Support Our Troops? The Shameful Reality. Last week, the House of Representatives passed a non-binding resolution opposing the President’s Iraq surge plans. The resolution finally forced members of Congress to take a stand. Although I applaud that this step, the reality is that this Congress will need to go farther and address funding the war that is their only real leverage on the president.

But there is something that Congress can do immediately that will have a more personal effect on the troops and their families. Congress can do something about the deplorable conditions at our nation’s military hospitals. In a terrific piece of investigative reporting, a two part series in Sunday and Monday’s Washington Post described how injured and maimed Iraq veterans are being slowly forgotten at Walter Reed Hospital. The Post calls Walter Reed “a virtual town of desperation and dysfunction (where) the wounded are socked away for months and years in random buildings and barracks…”. The article describes a bureaucracy that is overwhelmed, understaffed and insensitive to our veterans.

There aren’t enough counselors to support the veterans and their families. Another soldier who had his uniform cut off by medics in Iraq who were trying to save his life, is unable to get a uniform to wear to the ceremony where he is to receive his Purple Heart. When he tries to get a uniform, he finds that the Army bureaucracy has lost his paperwork and won’t issue him one because it has no record of his ever having been in Iraq.

Worse, some injured soldiers have to fight for disability pay because the Army claims their injuries resulted from pre-existing conditions. This must add immeasurably to the stress these veterans and their families face. Without sufficient disability pay, many face a lonely and frightening future. They rightly wonder how they will survive when they can’t work.

It’s shameful that these soldiers face living with permanent disabilities when many suffered their injuries because they didn’t have the proper equipment to protect them against roadside bombs. But it is a national disgrace that the reward for their sacrifice is that they now have to fight a military bureaucracy for the disability payments that would at least enable them to live without fear of financial ruin.

Congress may not be able stop them from going to Iraq, but at the minimum, it is Congress’ obligation to make sure that our veterans receive the benefits and care that many will need for the rest of their lives. This will require more funding and more oversight of how the military is dealing with our veterans.

One step each member of congress can take immediately is to “adopt” injured soldiers from his or her district and make sure that each one of them gets the services and disability payments that they desperately need.

Unlike the non-binding resolution, this is an issue that requires no debate.

Labels: Congress, Iraq, military

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