Why Are Soldiers with PTSD Not Eligible for the Purple Heart?

By Simon Maxwell Apter, The Nation. Posted January 28, 2009.

But the armed forces don't take such a tolerant view of mental hygiene. The problem, according to the Military Order of the Purple Heart, a Pentagon-supported group, is that awarding the decoration for psychological afflictions would "debase" the medal, like a kid watering down the lemonade so he can make more profit. After all, how would an amputee feel if he had to share his honor with someone who's merely suffering from a shattered psyche? It simply wouldn't be fair. Then again, it's not really fair to have our veterans searching for solace in suicide, either, which is what's happening at an increasingly alarming rate among veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. A 2007 CBS News investigation deemed suicide to be "epidemic" among returning veterans, which found their suicide rates to be twice that of non-veterans.

Still, PTSD and depression, according to the Pentagon, are not intentionally caused by the enemy and are therefore not the types of wounds that DoD likes to celebrate. While quiet depression doesn't quite appeal to classic ideals of heroism in the way that, say, shredded viscera or an amputated limb can, it's a slippery argument to make when a widely cited report says 20 percent of American fighting forces suffer from PTSD or severe depression. Though not exactly the Devil's Arithmetic, if one applies this 20 percent proportion to civilian life, then of the 180 or so passengers seated on a filled Boeing 757-223 -- the same type of jet that crashed into the Pentagon on September 11 -- between thirty and forty of them, more than enough to fill the entire first-class cabin, would take a more pessimistic view of surviving an incident-free flight than most psychiatrists would prefer.

A wounded soldier, whether he or she suffers from PTSD or from an RPG-shattered face, is a wounded soldier. By shining honor, and not shame, onto the psychological wounds of victimized soldiers, the armed forces can perhaps begin to update their decidedly old-fashioned vision of sacrifice and give their fighting men and women the credit and respect they deserve.

See more stories tagged with: iraq, vietnam, pentagon, afghanistan, veterans, ptsd, department of defense, u.s. military, william c. westmoreland, purple hearts, post-traumatic-stress dis, paul wellstone mental hea

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