Inspirational or Ridiculous?

[toasty]

Check this story out -- looks like getting limb blown off in combat no longer automatically means that you're discharged:

U.S. soldiers with missing limbs allowed to return to active duty

By AP
May 30, 2007

SAN ANTONIO (AP) ? In the blur of smoke and blood after a bomb blew up under his Humvee in Iraq, Sgt. Tawan Williamson looked down at his shredded leg and knew it couldn't be saved. His military career, though, pulled through.

Less than a year after the attack, Williams is running again with a high-tech prosthetic leg and plans to take up a new assignment, probably by the fall, as an Army job counselor and affirmative action officer in Okinawa, Japan.

In an about-face by the Pentagon, the military is putting many more amputees back on active duty ? even back into combat, in some cases.

...

Previously, a soldier who lost a limb almost automatically received a quick discharge, a disability check and an appointment with the Veterans Administration.

But since the start of the Iraq war, the military has begun holding on to amputees, treating them in rehab programs like the one here at Fort Sam Houston and promising to help them return to active duty if that is what they want.

http://www.timesrecordnews.com/trn/local_news/article/0,1891,TRN_5784_5562143,00.html

Looks like this is a voluntary thing, so if a soldier wants to keep being a soldier after something like this happens, far be it for me to tell him no. Seems crazy, though.

[rubyraks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

way to put our best foot forward...

[Jenks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

91st infantry heading into combat

[Jenks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

putin's response to this thread:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070531/ap_on_re_eu/russia_putin

[rubyraks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

I don't see how that's a response to this thread in particular...

Frankly, Putin's been looking for any excuse to up the Russian military capabilities...not that the US has made that hard by essentially withdrawing unilaterally from the ballistic missiles treaty.

[Jenks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

Putin accusing the US of creating an Arms race? The US sending even one armed soldiers back into battle. The play on words...get it? way to suck all the fun right out of this thread Ben.

[toasty]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

Back on point, as I think about it a bit more, I can actually kinda see how this might serve a useful purpose. I have an ex-uncle who was a career Marine and was injured in Iraq about a year ago and discharged.

To make a long story short, he ended up committing suicide shortly after he returned. All indications are that, having been in the military for his entire adult life, he lost his sense of self-identity and purpose when his military career abruptly ended.

While on the one hand, I'm sure there's more to it than that, I do wonder if that would have happened if he had the option of staying in the military at some sort of desk job or something else that he could still do notwithstanding his injuries. Absurd though it may seem, as long as it's a voluntary thing and we're not forcing amputees onto the battlefield, it's tough for me to be too critical of this.

[toasty]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

way to suck all the fun right out of this thread Ben.

...and if he didn't, I probably did with my last post. Sorry 'bout that. Not my intention, though -- he's an ex-uncle, and I hadn't seen him for probably 25 years before I heard that he had killed himself, so it isn't as if it was someone close to me or that I even really knew. Just trying to make the point that not everyone wants to go home just because they're injured in combat, and that the option to stay enlisted may have intangible benefits.

[rubyraks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

Putin accusing the US of creating an Arms race? The US sending even one armed soldiers back into battle. The play on words...get it? way to suck all the fun right out of this thread Ben.

Never a big fan of bad puns...

[rubyraks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

So are you saying that before this change in policy that amputees couldn't take a desk job and were forced to accept a discharge? I find that a bit shocking as these are exactly the kind of dedicated people I'd expect to take desk jobs. I just thought they were discharged from active on the field duty.

[Jenks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

Never a big fan of bad puns...

[toasty]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

@ ruby

That's the impression I got from the article. I really don't know, though. If that is the way it was done in the past, though, this wouldn't have been much of a story.

[rubyraks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

yup, reading through the article I get the same impression:

Most of those who return to active duty are assigned to instructor or desk jobs away from combat. Only a few — the Army doesn't keep track of exactly how many — have returned to the war zone, and only at their insistence, Arata said.

suggests that previously amputees didn't have the option of desk jobs. I do find that a bit silly to be honest and this reversal is probably a good thing...as for amputees going back active service in the field, well if they don't have a problem and that's what they want who am I to argue.

[rubyraks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

going back to brian's post, when's the last time he's really had anything substantive to add in this political forum?

[Jenks]

Re: Inspirational or Ridiculous?

been a long time ben, probably not going to pick back up any time soon either.