Originally Question to Quora – Why do so many US Soldiers end up in the streets?
Initial answer by Steven Johnson, Former Facilities Coordinator PEO-AVN, RSA, AL at The United States of America (1989–2018)
Out of respect for people I know, I will keep this brief and honest:
The largest share of homeless Vets are homeless combat Vets. Most non-combatant service members only lose their home if they become careless or criminal. Rare. The very core of serving is be honorable.
So this is why: most of the homeless Vets have seen, done, or suffered shit that is humanly insufferable, and they just can’t deal with it in any way that lets them come back home and re-insert into a civilian life that is nothing like the one they left…because when they left, they didn’t have the 4K-Ultra HD Dolby 9.2 full surround memories they made over there of unimaginable carnage, violence, terror, and grief. According to a study by the National Institute of Health and the National Institute of mental Health (govt agencies), fifty percent of homeless vets are Vietnam vets.
And admitting they can’t fucking take it is the hardest thing on earth besides reliving the fucking suck every fucking day.
So they withdraw, shut down, suffer in silence while everything around them evaporates including the woman keeping him warm and the pillow they shared.
And a great many of them take their own lives. That we send billions to terrorists while we have even a single homeless Vet pisses me off royally.
Tom Myers:
That was the best answer to that question that I’ve ever heard. My Dad was a Korean war vet. All I knew growing up in the ‘60’s was that he was painfully quiet sometimes, and that he hated rice and the cold with all his heart. I thought that was a little odd but
not a problem. It wasn’t until he was dead and gone that I began to understand how those horrible 3 years affected him while he was still a teenager.
Until you see someone you love sitting there but not really there with that 1,000-yd stare, and there is nothing that can be done… We take the best years of these men and then discard them when they are no longer of service and we give boatloads and boatloads of money to people that hate our guts. I truly do not understand this world anymore.
John Browning:
The most simple direct answer is that it’s the consequence of building a substantial part of our economy around the Military Industrial Complex. Instead of building world class products in other categories we focus so much of our national talent on world class weaponry.
Ike knew it intimately and said it plainly. Few listened.
Wall Street enriches itself on investments in hostile countries that promise high returns and if it goes south they hedge with defense stocks. Either way they win. ONE OF THE BEST ANSWERS!
MJ Lejer:
Right! Which is why I remember General “Ike” and compare the 6- time draft-dodger CIC we have in Office now (tRump, at the time), with his cackling, run-and-hide partner, all I can do is shake my head at the pure incompetence of a mighty nation that lost their head last November and voted for those two incompetents! America is losing face in the world arena, and it doesn’t bode well for our once, most-powerful nation on earth!
Eleanora M:
My Dad was the same way, Tom. He was a veteran of 3 wars-WW II, Korean War, & VN. He became very quiet & thoughtful after Korea, but it was VN that affected him greatly. The only one he spoke to about VN was my husband who had served 2 tours there.
It angers me as a taxpayer, that our government throws so much money away on ridiculous programs in our country & other countries who do not care about us, at the expense of our vets who did so much for us.
MJ Lejer:
Agreed! If one realizes all the costly committees our ‘leaders’ form, then nominate others to form another committee to help the committee, it gets ridiculous real quick, and on and on, while they spend our hard-earned tax money like it’s sand on a sea-shore! Some of the “tasks” of these committees are downright laughable, but to the Pols care? Hell no they don’t, as long as they continue to receive their fat paychecks!
Steve Gilbert:
My wife’s uncle was in Patton’s tank Corp and was in the Battle of the Bulge.
He NEVER talked about his time in WWII.
He lead a successful life, but it was clear he had saw and maybe done awful things in the war and didn’t want to relive any of it with anyone.
Bill Mullins:
I came along just in time to keep my dad from serving on an aircraft carrier of the coast of Korea but my wife’s dad was a top gunner in B-24s in WWII. He got shot down and spent the last months of the war in Europe as a guest of the 3rd Reich in one of those lovely resort communities the Germans maintained in Poland. He also got to tour the countryside in a fun little exercise known as the German Death March (google it). He had so much fun he would not tell us about it. Guess he did not want to make us jealous of all the good times he had.
Robert M Ward:
The ostensible reason that the United States internationalist “Uni- Party” continually confiscates resources from citizens of our country — for squandering in foreign countries — is purportedly to induce these tribalistic societies, who do not share our culture, magically to become as we think that we are — i.e., democratic. Wherefore, this doctrine of so-called “nation building” is inherently destined to fail.
But, perhaps the more genuine motive behind the de facto doctrine of “Continuous Foreign War” is to provide trillions of dollars to the American armament industry — and, moreover to the Press, to
Hollywood, to Big Academia, to Wall Street, and most ultimately to the American politicians (in both political parties) that the above joined entities have bought.
When it is someone else’s child who is to be killed or maimed for life, the choice of human wickedness — to take the bucks — is easy….very easy. (Another VERY GOOD answer!)
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