fat international wallet, local government here as in much of the insurgency-ravaged south could not function at all.

Setting up effective governments at the district level is key to U.S. strategy. U.S. officials hope that providing basic services will draw support away from the Taliban, especially here in the Islamist group's heartland of Kandahar province.

But in this dusty farming community 40 miles (60 kilometers) west of Kandahar, Thoreen has discovered that bolstering the authority of a district governor, who relies on him almost completely for financial resources and credibility, is a delicate balancing act. He also knows the effort is unsustainable without greater support from the central Afghan government in Kabul.

"We are putting a big gamble on this," Thoreen said. "Any of this stuff we're doing here, not just at our level but the $800 billion we have spent so far in the country, is contingent on the government being effective."
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US Army captain becomes king in Afghanistan

Sgt. Keith Adam Coe Sacrificed His Life for His Men

An Army carry team carries the transfer case containing the remains of Army Sgt. Keith Adam Coe of Auburndale, Fla., upon his arrival at Dover Air Force Base, Del.

Fulton native Sgt. Keith Coe dies in Iraq
By Paul Brockwell, Jr.
May 01, 2010, 10:46AM

Sgt. Keith A. Coe worked hard to get into the Army. When he was 26, the Fulton native was living in Florida working at a truss company and had been in trouble with the law.

Relatives say his eight months in jail for violating probation really marked a turning point in his life.

After getting released, his grandmothers say, Coe wanted to make something of himself and he saw the Army as his way to achieve that goal. His probation officer, says grandmother Dawn Jones, told her that she always knew Coe was one of the ones worth saving. Coe’s former probation officer stopped by to pay her respects and grieve with the family, Jones said.

In 2007, he married his wife, Katrina, at a Hawaiian wedding in Granny Jones’ back yard. Soon after, he joined the Army. Three years later, he had risen to the rank of sergeant.

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Fulton native Sgt. Keith Coe dies in Iraq

also

'Coe Daddy' Sacrificed His Life for His Men
Family of A'dale Army sergeant to hold memorial service in Haven.
By Shoshana Walter
THE LEDGER


Published: Friday, April 30, 2010 at 11:38 p.m.
Last Modified: Friday, April 30, 2010 at 11:38 p.m.


LAKELAND His men called him "Coe Daddy."


And on Tuesday, Sgt. Keith A. Coe, 30, sacrificed his life for them, said grandmother Dawn Jones.

Defense Department officials say Coe died Tuesday in Khalis, Iraq, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked his unit with an explosive device. Coe was the first to step out of the truck when they arrived on scene for a mission, Jones said. Before anyone else could jump out, he was caught in the explosion, she said.

"All the others in the truck were just kids, just out of high school. It was his duty to get out of that truck first because he was the sergeant in charge," Jones said. "Keith saved their lives."
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Coe Daddy Sacrificed His Life for His Men