Veterans in Prison

The only sure way the government/MoD can prevent combat related PTSD (CRPTSD) is by not committing its Armed Forces into any wars/conflicts.

However, given the facts that the only year in which a British soldier was not killed in any war/conflict (since the ending of the Second World War) was in 1968, then this was never going to happen.  Nevertheless, and as a result of the MoD’s none existent treatment programmes for CRPTSD, over the past 60 years of continuous wars/conflicts (right up to the present day conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan) then the very likely probability of CRPTSD being widespread among troops and veterans will be horrendous.

A veteran soldier of a previous war/conflict (now residing inside the prison system) had a visit from a young soldier recently – the young soldier had been trained as a sniper and had killed 19 Taliban on his first tour of duty in Afghanistan.  The British Army are now using many snipers these days in that war in Afghanistan – but unfortunately it’s a very cold and personal way of killing another human being and also very high risk of suffering severe combat related PTSD.

The advertisement below for ‘Prison In Reach’ was aimed at all troops/veterans in the prison population – published in the January 2009 issue of the Inside Time Newspaper, a national monthly newspaper issued free of charge for prisoners in the UK.

When it comes to sending people to prison (per population) very few countries in the world can hold a candle to the United Kingdom (as of 30^th May 2008 there were roughly 82,000 inmates in the prison  population).  Unfortunately one of the reasons for this that most politicians believe that the more people sent to prison (tough on crime) helps them pick up more votes – hence the prisons in the UK are now full to bursting!