1 in 9 deaths are suicides

I'm horrified today to read that every 1 in 9 non-violent (gasp) deaths of American soldiers in Iraq are suicides.

Of course, you can explain this in a number of different ways. But none allow you to escape the possible conclusion that what our young men and women are being forced to perform there may be so reprehensible to them that they cannot go on. And none allow you to forget that the Army was prepared to go after one young officer for failure to perform his duties - on a charge of cowardice - because he was so strongly affected by the sight of an Iraqi being sliced in two by a military action.

Yes, military suicides have always been a part of war. But this statistic is startlingly high in a war that - according to many letters published in military journals - even our soldiers question the validity of fighting.

Where are the weapons of mass destruction? Where's this democratization we hear about when the administration agrees to allow women in Iraq to give up their rights? Where is the rebuilding? Why are our soldiers held hostage to an Army that won't let them go when their tours are scheduled to end? What will they return to? Will they be greeted as Vietnam-era veterans were?

I remember being a child during Vietnam and having one young vet return to our church one Sunday wearing his uniform. He was asked quietly after the service not to appear in church again wearing his uniform because too many people felt too much confusion and shame about the war to feel comfortable with the wearing of the uniform. This was in a white, Republican, not-exactly-liberal town. He never returned to the church and for years afterward, it angered and confused him that he had given so much only to be treated so shabbily.