How About, "He's an Evil SOB."

Sadly predictable ... the PTSD defense meme is already out there and growing roots;

Experts caution against jumping to conclusions, but two facts are known. This was the sergeant's fourth deployment. And the risk of mental illnesses such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, and anxiety-related disorders is generally higher during subsequent deployments than during a soldier's first.

"The more exposure there is to trauma the worse it's going to be," said Dr. David Reiss, a psychiatrist in private practice who has treated patients with PTSD. "Especially if someone is deployed repetitively, then the whole issue of expecting to go home, not going home, just amplifies it."

Sigh. No, no, and no. PTSD does not make people psychotic killers, but if people can make you think it does ... then that has all sorts of uses from defending the evil to marginalizing veterans.

What makes me mad about this article is that it sets up a premise in the beginning, but then starts to backtrack - backtrack well after a lot of people stop reading.

As with most aspects of mental illness, however, the link between deployments and mental illness is not straightforward. For instance, the incidence of PTSD during a third deployment is 2.7 percent among male members of the armed forces, according to a study released last September by the Armed Forces Health Surveillance Center in Silver Spring, Maryland.

But the incidence of PTSD for GIs serving a fourth deployment is lower: 1.9 percent, found the study, which analyzed medical records of 1.3 million U.S. military members who had served in Afghanistan or Iraq.

Even among GIs aged 30 or older - the sergeant is reportedly 38 - that pattern persists. The rate of PTSD among these older soldiers is 2.4 percent during a third deployment but 1.8 percent during a fourth. By comparison, the rate is 1.2 percent during the first deployment.

The rate of other mental illnesses also peaks during the third deployment. About 1.9 percent of male GIs over 30 are diagnosed with an anxiety disorder during their first deployment, compared to 2.5 percent during their third and 2 percent during their fourth.
...
One reason for the decrease in the rate of mental illness after the third tour of duty is that service members who develop a mental illness during a deployment "are less likely than their counterparts to deploy again," found the 2011 study, "as a result, repeat deployers may be more psychologically ‘resilient' than their never or less frequently deployed counterparts."

Right. This guy actually has a lower chance of having PTSD than most. (as a side note, note the use of "male." Rates of PTSD and mental illness is much greater in females than in males. If there were a PTSD connection, then we should have roving bands of female vets laying waste to the countryside.)

Here is the kicker; at the end of a very long article, they give you this;

But these are only generalities, which are extremely difficult to apply to any given soldier. "We have never done very well predicting aggression or violence at the individual level," said Dr. Thomas Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health.

In other words, "This is just blind speculation ... but we'll keep the PTSD mythology alive and make it worse .... no problem."

As my regular readers know, this is just another part of an ongoing effort to smear veterans now just like was done to the Vietnam era vets. I've been blogg'n about it since my first year online.

Hat tip LCDR B.

USS ENTERPRISE (CVN-80); make it so

No, I'm not neutral. I've done a cruise on Big E, and as she heads out to give one more full measure - I cannot believe we are even having to do this ... but again; there is a petition to do the right thing. Sign it.

There should always be an ENTERPRISE .... let's make that, there shall always be an ENTERPRISE.

Well, the Chinese understand successful counter-piracy

Heck, if we won't do it - then maybe a nation that still has self-confidence and good domestic political top-cover will.

"For counter-piracy campaigns to be effective, we should probably move beyond the ocean and crash their bases on the land," said General Chen Bingde, the chief of the general staff of the People's Liberation Army.

China is among the countries fighting increasingly aggressive Somali pirates, who are making tens of millions of dollars in ransoms from seizing merchant ships in the Gulf of Aden and increasingly in the Indian Ocean.

Earlier this year, a U.S. Navy Commander, Vice Admiral Mark Fox, said he believed some of the pre-emptive techniques used to battle terrorism should be used to combat pirates, particularly the aggressive approach to tracking terrorist financing.

Chen appeared to be favoring an even more aggressive approach.

"It is important that we target not only the operators, those on the small ships or crafts conducting the hijacking activities, but also the figureheads," Chen said.

