MI analyst was denied counseling in Iraq pre-Abu Ghraib atrocities

You might expect this Dallas Morning News article, "Fallen From The Ranks", to be filled with apologist, blind pro-troop rhetoric, but it isn't.

This guy, Armin Cruz, did horrible things in Iraq and hasn't served long enough, imo, especially because he was unwilling or unable to implicate the chain of command. Before the war, he did some exceptionally kind things that are recounted in the article, not so much to diminish his offenses, but to contrast his patterns of behavior.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/030505dnmetcruz.42520.html

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A mortar attack at Abu Ghraib in September 2003 killed two soldiers, including Mr. Cruz's boss and best friend, 26-year-old David Travis Friedrich. Mr. Cruz took five pieces of shrapnel and was awarded the Purple Heart, but those who know him say his emotional wounds never healed.

He had recurring nightmares and hallucinations. He relived the blinding white light of the blast, the sight of his friend's shredded body, the emptiness in his eyes as he died.

Mr. Cruz testified that he asked a senior sergeant for counseling after the attack, but it was denied. Soldiers who served with Mr. Cruz at Abu Ghraib, and court documents, support that assertion. He has since been diagnosed and is being treated for post-traumatic stress disorder.

That was about a month before the worst of the torture (that we know about), and he was in the thick of it -sexual humiliation, punishing the wrong people, and he was in one of the photos.

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Severe stress and mortal fear, said the psychiatrist and professor at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine, often clamps off soldiers' ability to think through problems.

"Where otherwise, they may think of alternatives when appraising a situation," said Dr. Flanagan, who has not examined Mr. Cruz, "they may become more limited in their alternatives ... and overlook long-term consequences."

Then, when soldiers see their buddies killed or find their bodies mutilated, as happened in Vietnam, there is no rational outlet for the aggression.

That's the kind of work Jim McDermott did with returning Vietnam troops. Seems to me we'd be way better off with more counseling before combat than prayer meetings for victory.

I'd concede that some people -a few people- are just bad, and that others have weak characters and are too easily influenced by what happens around them. But there is also the fact that psychological trauma does wicked things to us.

What about Mr Cruz?