When Angels Deserve to Die?

There has been something odd going on lately with our military.

Officials say there has been an alarming spike in the suicide rate among our military.

The Army said 24 soldiers are believed to have committed suicide in January alone -- six times as many as killed themselves in January 2008, according to statistics released Thursday.

The Army said it already has confirmed seven suicides, with 17 additional cases pending that it believes investigators will confirm as suicides for January.

If those prove true, more soldiers will have killed themselves than died in combat last month. According to Pentagon statistics, there were 16 U.S. combat deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq in January.

"This is terrifying," an Army official said. "We do not know what is going on."

Some say the long, cold months of winter could be a factor.

Some say it could be from the stress of leaving family and loved ones behind knowing that they are struggling here at home with our ecomony in bad shape. They suggest that maybe some troops feel guilty and that could lead to the rise in the suicide rate.

Another therory is that the anti-depressants prescribed to the soldiers can have side effects that include suicidal thougts....(Yes I'm serious) (I've never big a big fan of our medical and/or pharmicudical system, but thats for another blog)

This has been such a problem that congress and army leadership were briefed monthy instead of the usual annual briefing.

In 2008, the rate of army suicides was 20.2 per 100,000 soldiers.

In the same year, 41 marines commited suicide in 2008. Up from 33 in 2007 and 25 in 2006.

What is going on here?

In this blog I don't have a point to make or a revelation. I'm just curious as to why this is happening and what should we do about this?

I have never served in the service. I can only imagine how hard it is to leave your loved ones behind to go to a distant country to fight a war.

it would make more sense if we were drafting soldiers who were forced to go against their will. But these are young men and women who signed up in free will.

And supposedly Iraq is starting to stabilize and violence has taken a steep downturn compared to several years ago.

So what is going on? Why is this happening?

My amature opinion is that it is either the anti-depressants(that cause depression) or it's from soldier's concern with their families well-being during this economic hard times.

They should look more extensively into the drugs they are giving the soldiers and maybe even offer finacial help to the families of soldiers while they are away.

These brave men and women have enough to worry about while in a war zone. They shouldn't have to worry about if their families are suffering or not. The soldiers are taking care of us over there, We should help their families over here. It's not easy when the bread winner in the household is shipped off to another country.

I just hope this epidemic doesn't grow any worse. We need to find out what is going on here. Of course these things do happen, but why is the number of suicides sky rocketing like this?

If it's a problem we can reverse or at least limit, we should do it.

God bless you all who have ever served this country and God Bless the troops currently serving! Please hang in there! As I said, I can't say I know you're pain or what your going through. But we all want you home soon!



"When you can't hold on. Hold On."

"All these things that I have done"
The Killers