General Chen .... most professionals I know would sail under your flag with those orders. It is sound and based on literally thousands of years of anti-piracy best practices. Go for it.

Hat tip E40.

It Must but it Won't and it Can't

One of the things that I am in full alignment with the Obama Administration on, though for different reasons, is the ongoing withdraw from Europe.

In Sal's world, we would only have Joint/Combined logistics and training bases. That's it. The major reason is that we have allowed generations of spoiled First Worlders in Europe let us spend our blood and treasure so they can have six-weeks of vacation.

Just when we back out though, the Europeans financial house is collapsing around them so that in many respects they couldn't re-arm even if they wanted to.

In that light - in a way - this is sad. Behold; the EuroWeenie-ess Brigitte Adès in the NYTOnline,

But among the Western allies, the French and the British have long anticipated a withdrawal of U.S. troops and have been more forward than most in their attempts to promote the idea of a European defense, as evidenced by the Franco-British agreement signed in Lancaster in November 2010. Nevertheless, looking at the agreement closely, the content seems motivated by budgetary constraints rather than by a genuine desire to build an independent European defense. Against the backdrop of severe economic crisis, it is unlikely that Europeans will accelerate the building of a common defense. And NATO will therefore remain Europe’s primary defense organization in the years to come.

As with most NATO-speak, when you hear NATO in the context of serious military action - read "United States."

Senior NATO officials confirmed to me their intention to adapt to the new American policy, and to the changing world, with a more flexible approach. They say they look forward to new, more flexible partnerships within NATO and even with outside partners, adapted to new challenges, such as cyber warfare, environmental crisis and energy security.

Amazing. The bloodless dreams of the pampered. That is the world of their think tanks; but that isn't the real world.

The crisis right on Europe's door is in Syria - nothing cyber or green about that war. That is a war of reality; blood and iron.

This is even more delusional.

“Afghanistan has served as a catalyst,” he added. “It has set up a new culture. We must keep working on the links which have been made through joint operations so far. We must invest in permanent ties by having global partners such as Australia, Japan. South Korea, India and even China. We are connecting NATO to the global landscape.”

Now that is rich. What is the American lesson of Afghanistan WRT NATO? Simple; outside GBR, EST, DNK, NLD, CAN and some dog-n-cat one-off SOF/specialized units from a few others - the rest are more than content to let others die for them as they huddle in the FOB and keep their major maneuver forces home for the holidays.

Too many generations of Europeans are detached from meaningful military means of self-defense. Uncle Sam will always be there ... right?

Ummm .... no.

Generational Warfare

Ya'll know I like to tweak the Boomers, and have a lot of faith in the younger generation.

Though the bell curve is wide, generations do have personalities and points of views.

I'm a Gen X type - so I found this description by our buddy over at BroadsideBlog very interesting, and right on target.

If you are a boomer, here is how you see them (condensed from “10 characteristics of Generation Me” by Gary Schlee, based on a book by Kathleen Shaputis):

Direct to the point of being rude
Lacking self-esteem
Sense of entitlement
Thin skinned
Dreamers
Cynical
Professional students (living at home)

If you are in Generation Y, you see yourself this way (from “Generation Y” by Sally Kane):

Tech-Savvy
Family-Centric
Achievement-Oriented
Team-Oriented
Attention-Craving (wanting feedback, guidance, mentoring)

He doesn't cover Gen X, but a decade ago at ScienceBlog, this works.

Generation Xers -- those born between 1965 and 1984 -- are tormented by anxiety, fear of failure and a lack of control over the forces that affect their lives. To cope, many have adopted "chameleon" personalities, pretending to be what others want them to be, but at great emotional cost to themselves,
...
In Masks and Mirrors: Generation X and the Chameleon Personality (Praeger, 2001), Bernard Carl Rosen, professor emeritus of sociology at Cornell, asserts that elite Generation X'ers are at the forefront of the technology revolution but are filled with anger at the preceding generation -- the baby boomers -- who, they feel, takes advantage of them.

To the frazzled, elite X'ers, who feel under intense pressure in a fiercely competitive society, the glue that keeps society together looks weak and the social system feels wobbly.

