Sick, wounded U.S. troops held in squalor

[The Mad Monk]

Has anyone tried to do something about this?

[MichaeltheGreat]

Yeah, you can *****. Anything you say or do disappears down a big black bureaucratic hole.

The big problem now is that post 'Nam, the military decided that a lot of it's support functions will come primarily or exclusively from the reserves, but they have not reformed the reserves structurally since WW2.

Basically, the reserves used to be places for sad sacks who you could con into sticking around because they got to play soldier, so that just in case the **** hit the fan somewhere, you had instant speedbumps until the draftee army got put together. That characterized a lot of the early Korean war, between the first row of speed bumps (occupation forces in Asia) and the regular draftee Army.

Now, you have a generally professional regular military (with some horror story ****ups like docs and dentists, etc.), and a reserve component that should function the same way, but it's still the same type of (dis)organization it was 50 years ago - and it's still a bastard child to the regular forces.

A good first step would be splitting FORSCOM into two equal commands - one for regular forces in CONUS, and one to oversee all Reserve and National Guard matters.

Once you have a four star regular army command, you can then set about reforming the entire system.

Meanwhile, some things being done at Stewart are assinine - there's a shortage of docs to treat the regulars and reservists in transit and the medical holds, so the medical holds should be split out to different bases nearer their homes and reserve units.

Any time there is a disability claim, and you don't have pieces visibly missing (and sometimes, even when you do), there is an institutional mentality to find any ****ing excuse you can find to claim the disability is non-service related. In my dead brother's case, he had an 18 year fight on disability, and when he died, the VA (different organization, same mentality) spent more money by far denying service related cause of death and fighting appeals that it would have cost in survivors benefits to his widow and their kids.

Army docs in general are abysmal - they come in getting O3 pay, which is about a tenth what they'd get on the outside, but they are immune from liability. There's also a real shortage of docs qualified to deal with secondary traumatic injuries (that's mostly OJT after the casualties start coming in from Germany), and with infectious diseases, virology, etc. It's no excuse, because the Navy (at least at Navy hospital in San Diego) contracts with civilian docs who work in real hospitals.

It is entirely possible to distribute these patients out to multiple bases, and to get them proper care under contract at civilian medical facilities. It is simply a command failure to do so, from the top down.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Static Universe
Yeah, army dentists suck. When I was in basic, I got pulled out of the chow line and sent to the dentist where I got all four of my wisdom teeth pulled out, in five minutes.

If the Army wanted you to have wisdom teeth, they would have issued you a set. Besides, I bet you never grew back any new ones after that experience, did you, soldier?

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Odin
More proof that Bush is a scumbag.

SUPPORT OUR TROOPS YOUR JACKASS HYPOCRITE!!!

Vets, especially banged up or crippled up ones who are no longer useful for service, have been ****ed over in the US since the American Revolution. Other countries have been ****ing over their vets longer.

If you don't stay fit for full duty, or have the courtesy to die with acceptable efficiency, you're just a liability. And now that they ship bodies home, you're a pain in their ass if you die.

[laurentius]

Well, Frankly I dont think the US army is the only place with incompetent docs. I have serious dobts about the capability of our Finnish army doctors too. I mean I waited for 7 hours to see a doctor. I had just had a leg operation and would have needed antibiotics and pain killers for that. What did I get, a couple of aspirin pills. Yeah, sweet.
So I got out of the army and got proper treatment in a real hospital.

Cant you sue them?

[Sikander]

Too bad Rummy wasn't up for the unglamorous job of sorting out the reserves and guard. I would have remained in the active reserves if I wasn't absolutely sure that I'd be getting fvcked constantly by the command structure. Our unit averaged a new CO every six months for over 20 years. Average attendance at drills was about 15-20% of paper strength because people were not getting paid. The worst morale was amongst the senior NCOs, whom I would have sacked immediately upon taking command (had I been unfortunate enough to be in command). It would have been unfair in many ways, as they didn't gripe for no reason, but IMO they were beyond redemption in their bitterness, and their effect on even brand new troops was poisonous.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Nope, not even if they blatantly and incompetently and unnecessarily cripple or kill you, and there's absolutely no disputing the facts of the case.

[laurentius]

Well, WTF is that!? They dont take any responsebility?

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Sikander
Too bad Rummy wasn't up for the unglamorous job of sorting out the reserves and guard. I would have remained in the active reserves if I wasn't absolutely sure that I'd be getting fvcked constantly by the command structure. Our unit averaged a new CO every six months for over 20 years. Average attendance at drills was about 15-20% of paper strength because people were not getting paid. The worst morale was amongst the senior NCOs, whom I would have sacked immediately upon taking command (had I been unfortunate enough to be in command). It would have been unfair in many ways, as they didn't gripe for no reason, but IMO they were beyond redemption in their bitterness, and their effect on even brand new troops was poisonous.

