Scientists say Pentagon misleads on dust study

The Pentagon is falsely claiming its research shows that airborne dust in Iraq and Afghanistan poses no health risk to U.S. troops, say three scientists whose review of that research found it riddled with mistakes. 

Military officials then falsely said the review of their research backed their conclusion that the dust in the two war zones is no different from that in California, scientists Philip Hopke, Mark Utell and Anthony Wexler say.

The scientists, who issued their report last year for the National Research Council (NRC) of the National Academy of Sciences, were part of a team that reviewed a 2008 study at the request of the Pentagon.   The earlier report, which was conducted for the military by the Nevada-based Desert Research Institute, made a series of incorrect conclusions and used faulty research methods, the 2010 study showed.

It is simply not true that research supports the Pentagon's claim that Middle Eastern dust is similar to that in the United States or that it poses no health risks, says Hopke, a Clarkson University scientist who conducted the National Research Council study.

"It's a bit disappointing when they know that, realistically, the data does not support that conclusion," he says.

Both studies were conducted to better understand risks as the number of U.S. troops who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and developed mysterious and severe respiratory conditions skyrocketed after their service. Since the start of the wars in 2003 and 2001, neurological disorders per 10,000 active-duty servicemembers have risen by 251%, while respiratory issues jumped by 47%, according to a USA TODAY analysis of military morbidity records from 2001 to 2010.

In a series of interviews and written memos in recent months, Pentagon health officials have claimed that the 2008 study found nothing wrong with the dust from the Middle East. "It is not noticeably different from samples collected in the Sahara Desert and desert regions in the U.S. and China," Craig Postlewaite, head of the Pentagon Force Protection and Readiness Office, told USA TODAY for a May story.

That USA TODAY report, Postlewaite and other Pentagon officials later said, "attempts to form a 'cause and effect' relationship" but there is "no evidence on which to base such a relationship."

In a blog on the Defense Department's website, Navy Capt. Patrick Laraby cited the NRC study directly: "After an exhaustive review, the NRC was unable to identify any health risks and indicated that they would need more data to determine whether there were any risks," Laraby wrote.

Utell, a professor at the University of Rochester School of Medicine who headed the National Research Council study, said it's incorrect for the Pentagon to claim the council's research found "no adverse health effects."

Instead, he said, the 2010 study found there could be negative health effects from the dust and that the 2008 research was so flawed "that they wouldn't be able to determine that with their study."

Utell, Hopke and Wexler, of the University of California-Davis, say their study found that the military's research in the 2008 report was flawed from the beginning, and the council made no statement that the dust is safe or similar to that back home.

In fact, they said the Army's research was so "ill-founded" that it couldn't be used to determine anything other than that the fine particulate matter levels in the Middle East far exceeded recommended World Health Organization levels.

Postlewaite did not respond directly to questions about how he and others represented the two studies. Instead, he said the council praises the military's "ability to carry out such a large-scale exposure-monitoring study in the midst of a military operation."

Utell agreed that the military took on a big task that could lead to better surveillance, but he and Wexler said military medical command were told even before they began the 2008 study that it was faulty.

"It is troubling that they did not take the scientists' recommendations to heart," Utell said.

Wexler said these kinds of studies have been performed before, so researchers should have known that the sampling equipment they used would be overwhelmed by sandstorms, that samples should not be kept in plastic containers in a hot environment because they could become contaminated, and that samples should be taken every third day - as has been the EPA standard since 1997 - rather than every sixth day.

"It's not like it's rocket science," Wexler said.

He said the researchers used "inappropriate" methods to test for metals, and that when they did perform analyses correctly, they did not release the results.

"It was just weird," Wexler said. "Were there people in the military trying to cover up and get away with something? Who knows. It could also be the best they could do with the resources they have."

Johann Engelbrecht, the Desert Research Institute scientist who led the 2008 study, called the council report "probably a fair judgment" and said he planned to use its recommendations for his upcoming report. That report is being paid for by a $1.2 million earmark put in the defense budget by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat.

DRI, Engelbrecht said, is independent and was not pressured by the military.

Reuniting with family after a combat deployment

It has been said that it can take anywhere between 6 and 18 months to fully recover back to "normalcy" after a combat deployment. I can tell you that the relationships you maintained and possibly improved upon will shorten that time. For many the first emotion felt after coming home from a combat deployment may be surprising to some. Things to look for upon a service member's return from a combat deployment and how to react are as follows.

