From USA Today:The rate of Army soldiers enrolled in treatment programs for alcohol dependency or abuse has nearly doubled since 2003 — a sign of the growing stress of repeated deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to Army statistics and interviews.
Soldiers diagnosed by Army substance abuse counselors with alcoholism or alcohol abuse, such as binge drinking, increased from 6.1 per 1,000 soldiers in 2003 to an estimated 11.4 as of March 31, according to the data. The latest data cover the first six months of the fiscal year that began in October.
"We're seeing a lot of alcohol consumption," Gen. Peter Chiarelli, the Army's vice chief of staff, told top officers during a briefing on the Army's growing number of suicides.
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My Comment: My father and his friends were World War 2 vets, and while they were not alcoholics, they did love the bottle. It was from them that I learned that these men .... because of their experiences .... did need to "escape" (especially when they were together), and alcohol was the thing for them. I can only presume that today's vets are just like my dad and his friends .... continuing a tradition that goes back generations if not centuries.
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