"Military Psychiatric Screening Still Lags," by Matthew Kauffman and Lisa Chedekel, Hortford Courant, March 9, 2008

Washington Monthly, April, 2008

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One of the greatest stains on the record of the Bush administration is its neglect of veterans returning home from Iraq. But for the past two years, Matthew Kauffman and Lisa Chedekel of the Hartford Courant have been investigating a lesser-known disgrace: the numerous American soldiers who have been deployed despite being mentally unfit for combat. In 2006, the Courant obtained predeployment records for nearly a million soldiers and found that the Army was failing to screen troops for psychological problems before sending them to war. Even when the Army did know that soldiers were suffering from serious mental illnesses, or were even suicidal, these servicemen and servicewomen were often sent on second and third tours because of troop shortages. Although the military doesn't track suicides (it counts them with other noncombat fatalities), the Courant identified such deaths--many for the first time--by obtaining autopsy reports and speaking with the family and friends of dead service members. The Army confirmed the newspaper's assertion that the suicide rate doubled between 2004 and 2005.

After the Courant published its findings, Congress ordered the Pentagon to improve psychiatric screening of troops. Despite this apparent success, Kauffman and Chedekel stayed on the story. This March, they discovered that although the Pentagon had increased mental health screenings in the immediate aftermath of the scrutiny from Congress, by 2007 only 1 percent of troops were being checked for psychiatric problems before being deployed. The Courant's persistence is an impressive journalistic achievement; it is also a sobering reminder of the time and resources needed to keep an effective watch on government negligence--resources that are increasingly under threat in many newsrooms today.