1. The returning Service Member may have moments of isolation.
2. They may also have high emotions.
3. You as the family member should listen but do not react to the service member's possible expressions of anger.
4. However, you should never accept emotional or physical abuse.

It has been said that war is hell! However with proper planning you as well as your family and other relationships will survive. It is very important to take your time and expect a readjustment period. You have been gone away from home for a very long time. This absence is only compounded if you have small children. When I left home my son was 9 months old and upon my return he was nearly 3 years old. I saw a tremendous growth. There was an adjustment that we both made. Even though you may not notice, you as well as your loved ones have changed in many ways. Take it slow and seek help if needed from your local family support center or religious/spiritual advisor. Do not let your marriage become a casualty of war.

Financial Liability Investigation of Property Loss (FLIPL)

One would be amazed at just how many hats an Adjutant wears in the course of any given day. One such hat I wore on several occasions was that of an Investigator. I would investigate all sorts of interesting things that included the investigations of solders accused of disrespecting a Non Commission Officer (NCO), another case involved the cause of death of a service member which required me to make a recommendation as to rather or not his death was in the “line of duty”. However, the most tedious types of investigations I have been appointed to investigation dealt with the loss of government property by service personnel.

It is mind boggling to know that every year tens of thousands if not millions of dollars worth of property go unaccounted for in military inventories. I have found that the typical situation involves poor accountability of government property and rarely does it involved theft of government property. However someone will have to pay for the lost, misplaced or damaged property and typically it is the person who signed for the property.

I would advice any service member, be they a Commander or Private, to ensure they accurately keep accountability of all property they are signed for. And while it may be time consuming and tedious, ensure that if you loan out property that you are signed for, ensure that the person who takes the property from you signs for the property. You want to always ensure the property is signed for down to the user level. NO EXCEPTIONS!

If you find yourself the target of a Financial Liability Investigation of Property Loss or “FLIPL” remember some important basic points. First, if you have properly kept accurate records of all property you are responsible for, you will have little to worry about. This includes ensuring your hand receipts are up to date and all property is sub-hand receipted down to the user level. NO EXCEPTIONS!

You will generally have 30 days to contest the findings of the FLIPL investigator and even given the opportunity to speak with an attorney. After the 35th day has passed, the recommendation of the findings and recommendations of the FLIPL Investigator will go to the approving authority for action which may include recoupment of all or a portion of the value of what has been lost.

When taking the loss value of the property into consideration, the FLIPL Investigating Officer can reduce the amount of loss via the concept known as deprecation. There are formulas use to do this, however, one such formula will allow for the reduction of lost property value due to depreciation by up to 25%.

One final point to remember is that in most cases, the actual amount of loss to be recovered from the “Respondent” is limited by their base pay. So for example, if “Respondent” losses 2 million dollars worth of property, the most they would have to pay would be up to one month of their base pay and for the average service member that would be less then $4,500.00 per month.

For more information on the role of the FLIPL Investigator and what to expect if you are a “target” of an investigation check out the Department of the Army Pamphlet 735-5, "Financial Liability Officer’s Guide" at: http://www.army.mil/usapa/epubs/pdf/p735_5.pdf

Life Insurance

Life Insurance is a very important and valuable benefit for service members. At the time I wrote my book, The Service Member’s Guide to Deployment; What every Soldier, Sailor, Airmen and Marine should know prior to being deployed., service members who died while on active duty received up to $400,000 and under certain situations could receive even more money. Servicemembers' Group Life Insurance or SGLI is life insurance policy the covers service members who die or are killed. The money is paid directly to the named beneficiary or beneficiaries upon the death of the service member. This money could also be used to fund a Trust. The trustee would then carry out the wishes of the deceased service member. Additionally, there are other monies paid to the family upon the death of a service member in combat. I discuss those benefits in greater detail in my book.

It is very important that as a service member you review your SGLI policy to include beneficiary information for changes or necessary modifications. A thorough review of your insurance policy is a must and should be done yearly regardless of your deployment status. You need to review your beneficiary information just in case something unfortunate happens to you the service member. You want to make certain that the person receiving the death benefit actually is the intended recipient or beneficiary. You certainly want to ensure your intended beneficiary is provided for if you are killed while serving your country.

