[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 12180]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




    START WINNING THE WAR ON MILITARY SUICIDE BY ENDING THE WAR IN 
                              AFGHANISTAN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Woolsey) for 5 minutes.
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, more than 2,000 U.S. troops have been 
killed in the line of duty in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, that 
dramatically understates the human cost of this war, a war that is now 
nearly 11 years old.
  A recent Time magazine cover story details the silent killer of our 
brave servicemembers--the tragically high suicide rate among Iraq and 
Afghanistan veterans and other members of the service. The article 
describes how one Army helicopter pilot, who had flown 70 missions in 
Iraq over 9 months--70 missions over 9 months--waited on the phone for 
45 minutes to speak to the Pentagon crisis line when he was in severe 
distress. The last communication his wife received from him was a text 
in which he said, ``Still on hold.'' Several hours later, she found him 
in their bedroom with a fatal gunshot wound to the neck.
  A second victim, an Army doctor who wasn't deployed to Iraq or 
Afghanistan, wrote an email to his wife minutes before hanging himself. 
It read:

       Please always tell my children how much I love them, and 
     most importantly, never, ever let them find out how I died.

  Mr. Speaker, we can no longer deny the devastating mental health 
impact of repeated deployments, of continued exposure to explosions, 
horror, carnage and destruction. Of course, in an institution like the 
U.S. military that values courage and toughness, there's a reluctance 
to admit to depression and anxiety.
  Sometimes that manifests itself in the worst possible ways. For 
example, one Army major general wrote an angry diatribe on his blog 
about the selfishness of troops who killed themselves or were leaving 
others to ``clean up their mess.'' He admonished:

       Act like an adult, and deal with your real-life problems 
     like the rest of us.

  It's about time, Mr. Speaker, that we lost that attitude because 
we're losing brave Americans at a terrifying clip. In fact, according 
to the Time article, more soldiers have taken their own lives than have 
died in Afghanistan. While veterans make up 10 percent of the adult 
population, they account for 20 percent of the suicides.
  We are starting to see more awareness of this problem, thank Heavens. 
Secretary Panetta says the right things, but it's time to back up 
rhetoric. It's time to back it up with more resources because the fact 
is only 4 percent of the Pentagon's medical budget is devoted to mental 
health, about the same amount that we spend on the Afghan war every day 
and a half. We spend $2 billion a year to treat servicemembers 
suffering from psychological trauma, but we spend $10 billion a month 
on the war that is the root of much of that trauma in the first place.
  Even if the Afghanistan war ended tomorrow, Mr. Speaker, so much 
damage is already done. We would still be left with a huge crisis that 
will require more resolve than we are seemingly prepared to muster. I 
would expect every Member who has enthusiastically supported this war 
to just as eagerly support what it takes to fight the suicide epidemic 
this war has caused. It's time to stop the bleeding to make sure our 
heroes are removed from the conflict that is inflicting so much damage. 
We can start winning the war on suicide by ending the war in 
Afghanistan.
  Let's bring our troops home now.

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