Eval sought 4 times before Marine killed Iraqi

[unhappycamper]

Eval sought 4 times before Marine killed Iraqi
By Trista Talton - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Oct 4, 2007 5:47:34 EDT

CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. — Lance Cpl. Jonathan A. Phillips’ fellow Marines all knew one thing: He should not be in combat.

His reaction to the deaths of four friends in the span of two weeks gave Phillips’ commanders enough concern to send him to a mental health expert. Then again. Then two more times.

But whatever the battle-hardened Marine was dealing with inside, his outward demeanor was of a man ready for duty. At least that’s the impression he gave the doctors. And to the chagrin of his fellow Marines — including his platoon commander, who personally contacted a psychiatrist at Camp Fallujah — he was sent back in.

“He didn’t need to be out there,” said Stephen Reagan, former 2nd Platoon squad leader with 2nd Battalion, 8th Marines. “I knew that. His buddies knew that.”

After Phillips killed an innocent Iraqi man, everyone else knew it.

Now, after pleading guilty to a crime that his friends and family believe could have been prevented, Phillips’ story stands as a cautionary tale for anyone who’s ever lied to get back into the fight, buried his feelings too deep or overlooked the pain of a co-worker in obvious need of help. Phillips pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and solicitation in a small Camp Lejeune, N.C., courtroom Sept. 21. He was sentenced to two years in prison.


Rest of article at: http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2007/10/marine_manslaughter_071002/

[babylonsister]

1. I read this three times before I 'got' who 'eval' was!

:crazy:

[fed-up]

2. do you mean "what"?- I just got it too (I think)-evaluation? as in Mental Health...nt

[babylonsister]

3. Yes, 'what'. I used to be coffee-less!

:crazy:

[TahitiNut]

4. Just another evil of a 'professional' military.

We've decided to adopt an "all-volunteer" military strategy ... which means that not only does the military depend on a very small pool of folks willing to entertain the notion of a career in the military but those folks are, like anyone would be, emotionally invested in 'succeeding' in their chosen career path.

This is something I understand more fully than most. When I grew up, boys were asked "what do you want to be?" (Girls were asked "who do you want to marry?") Thus, boys began at a very early age to envision themselves in whatever adult professions they could observe. Fireman, policeman, teacher ... all of these professions have traditionally crossed the radar screens of adolescent boys as they prepared for the "spot quiz" of "what do you want to be?" In the days immediately following WW2, "soldier" was an answer that crossed plenty of kids' minds.

A precocious only child raised by a divorced mother, in what we'd today call a "working poor" household, I filled my head with stories of West Point, Annapolis, and Don Winslow of the Coast Guard (a popular Saturday matinee serial). I had an older cousin who made a career in the Coast Guard, becoming a lighthouse keeper on the Great Lakes. My youngest uncle, 10 years my senior, chose to fulfill his military obligation by enlisting in the Coast Guard - and pulled bodies from the water after the sinking of the Andrea Doria.

Money for college was out of the question (as far as I knew) - only one person in my family had ever gone to college and that was on the GI Bill. A high school counselor facilitated my application for the Coast Guard Academy. A career as an officer in the Coast Guard was in my future.

Well, reality reared it's head in my third class (sophomore) year and I discovered I wasn't cut out for giving (silly) orders and hazing the swabs (freshmen). I wasn't "militarily adaptable." Buh-bye.

It's difficult (to say the least) to confront a disabusement of one's life plans. That such life plans are made by inexperienced and immature people makes it more problematic. I think it's particularly difficult in any military context due to the heightened premiums placed on toughing it out and not "washing out." The military places a very high premium on sustained efforts - a commitment to goals. VERY high. It's part of military indoctrination. (It has to be.)


The Marines is no exception. The specter of "washing out" in a psych eval is too difficult for a guy already under emotional stress to contemplate. It's Catch-22 ... the very fact that he's running low on psychological resources makes it inconceivable that he'd be open and introspective in a Psych Eval that would, he would clearly fear, make him a "wash out" and separate him from his unit. Good grief! This is his career! His life!

Such screening and evaluation is a "wheat from chaff" separation process far more than a treatment or therapeutic process. The military is appallingly blind to any suggestion that ALL personnel receive nurturing, emotional support and therapeutic processes for confronting stresses and traumas that few kids in this country are really prepared to deal with.