Community can help stop Army suicides

The Army in Hawaii and bases around the world was assigned to "stand down" from regular duties Thursday and spend the day on training to cope with an increasingly grim reality: Too many in the ranks are dying from suicide.

These deaths must also be counted among the tragic and inevitable costs of war. The Army needs to examine how its leaders can take appropriate action to deal with the problem. And those who send our troops to battle must also be prepared to support them on their return.

The Army reports 131 potential active-duty suicides this year through August, as well as 80 poten- tial suicides by Army National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers who were not on active duty. At least eight possible suicides have been recorded this year in the U.S. Army Pacific, which includes Hawaii, Alaska, Japan and South Korea.

During those same months, the Army lost 171 soldiers in Afghanistan.

It gets more puzzling: Nearly half of those who died by suicide and three-fourths of those who attempted suicide were in the outpatient care system within 30 days prior to their deaths or suicide attempts. In recent years, most of those who committed suicide had never been deployed in combat or had just one deployment.

Command Sgt. Maj. Frank Leota, the top enlisted soldier in the Pacific, candidly said in a panel Tuesday at Fort Shafter that he had seen behavioral health experts at Tripler Army Medical Center for anger and other issues related to his own six combat deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.

"There’s a lot of personal guilt, a lot of second-guessing," Leota said. "There’s a lot of anger, so yeah, I was a pissed-off dude. … Soldiers need to understand that asking for help is taking that moral courage step. That’s what we talk about — having the courage to go up and (say to) someone, ‘I’m having issues,’ and that’s key."

A major deterrent to suicide is that leaders be "open to the signs of stress and they’ve got to be aggressive in encouraging those that need help to seek that help and be able to receive it," Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said recently. "It is important to point out that seeking help is a sign of strength and courage, not weakness."

More non-commissioned officers have been lost to suicide than junior enlisted soldiers who have taken their own lives, Bruce Shahbaz, a medical analyst with the Army’s Suicide Prevention Task Force, recently told Time magazine. Depression and other signs surface after they have been home for more than a year, trying to reintegrate with their family and facing a poor economy.

The problem is a complex one. It’s incumbent upon the Army leadership to use all the tools available to detect signs of potential suicide, including training and such simple methods as frequent communication with those who may be vulnerable.

So, too, are the obligations on the civilian side: Given the unique stresses placed on armed services members during times of war, political leaders must commit resources and other support to reduce suicides in the ranks. One way would be to consider all the consequences of putting our young men and women in harm’s way, and then reconsidering the efficacy of war.