I know of several cases where because the service member did not update their SGLI policy, an ex-spouse or someone other then the intended beneficiary received the insurance money. In situations like that, there is little the intended beneficiary can do, especially without court intervention. Even then, the intended beneficiary has very little to adequately show they were the intended beneficiary. Think of it this way, if it were that easy to contest the named beneficiary, courts would be tied up more then they are already with cases of folks trying to overturn what the court assumes is the “will” of the deceased. If you find yourself in a situation like that, contact an attorney immediately to discuss all of your possible options.

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Military database shows increasing Afghan civilian deaths

Casualty data released Thursday by the U.S.-led military coalition in Afghanistan paint a month-by-month picture of an increasingly deadly war there for civilians.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization-led military coalition in Afghanistan has released its internal database of civilian casualties. In this visualization of the data, monthly casualties rise above the region of Afghanistan in which they occurred, from January 2009 to December 2010. Over this period, 2537 civilians were killed, and 5594 were wounded, with weaponry and perpetrator coded by color.

The International Security Assistance Force "CIVCAS" database provided to the journal Science, suggests insurgents, largely through bombs and executions, caused 80% of the 2,537 civilians deaths over the last two years in Afghanistan. The CIVCAS totals of civilian deaths are about half those of a yearly United Nations estimate released Wednesday, but the trend of increasing insurgent killings is consistent.

The Afghanistan war, "has become a counter-insurgency, where civilian casualties are the only game in town," says Science reporter John Bohannon, a molecular biologist who "embedded" with the CIVCAS team in Afghanistan last year. "If you can't get those down, you are never going to win the war."

ISAF began keeping the database's civilian death numbers in 2007, but only in the last two years has it systematically tracked civilian deaths by incident type, such airstrike or assassination. "We acknowledge that there are likely additional civilian casualties that we cannot track, but the trends between all organizations are very similar," says Colette Murphy, a U.S. naval officer with ISAF Public Affairs, attributing differences with UN and human rights group estimates of Afghan civilian deaths to methodology differences, primarily in use of media reports of casualties. "All point to the Taliban as causing the overwhelming majority of civilian casualties."

The release in Science magazine, agreed to after months of negotiations with ISAF, should help outside researchers analyze the conflict. An analysis of the CIVCAS data prepared by the magazine in collaboration with six outside experts finds:

•Civilian deaths increased 19% in 2010, with summer months and the Southern provinces around Kandahar the deadliest. The UN data shows a 15% jump.

•Airstrikes were the largest source of military-caused civilians deaths, 136 over the last two years, but they dropped 11% in 2010. UN numbers are much higher, 171 deaths in 2010 alone, but that was a 50% drop in air attack deaths from the previous year.

•Improvised explosives killed the most civilians, 777 men, women and children last year, with the Taliban increasing their use in the face of last year's U.S.-led military offensive that doubled troop numbers to 140,000.

"Clearly there has been an effort to address civilian casualties caused by ISAF, but this is only a snapshot," says economist Michael Spagat of Royal Holloway University of London, one of the casualty number analysts. The CIVCAS numbers nearly match data made public last summer in Wikileaks documents, he and others note. Science has made the database and its methodology available on its website. "ISAF has shown a greater willingness to be transparent in releasing monthly regional-level data," Spagat says. "An even greater degree of openness would be to release the incident-by-incident data."

Bohannon acknowledges that ISAF likely released the data because military officials view the story it tells as favorable for them. "(But) what is important is getting the data out," he says, to help public health researchers and analysts gain a more clear picture of the situation facing Afghan civilians.

Casualties in time and space. The seasonal rhythms and shifting battlefields of the war emerge in this view of the 8131 Afghan civilians killed or injured over the past two years, recorded in a military database called CIVCAS. (No data were available for the first 5 months of 2010 in the Southwest region.)CAPTIONGeorge Michael Browe

Although they have roughly similar populations, civilians deaths in the war in Iraq (roughly 100,000 deaths over the course of the conflict by one estimate) have outnumbered those in Afghanistan, which lacks the same crowded cities. "However, as the Taliban shifts its strategy to attacking Afghan government-related targets, which include school teachers and health workers, then it is inevitable that the trend in deaths among non-military personnel will rise," says Gilbert Burnham of the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in Baltimore, who has published estimates of Iraqi civilian deaths. "While much of Afghanistan does not overtly support the Taliban, the tolerance for deaths caused by the Taliban is greater than that for death of civilians by ISAF," he adds, by email.

