The Real Cost of Surge 2.0: Thousands more disabled veterans

Susie Madrak at Crooks and Liars brings us the bad news from the San Francisco Chronicle:

More than 13,000 new cases of post-traumatic stress disorder. An additional 8,000 or so traumatic brain injuries. More suffering and need coming home in the form of wounded vets than the country can easily handle.

The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have produced more diagnosed cases of PTSD and debilitating injuries per capita than any other war in the nation's history, health care experts say. And veterans who encounter homecoming trouble are becoming homeless more quickly than ever, street counselors say.

SNIP

"We have this theme in this country that we will support our troops, all work as a team, but there are so many cases when they are just released from service and left on their own," Blecker said. "We treat them as second-class citizens, but they are the ones who pay the price."

There are proportionately more vets than ever suffering from PTSD and disability upon coming home because military armor and rescue capabilities are better than ever, experts say. That means fewer soldiers die of serious wounds, and more survive with lost limbs, injured brains and the damaging memories of horror.

Read the whole thing.

Even if half a trillion dollars to pay for fighting another 18 months in Afghanistan were to fall from the sky tomorrow, the price we will pay for the injuries to our veterans who survive that fight will continue to rise for decades to come.

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