Assuming you had the means and the authority to fix the problems, I'd rather have a little come to Jesus chat with the bitter beyond redemption. Start fixing the problems and offer them gentle encouragement (size 11-EEE Corcorans in my case ) to be part of the solution, or make examples of them after I started fixing the problems, to encourage their replacements to be part of the solution.

If you sack them immediately, you just look like a p***k. It's important for the troops' future performance to understand why you're a p***k.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by laurentius
Well, WTF is that!? They dont take any responsebility?

By law, the military (and it's personnel acting in their official capacity) are immune to civil suits by military personnel or their survivors.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat

Assuming you had the means and the authority to fix the problems, I'd rather have a little come to Jesus chat with the bitter beyond redemption. Start fixing the problems and offer them gentle encouragement (size 11-EEE Corcorans in my case ) to be part of the solution, or make examples of them after I started fixing the problems, to encourage their replacements to be part of the solution.

If you sack them immediately, you just look like a p***k. It's important for the troops' future performance to understand why you're a p***k.

That's smart. If you've got to sh!tcan some people you should get as much mileage as possible out of them by way of example, and as you and Napolean (IIRC) have said before, they can serve as an example pour les outres.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

Apropos to nothing...

I used to ride to drill with my platoon sergeant. He was actually one of the few senior NCOs who didn't have a major morale problem, and amazingly he had an MOS that was actually pertinent to the unit. Anyway, we were driving to drill one weekend and he started *****ing about having to wait in line at the convenience store the night before behind a black lady (and he didn't use the word black or lady) who was buying a bunch of lottery tickets. The clerk was typing in her numbers one after another, and the line at the counter was huge. I was aghast, and sat in stunned silence as this piece of white trash used the N word in his sorry little story. I could see the whole story before he finished it, how blacks were inferior and wasted their welfare money on lottery tickets etc. ad nauseum. I caught myself drifting on this line of thought and checked back in as he finished his little story.

"Finally she gets her last ticket and I get to the front of the line and say, gimme 10 quickpicks."

That dumbass was only pi$sed off because she didn't use the random number function to buy her lottery tickets, but instead wanted to play "her" numbers. I laughed uncontrollably at his little story, and I'm sure that he thought I was laughing with him. Wrong!

[Sprayber]

I know there are lots of horror stories but during my recent depolyment I found the doctors at Fort Sill to be very professional on how they conducted themselves. At first there was a problem with records and such but over all the doctors there acted better than a lot of civilian doctors I have been too. As far as pay goes, I have heard lots of stories about them botching pay, and it has happened to me. The key is to be good friends with the administration guys and all those problems always gets smoothed over. There have been at least two occasions where a particular guy covered my ass and I got paid while I was not there. All I had to do was come in the following week and make it up.

A couple of years ago we got a new Training NCO and all he was interested in doing was marking time until retirment. Thankfully that didnt last long when the new commander came in.

[Static Universe]

Originally posted by Sprayber
I know there are lots of horror stories but during my recent depolyment I found the doctors at Fort Sill to be very professional on how they conducted themselves. At first there was a problem with records and such but over all the doctors there acted better than a lot of civilian doctors I have been too.

There are some very good doctors serving in the army, especially if you're stationed at a base large enough to support a decent hospital or one that does medical type training.

Unfortunately, most of the poor doctors seem farmed out to deal with soldier inprocessing or screening sick call or doing physicals, and this is where most of the diagnostic, early treatment and medical record problems begin. These doctors tend to be simply incompetent to deal with anything except prescribing you Motrin.

[Static Universe]

Originally posted by laurentius

Cant you sue them?

As far as I understand it, a U.S. serviceman cannot sue the government or military under any circumstances related to their military service, including healthcare.

[Mr. Harley]

However, there is another issue. Members of the military consistantly vote Republican and conservative. To fund tax cuts, especially since the Gingrich House back in the 1990's, support services have been "contracted out" and veterans benefits reduced whenever politicians thought they could get away with it.

The Bush administration has taken this to new lows, rescinding Clinton administration initiatives to go out and encourage veterans to take advantage of their benefits. The Bush administration is not your old traditional Republican party - they support a leaner, meaner military, which translates to fewer Main Battle Tanks, and more Stryker light combat vehicles, which are deployed easier (read more cheaply) and could not pass the required heavy machine gun ballistics test (read a 50 caliber HMG will penetrate them). But heck, we'll still deploy them, with little armor appliques that might work rather than flunk them. Since an RPG 7 shaped charge round will penetrate them, we'll deploy them with screen cages to pre-detonate them, we hope (and if not, well, it's only one crew that dies). I guess General Dynamics gave the Bush Reelection Committee enough money.

To translate, this means more casualties but hey, they aren't our kids! As long as veterans and serving military members let the current Republican leadership off the hook on how they treat veterans and vote as a group Republican, then they will be treated like crap. Make the Neoconservatives worry, and maybe some of those tax cuts can instead go to taking care of the individuals who put themselves at life's risk for their country. Genuine tradional values.