From USAToday

Troops may remain in Afghanistan thru 2014

It sounds like the administration is starting the process of withdrawing troops from Afghanistan this summer, but when that process ends is anyone's guess.

The U.S., its allies and the Afghanistan government have agreed to end combat operations in 2014, but Defense Secretary Robert Gates said today that a residual force may stay beyond that date to help train Afghan forces.

"Obviously it would be a small fraction of the presence that we have today, but I think we're willing to do that," Gates told U.S. troops during a surprise visit to Bagram air field. "My sense is, they (Afghan officials) are interested in having us do that."

It should be noted that the U.S. still has troops in Europe and Japan, more than six decades after the end of World War II.

Gates made the trip so that he can assess his recommendation of how many troops to pull out of Afghanistan starting in July, a Pentagon statement said.

When President Obama announced the deployment of 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan in December of 2009, he also said he would begin the process of withdrawal in July 2011.

That moment is fast approaching.

In his remarks at Bagram, Gates encouraged the troops.

"I know you've had a tough winter, and it's going to be a tougher spring and summer, but you've made a lot of headway," Gates said. "I think you've proven, with your Afghan partners, that this thing is going to work and that we'll be able to prevail."

From USAToday

The demobilization station

Arrival at your demobilization station may bring mixed emotions. On the one hand you are very excited about going home to see loved ones yet on the other hand you may be a little curious as to the changes made in everyone's life as well as the changes that you have made during your deployment. I will never forget the words of another survive member, SGT Lakesha S. McNeil from Mississippi, prior to departing for my first deployment. She indicated that no mater who you are, you will certainly be affected by your combat deployment experience. If I ever run into SGT McNeil in the future, I will let her know that she was right.


Upon my arrival at Ft McCoy Wisconsin, my demobilization station, I was eager to get my demobilization process underway. Service members returning from a combat deployment must undergo thorough records checks and medical evaluations to ensure, not only their records are in order but their mind and body are well and prepared to be reintroduced to civilian life.

I found this process to be very well organized and easily navigable. The process of demobilization consist of several stations. In my case, I was considered and Individual Redeployer. That meant that I did not have to navigate the demobilization process with a large unit. Instead, I was able to just slide in where I could get in! Expecting to spend as much as a week or more at the demobilization station, I spent less then 3 days. I have heard of horror stories of service members spending weeks at their respective demobilization stations. Often times the reason is being considered a "medical holdover". Among the stations that each service member must process and clear consist of the following.

1. Audiology
2. Record Review
3. Chaplain
4. Legal
5. Dental
6. Retention
7. Medical
8. LODs
9. ACAP
10. Finance
11. DD214
12. ID Card
13. QA Survey
14. Final SRC Checkout

No matter how much preparation one does in preparing to deploy, I am amazed how important things get missed. For example as I processed through the ID Card station, I learned that I was never coded as someone serving on "Contingency Operations" duty. In a nut shell, that meant that if someone in the future had questioned if I had ever served in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, much less served in Kuwait, they could have denied certain benefits that are only available to those who serve under that coding. They certainly would have required me to jump through more hoops to prove I was eligible for certain benefits.

I have some very important advice for those National Guard and Reservist out there. If you have built up Leave days, it is imperative that you depart theater in enough time so that you do not lose those days. Unless you fall into a certain category such as having served in Iraq or Afghanistan with the hopes of taking advantage of the Post Mobilization Respite Absence or PMRA.

PMRA is a program designed to offer benefits to those service members who served in Iraq and Afghanistan without taking their required time off with the family. If for example a Reservist or National Guard service member serves two consecutive tours in those countries, they would be offered additional non-chargeable leave days. They would not lose those days even if they did not have available days to take them. Instead what would happen is that upon reaching their demobilization station, their orders would be extended giving them the opportunity to take their leave without the loss of their benefits and entitlements.

