vanguard blog | July 08, 2010 | 9 comments

Veterans Administration Will Offer Expanded PTSD Benefits For Soldiers

Alex Simmons is the producer of Vanguard's "War Crimes."

From the front page of The New York Times today:

The government is preparing to issue new rules that will make it substantially easier for veterans who have been found to have post-traumatic stress disorder to receive disability benefits, a change that could affect hundreds of thousands of veterans from the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam...

Under the new rule, which applies to veterans of all wars, the department will grant compensation to those with P.T.S.D. if they can simply show that they served in a war zone and in a job consistent with the events that they say caused their conditions. They would not have to prove, for instance, that they came under fire, served in a front-line unit or saw a friend killed.

The new rule would also allow compensation for service members who had good reason to fear traumatic events, known as stressors, even if they did not actually experience them.

The move reflects a greater understanding of PTSD, that one doesn't have to serve on the front-line or come under direct fire to return with the disorder. [Watch an outtake from "War Crimes" about a Los Angeles treatment clinic for veterans with PTSD.]

Of the vets we spoke to with PTSD during the making of Vanguard's "War Crimes," some experienced what are considered classic causes of combat trauma, seeing a good friend die or having their Humvee hit with an IED, like Jesse Bratcher.

But others, like Clark Fish, returned from the war zone traumatized not by fighting on a battlefield, but from working in an emergency room and seeing soldiers, and Iraqi children, die on a daily basis. [Meet Clark Fish in this scene from "War Crimes."]

In the past, it has been much harder for those like Clark to prove they had PTSD after never coming under fire from the enemy. These new rules are attempting to change that.

Watch Vanguard correspondent Kaj Larsen talk about his experiences as a Navy SEAL returning from combat below.

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9 comments // Veterans Administration Will Offer Expanded PTSD Benefits For Soldiers

  • sbghee08
  • Harrison89
    • 0
      Harrison89  

    • Those who serve this country should have the upmost care from the country they served. PTSD is a real danger that should not be confined to simple things as "were they in the front lines." War, for everyone involved, have a danger of this. Soldiers need more assistance returning home. They deserve more.

    • 1 year ago
  • amygdalavet
    • 0
      amygdalavet  

    • Kaj, Thanks for your work on this issue!
      I am combat vet of Vietnam war and know this issue well.
      Thanks for your service too.

      Take Care

    • 1 year ago
  • maarrsssss
  • sbghee08
  • sbghee08
    • 0
      sbghee08  

    • I am swelling up with frustration inside as I watch this! I won't babble on about my work history, training, and COMMON SENSE. But, if we are "training" soldiers for WAR, why aren't we "training" them for society?? Think about it, these brave men and women, voluntarily, join one part of the military and go through extensive training to prepare them for combat. Six weeks of boot camp, mostly at an impressionable age, and then deployment. Now, common sense to me would wonder, instead of these "veteran's courts", why are we not preparing them for society?? When soldiers come home there is NO TRANSITION period! Somebody says there is, your right, 3 (THREE) DAYS! We "train" them for war, we should "train" them back into society, which is not a war zone! Instead of waiting to see if veterans are going to commit a crime, TRANSITION!! That's all I can say, TRANSITION, TRANSITION, TRANSITION!!
      I apologize if this doesn't make sense, but there are MANY other factors that I would not want to post.
      OUR SOLDIERS ARE HERO'S!!

    • 1 year ago
  • kassandrasduplex
    • 0
      kassandrasduplex  

    • And I thought this would actually be about the war crimes the US military has and continues to commit in these immoral wars of choice fought for the TAPI pipeline and natural resources. Our military is being used to steal oil, lithium, gold and copper and probably is involved in the opium trade too. Vietnam all over again except the level of psychopathy in the average grunt has tripled since then.
      But instead we get a sympathetic treatment of the mercenaries who volunteered to kill innocent people in a place they know little to nothing about.
      These murderers deserve everything they get.

      STOP THE WARS BRING OUR TROOPS HOME.

    • 1 year ago
  • A_M_
    • 0
      A_M_  
    • kassandrasduplex:

      war crimes. it's irony. training people to commit crimes abroad and in time of war..equals problem when returning to civil (ian) life? i would have been bored by another typ. 'war crimes' report, this was much more intriguing n gut wrenching

    • 1 year ago
  • Incredulous
alexsimmons

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