The U.S. Army's Ambitious Fight Against PTSD
Mental Combat Chris KoehlerWith a decade of war winding down, post-traumatic stress disorder is an increasingly urgent problem. Will the Army's efforts work? The roar of the chopper's engines made it hard to hear. First Sgt. James Kelley signaled with his hands and yelled: "Five minutes!" In the murky light of the Chinook's cargo bay, rows of helmeted figures sat surrounded by rifles and camouflage rucksacks. It was four in the morning. Bulldog Company from the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division, along with dozens of Afghan National Army soldiers, forward air controllers, military intelligence officers, and bomb-dog handlers, were air-assaulting into enemy territory. Under the light of the full moon, rows of mist-shrouded grapevines and mud compounds rushed below. The mission, Operation Lion Strike, was to land in a Taliban-controlled area in one of the most violent parts of Kandahar Province, southern Afghanistan. The soldiers would then push northward, into...