If you arrive at your demobilization station with more leave days then you have left on your orders, you could end up losing certain benefits that you would not have lost if you had enough days on your orders to cover those days. The best way to illustrate my point is to consider the following. Service Member "A" departs Kuwait with 10 days left on his orders but has 30 days of leave built up. Upon arriving at the demobilization station, he would be able to use up to 10 days of transitional leave and be required to sell back the remaining 20 days.

Why is that important you might ask? Well when Service Member "A" sells back his 20 leave days, he will lose his "day for day" credit for his retirement calculation thus cause a possible reduction in retirement benefits. Additionally he will lose his housing allowance which can be calculated at over $2,000 per month for some service members.

Now consider Service Member "B". She departs Qatar with 35 days left on her order but has 30 days of chargeable leave. Upon arrival at her demobilization station, she would be able to take her entire 30 days of leave plus earn her day for day credit for retirement purposes. In addition she would also continue receiving her housing allowance. Service Member "B" is a much happier and wealthier service member.

However, you can avoid the paroles of Service Member "A" by just ensuring you depart theater with enough time to utilize all of your earned chargeable leave. There are exceptions to this such as obtaining a letter from an O6 in your chain of command. However, you must plan ahead. Remember YOU are the only one that is responsible for your career!

It can not be stressed too much, it is very important that you keep accurate records of your file and ensure your file is correct and updated! Without over exaggerating, I have gone through no less then 4 Soldier Readiness Processes or SRPs prior to mobilization in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. However, during my demobilization phase after my two years of active duty, it was discovered that my records were not coded correctly and not giving me credit for serving in contingency operations. So in fact there was not a record of me serving in a war zone. How could this happen you might ask? Well I will respond by saying what the fine young woman told me as I past through her "ID Card" section; "If it is not THEIR records, no one cares." In other words, you are the best custodian of your career and records. No one else will put as much time and effort into ensuring your files are up to date as you!

Battle Stress

Whether you wear a medal on you chest or just courage in your heart, the effects of war are real. Service members should never be ashamed to seek mental health counseling. There is no shame in recognizing that you are having problems dealing with the effects of your combat deployment. In fact, it is honorable and shows a great deal of courage for you to seek out and get the treatment you need to succeed. In the past seeking mental health counselling may have affected your ability to obtain or keep a security clearance or even certain jobs in the military. Recently the have been changes on security clearance application procedures. You are now allowed to check the "no" block when asked if you have any mental health issues as long as you are seeking and undergoing treatment with a mental health provider.


As l look back over the two years I spent deployed to the Iraq war theater of operations, I am amazed at the many experience I have had. I have held positions that helped service members return home for much needed Rest and Recuperation as the Deputy Chief of USARCENT's R&R Program. The R&R program, with nearly a billion dollar per year budget, did just that. I also on a more relevant note to this book held the position of S1/Adjutant. However for me by the end of my deployment I learned that the truly most important thing in life was the connection you have with family and friends. Family is and will always be the most important thing in my life.  Remember when you serve, your entire family serves with you. When you are under stress so is your family. It took a combat deployment for some to realize this fact.

If you are suffer from stress associated to your deployment contact your base mental health provider or the Veterans Administration. They are well equipped to assist you as you navigate on your road to recovery and mental health bliss.

Report: 35% of warrior-unit soldiers face addiction

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Medical officials estimate that 25% to 35% of about 10,000 ailing soldiers assigned to special wounded-care companies or battalions are addicted or dependent on drugs — particularly prescription narcotic pain relievers, according to an Army inspector general's report made public Tuesday.

The report also found that these formations known as Warrior Transition Units — created after the Walter Reed Army Hospital scandal in 2007 as a means of improving care for wounded troops — have become costly way stations where ill, injured or wounded soldiers wait more than a year to receive a medical discharge.

The newly appointed commander of the warrior units, Col. Darryl Williams, criticized the report's assertions about drug addiction. He said the high rate of drug addiction and dependency cited in the report was based on estimates made by case managers and nurses working with troops and are not statisticaly valid.

"It kind of caught me by surprise," says Williams, who has asked his inspectors to see of the numbers are accurate. He says most of the report's recommendations for change will be in place by summer.

