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baldeagle wrote:

K.Mooneyham wrote:... There are things you see in combat that are beyond anything you can imagine unless you've been in combat yourself. War does awful things to human bodies. Many people can't get those images out of their heads. There may be a few for whom killing someone is a traumatic experience, but that experience pales in comparison to some of the other things they see.

And, not really too strangely, other senses are also triggers: smells (for me, burnt flesh is still a problem)... sounds... etc. And when the triggers occur simultaneously....

OT a bit, but something to consider in context of the thread...

K.Mooneyham wrote:It would seem to me that the reason our folks suffer from things like PTSD is that our society teaches that killing folks is wrong, period. I'm not saying that as a moral judgement, just as a statement of observation. But, I do seriously doubt those Taliban guys lie awake worrying about the folks they've killed or maimed. And there have been a lot of other societies throughout history that haven't really had a problem with the taking of human lives, though often tempered by the circumstances of who or when they were killing.

The theory behind PTSD (and/or Critical Incident Stress Disorder - something that was explored heavily in the police/fire/EMS community in the late 70's and 80's) is that sometimes things happen that overstress our mind's ability to deal with them, and that certain smells, noises, situations, tastes, almost any sense, can bring about a re-observation of that event. Sometimes these interruptions are intense and long-lasting - sometimes they resolve themselves over a period of time. For example, when I came back from Vietnam, where I got to see and, in a small way, participate in a couple of very horrendous incidents, I had a problem with helicopters, specifically the whupping noise of a Slick, a UH-1, up close and loud noises. Those, you might think, would be perfectly normal reactions. But, when my new wife burned some a couple of chickens (she didn't realize you had to thaw them before you roasted them) - the vision and smell of that partially incinerated chicken threw me into a state of panic for several hours. Luckily, Pam had an idea what was going on and was able to talk me down, since I hadn't reacted violently, like some of my returning vet-mates had done to their spouses when they reacted to recurrences (flashbacks) in which their life was more directly threatened by my situations. These were by no means the total list of problems I had after Vietnam, but will serve to show that my symptoms and intrusions were rather mild, all things considered, and I'm so very thankful for that - I still have the same wife (though now she's a heck of a chef), a great family, and a life that I might not have had had by problems been much worse. When I was attempting to finish my degree in the early 90's, I met with several guys that served when I had, that had had a lot more problems with PTSD, and were still dealing with it, with some having greater success than others.

We all knew the grunt that could go out into an AO, wind up in a firefight, find a VC's body and make jokes about the Gomer while searching the body for documents or weapons or souvenirs, then go back into the unit area in the morning and ask for chilli and mac after seeing a body with it's head blown into roadkill. Others took a bit more time to get over it. And that's with the bad guys taking the most damage, which the Taliban certainly would think of any of the allied forces would be. So, no, I wouldn't expect any of them to loose sleep over an incident that killed lots of Americans.

Someone forced to shoot someone in close to them, say a family member, or perhaps someone presented with sudden unanticipated violence that has to react with force to save their life might get the same symptoms - people will definitely react differently.

If someone has multiple occurrences, in which they fear for their life constantly for a period of while, the emotions and reactions certainly would be more intense than someone with a single incident. The inability to process those feelings and emotions in a normal way is what defines PTSD.

BTW - while I worked as an EMT, I got interested in helping others in the EMS/fire/police community and got involved with the Critical Incident Stress training that was going on throughout the country - and continued my own personal study of PTSD in the EMS community while I worked as a paramedic for the next 20 years. So, that's where I'm getting my background info. I can give you lots of links for info to look at if you're interested.

Wayne

Jim Beaux wrote:....The way Kyle explains it in his book, Ventura is technically a Seal, but he isnt one of today's type of seal. Much has changed since Ventura's time & the training & the standards of today are much more rigorous & stringent. Kyle implied that he didnt think Ventura could have qualified to be a modern day Seal.

Which is something Seals and all Spec-ops types would take offense to.