"To cope with their anxieties and fears, many X'ers have decided that fighting is useless, submission intolerable and escape impossible. Thus, they choose pretending -- that is, they become chameleons as their only chance for protection," says Rosen, a socio-psychologist. "This practice, however, of pleasing whomever they are with, is ultimately self-defeating." Over time, "chameleonism," becomes permanent, Rosen says.

About right, but Chameleon? No .... Salamander.

Hat tip Lucien.

I should have told him about the fake FB Salamander

Back right before VADM Miller took over at Annapolis, there we a lot of nasty things going on there and this blog was getting some great primary information about them from the Color Guard fiasco to the ongoing warping effects of D1 football - in the middle of it there was/is a fake "CDR Salamander" site created on Facebook (it is still there). I don't think I ever mentioned it before, and I won't link to it now - but I had multiple MIDN warn me about it.

It was quasi-Darwinian, as any review of friends or even a look at the avatar (a guy with binoculars looking over the stadium that is now gone) should have let people know that something was wrong. Maybe I should have "GINGERBREAD'd" - but I didn't want to give it more PR.

The reason it existed was obvious - it came online at the same time MIDN were warning me about the witch hunt going on to find out who was communicating with me (NB to those budding MIDN and active duty fascists ... you never smoked out any of my primary contacts; only terrorized the innocent). Setting up a FB trap was a cheap way to find out who was late to the game to finding me on FB.

That kind of spoofing isn't rare - and there are much worse FB spoofing going on - one that involved someone I'm a big fan of;

Admiral Stirvis (sic) - who was in charge of operations in Libya to bring about the end of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's regime - now has an official Facebook site while the bogus one has been permanently deleted from the internet.

But it opened up a treasure trove of personal information to the people behind the fake.

As well as their names, people routinely put personal email addresses, dates of birth, clues about their home address and personal and family pictures online. Some even state their current location, and messages on a page's "wall" can reveal huge amounts about their beliefs and state of mind.

Although it is not known how much information was harvested, foreign intelligence agencies would be delighted to have such huge amounts of information which can be used to produce detailed profiles of potential targets for espionage or even blackmail.

Senior Nato staff were warned about the fake account late last year and made representations to Facebook.

It is understood that Facebook uses very sophisticated techniques to identify bogus accounts which, it says, have very different footprints to genuine Facebook users.

A spokesman said: "After the profile was reported to us, it was taken down as soon as we were notified and investigated the issue."

Last night officials at SHAPE, the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, reluctantly confirmed that its commander had been targeted.

Oh, for the record .... THIS is my FB page.

This Will Get Very Ugly

This is one of those things that are very hard to plan for. There is no "good" response, and you can have very little impact on the direction it can take until you see the first move on the other side.

In other words, we really don't know what to do until we see what happens outside the HESCO.

A US soldier in Afghanistan has killed at least 16 civilians and wounded five after entering their homes in Kandahar province, senior local officials say.

He left his military base in the early hours of the morning and opened fire in at least two homes; women and children were among the dead.

Nato said it was investigating the "deeply regrettable incident".

Anti-US sentiment is already high in Afghanistan after US soldiers burnt copies of the Koran last month.

US officials have apologised repeatedly for the incident at a Nato base in Kabul, but they failed to quell a series of protests and attacks that killed at least 30 people and six US troops.

Local people have reportedly gathered near the base in Panjwai district to protest about Sunday's killings, and the US embassy is advising against travel to the area.

Lt Gen Adrian Bradshaw, deputy commander of Nato-led forces, said he was unable to "explain the motivation behind such callous acts", adding that "our thoughts and prayers are with those caught in this tragedy".
...
The soldier has not been named, but is thought to be a staff sergeant.
...
He is reported to have walked off his base at around 03:00 local time (22:30 GMT Saturday) and headed to nearby villages, moving methodically from house to house.

It could not come at a worse time - as "the other side" is starting to look like "everyone."

Watch and pray - and give a nod to our leaders on the ground that they have the tools, ROE, and support they need to do what is their ultimate charge; protect themselves as things most likely escalate.

Watch your back.