""This report shows that there continue to be soldiers falling through the cracks of the Army's efforts to care for their wounded, ill, and injured," says Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., a senior member of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committe who was briefed on the report because of her work to improve health care for troops. "It illustrates that soldiers are waiting too long for routine examinations, that many (warrior units) have not been provided the uniform guidance they need, that access to mental health professionals is too often scarce and that too many soldiers are abusing drugs as they struggle to recover both mentally and physically."

Most case managers and nurses interviewed by investigators said 25% to 35% of soldiers in warrior units "are over-medicated, abuse prescriptions and have access to illegal drugs."

They said most soldiers arrive in the units with narcotics provided by battlefield doctors or military bases. They also said a few soldiers under their care are buying narcotics out of pocket and may be mixing legal and illegal drugs.

About three out of four soldiers in the warrior units either leave the Army or active duty.

After nine years of war, the Army medical-discharge process has become a bureaucratic backlog where nearly 7,800 soldiers from across the Army wait for their cases to be reviewed. That's nearly a 50% increase since 2007, according to the investigation.

The "process is complex, disjointed and hard to understand," the report says.

For the high-care warrior units, it means many of their soldiers wait more than a year for a medical release from the Army, the report says.

"Medical resources (are) tied up for soldiers who will not be returning to the fight," investigators say.

Murray says "too often soldiers are finding themselves stuck (in warrior units). This is unacceptable."

The warrior units were created across the Army in June 2007 in response to media reports that the processing of wounded and ill soldiers at Walter Reed was poorly managed. The warrior units — where many ill, injured or wounded troops are temporarily assigned — have nurses, case managers and squad leaders to guide each soldier through the health system.

Only about 10% of the soldiers in these units are wounded in combat. The rest are there for injuries, illness or mental health issues.

The report says most people "generally" feel the units are the best place in the Army to heal up.

Other issues raised in the report:
•The Army does not have the resources to "appropriately treat drug dependence or abusers."
•The Army doesn't have enough doctors to review requests for medical discharges.
• A growing number soldiers returning to duty from the warrior units may have unresolved medical problems — such as mental health or brain injury issues — from past deployments.

Reprinted from USAToday

More Army Guard, Reserve soldiers committing suicide...

An increase in suicides among National Guard soldiers largely in states across the Midwest — such as Missouri and Wisconsin — is responsible for a 24% increase in Army suicides last year, the service reported Wednesday.

Missouri and Texas each reported seven suicides among their National Guard troops in 2010, Wisconsin had six, and there were five each in the National Guard units of Minnesota, Ohio, Arizona, California and North Carolina.

Soldiers, both active duty and on inactive status, died by suicide at the rate of 25 per month in 2010, Army figures show.

"All of us are stunned by it, and we wished we knew why," says Army Lt. Col. Jackie Guthrie of the Wisconsin National Guard. "It is especially hard when it's suicide, when it's someone hurting in our ranks."

USA TODAY reported in November that suicides had doubled among National Guard soldiers who were on inactive duty in a year when the Army was seeing a slight decline among active-duty soldier suicides.

The Army released final year-end statistics Wednesday. There were 301 confirmed or suspected soldier suicides in 2010, including those on active duty and reservists or National Guard troops on an inactive status, the Army reported Wednesday. This compares with 242 in 2009.

The Marine Corps reported a decline in suicides from 52 in 2009 to 46 confirmed or suspected cases in 2010.

Among active-duty Army soldiers, there were 156 potential suicides in 2010, down slightly from 162 in 2009.

Among National Guard soldiers on inactive status in 2010, there were 101 confirmed or suspected suicides, more than double the 48 deaths among Guard members on inactive duty in 2009.

Suicides among National Guard troops in Missouri and Wisconsin not only outnumbered such deaths in previous years but were also far more than combat deaths for these units during any year since 2001, says Guthrie and Maj. Tammy Spicer of the Missouri National Guard. As an example, the largest number of Missouri National Guard members killed in combat was three in 2006, less than half the seven suicides in 2010.

Members of the National Guard or Army Reserve who are on inactive duty are civilians much of the time, wearing a uniform only to drill one weekend a month and two full weeks a year.

Army leaders said Wednesday that more must be done to monitor and keep tabs on troops, and section leaders should checking in with them more frequently.

"We recognize we must be even more aggressive," says Gen. Peter Chiarelli, the Army's vice chief of staff.

Chiarelli says programs designed to help soldiers deal better with stress, make it easier for them to seek substance-abuse treatment and obtain marriage and family counseling are helping prevent suicides among active-duty troops.

Reprinted from USAToday

'Stop loss' bonuses go unpaid to 35,000 soldiers

The Army is struggling to find about 35,000 soldiers, most of them veterans now, who are owed bonuses because they were forced to remain in the military beyond their normal enlistment.
The government authorized the "special pay" in 2009 following criticism from some troops and Congress who said the "stop loss" policy that extended enlistments amounted to a "back door draft." Most of the troops fought in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Veterans groups have faulted the Pentagon for not being able to locate the troops.
"In this economy, I haven't met a single stop-loss veteran who can't use this money for their family or school," said Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.

The Army has paid $245 million in bonuses for 84,000 soldiers since the law passed, said Army Maj. Roy Whitley, who is managing Army efforts to provide the special pay.

The Army has yet to pay up to $160 million to 57,000 current or former soldiers, or to families of those who have died or were killed while on stop-loss. That includes 22,000 requests that are currently under review and about 35,000 people the Army cannot yet locate.

The Army used stop-loss extensively to maintain troop levels as fighting in Iraq ramped up. Other services also used the program, but less frequently.

There are about 15,000 unpaid cases among other services, the Pentagon says.

The military has ended the practice of stop-loss.

Congress passed a law in 2009 to compensate the troops with retroactive bonuses of $500 for every month served beyond enlistment. The average payout is about $3,800.

The Pentagon is barred from using the Internal Revenue Service or other government data to track the troops, IRS spokesman Eric Smith said.

Many servicemembers are young people who may be in college or have moved from the address that the military has for them.

The law requires servicemembers to apply for the special pay. Congress has extended a deadline for people to apply for bonuses to March 4. The Pentagon urges anyone owed money to get more information at www.defense.gov/stoploss.

The Army has used direct mail, worked with the Department of Veterans Affairs and veteran organizations and placed notices in the media. Another plan is to reach out to new GI Bill recipients and see if any of them are owed the bonuses.

Navy Cross recipient Scott Montoya, 41, said he was stop-lossed for several months in 2003 while fighting in Iraq and has yet to be paid.

The former Marine Corps reserve sergeant, who received the second-highest combat valor award for rescuing wounded civilians and Marines while under fire in Baghdad on April 8, 2003, said he received mail alerting him to the bonus last year and responded. But he has received no reply.

The Marine Corps confirmed that Montoya may be owed a stop-loss bonus and is looking into it.

For the months he says he was on stop-loss in 2003 a bonus could amount to several thousand dollars.

"Oh God, that would be helpful," he said.

Reprinted from USAToday

Servicemembers' Group Life Insurance (SGLI)

Life Insurance is a very important and valuable benefit for service members. At the time I wrote my book, The Service Member’s Guide to Deployment; What every Soldier, Sailor, Airmen and Marine should know prior to being deployed., service members who died while on active duty received up to $400,000 and under certain situations could receive even more money. Servicemembers' Group Life Insurance or SGLI is life insurance policy the covers service members who die or are killed. The money is paid directly to the named beneficiary or beneficiaries upon the death of the service member. This money could also be used to fund a Trust. The trustee would then carry out the wishes of the deceased service member. Additionally, there are other monies paid to the family upon the death of a service member in combat. I discuss those benefits in greater detail in my book.

It is very important that as a service member you review your SGLI policy to include beneficiary information for changes or necessary modifications. A thorough review of your insurance policy is a must and should be done yearly regardless of your deployment status. You need to review your beneficiary information just in case something unfortunate happens to you the service member. You want to make certain that the person receiving the death benefit actually is the intended recipient or beneficiary. You certainly want to ensure your intended beneficiary is provided for if you are killed while serving your country.

I know of several cases where because the service member did not update their SGLI policy, an ex-spouse or someone other then the intended beneficiary received the insurance money. In situations like that, there is little the intended beneficiary can do, especially without court intervention. Even then, the intended beneficiary has very little to adequately show they were the intended beneficiary. Think of it this way, if it were that easy to contest the named beneficiary, courts would be tied up more then they are already with cases of folks trying to overturn what the court assumes is the “will” of the deceased. If you find yourself in a situation like that, contact an attorney immediately to discuss all of your possible options.