Posts Tagged ‘military cover-ups’

If you think the news coverage about the war, and what happens to men seems scarce, coverage on what happens to women at war is even more scarce. News coverage and military data keeping about military suicides is similarly sketchy. Even in an ever more unpopular war, suicide is seen as a weakness of the individual rather than an indictment of the way the war is going. And it gets even more obscure when one re-examines the confluence of women at war AND suicide. Suicide for males may be weakness revealed, but to look at the military list of female suicides, it covers alleged sexual promiscuity and other types of personal culpability as well. And it is a convenient folder for hiding male behaviors the military would prefer to dismiss as boys being boys. Trouble is, the “toys” these boys have are military women treated as disposable objects.

Let’s review a couple of the worst stories, shall we? Like the continued obfuscation about Lavena Johnson, for instance. Lavena Johnson’s death was listed as a suicide, and had her father never opened her casket to look one final time on his beloved daughter, it might have stayed that way. But her mourning father saw bruising on her face, and when he looked at her body, he wondered how the gunshot wounds matched the military story of her shooting herself. And why was her body burnt? Why were her genitals covered with chemical burns? Lavena Johnson appeared to have been raped and murdered, and although her body was suspiciously found in a contractor owned (KBR) tent, the signs of rape never adequately investigated. She died in 2005, and still, her death is listed as suicide. Apparently the US Army still prefers a convenient fictional suicide to investigating murder and rape of an American black woman. The military still contends that after starting the fire to burn her journal, she killed herself in embarrassment over having contracted genital warts.

Really? Seriously? So much has been written about this case, and yet her father cannot get Congress to seriously seek answers for what happened to her: “Private LaVena Johnson’s nose was broken, teeth were loose, one eye was concave and there were abrasions over her body. The supposed M-16 hole to the head was far too small for the revolver-sized exit wound, and was on the wrong side of her skull for a right-handed woman to have pulled the trigger. Her genital area showed evidence of acid, perhaps used to destroy DNA evidence. She had white military gloves glued to her burned hands.” All this time, and no answers, the Army insists all the injuries to her face were from the ‘backblast’ effect of the M-16. And why would she suicide in a KBR tent? Veterans have told me tales of contractors behaving as if American military women were their private stock of Playboy bunnies; why is this not addressed? Seems some serious ass-covering was operative. “The death was initially taped off as a crime scene but the investigation was shut down by a general’s order.”
Dr. Johnson, seeking his daughter’s killer, found ten other families whose daughters were alleged suicides: all had rape as common history! He believes he knows who killed Lavena, an officer quickly gotten out of country two days after her death—a man still free.

The Army has not done a good job on being honest about female soldiers and the causes of death, and some of the contracting firms are even worse. It throws credibility to the winds, as even a men’s magazine pointed out in a story examining Kamisha Block’s murder. Both Block and Johnson were failed by the military chain of command, both sets of parents were lied to about cause of death. Block’s parents were told a friendly fire incident killed their daughter, when she was in fact shot to death by an abusive supervisor who was obsessed with her.

I urge you to read the long Alternet article because although it is from 2008 and is several pages long, every bit of information is necessary to understand the additional risks women in the military face daily on and off the battlefield. The military treats suicides as if they are shameful, a sign of lack of proper attitude—when the despairing person was male. But if the dead body is female? Well, then suicide is a comfortable, conveniently emotional excuse to ignore abuse, rape, and murder. More than a flag covers these women’s caskets—an invisible pall of shame and disgrace is pulled over the incidences of their deaths.

I don’t care if you let your little boys grow up to be cowboys, folks; but until the military establishment can ‘fess up the truths about the numerous non-hostile deaths of female troops, do NOT let your little girls grow up to be soldiers, sailors, or BAMs, ok?

The news today made for a second Monday in the week.  Two sixteen year old girls found in the barracks room of a Ft. Lewis soldier—one of them dead.  It took the Army 36 hours (”because of the holiday weekend”??) to release this bit of news.  Obviously, two 16 year old females are not Army members.

They should not have been there at all.  No news has been released, but I rather imagine copious amounts of alcohol had a lot to do with one girl being dead and the other unconscious.  We go through the gates of Lewis a couple times a month.  They check all identification of all car passengers and if the car has no post ID tag, you go through only the front gate and get a pass.  I am imagining these girls went as passengers in a soldier’s car.  Why did some gate guard not wonder about the ages and what they were doing going on post? Oh yes, silly me, we don’t care about tipsy teenagers , we care about terrorists, right?  Neither of these girls looked “terroristical” enough to wonder about, one supposes.

Somebody’s little girl is dead.  Rest in peace, Leah King.  The other is “stable” in the hospital.  I hope she gets stable enough soon to tell what the hell happened, if she can remember at all.  No arrests have been made yet.  The crying has surely begun, however.  Justice will take longer.

Just my note to the troops, as a former troop, as a mother of both a daughter and two soldiers:  LEAVE THE JAIL-BAIT ALONE!  Don’t feed booze to ANY date to the point that she falls down.  You need more than a designated driver, you need a designated SOBER “Don’t be a frakkin’ idiot” person!

And to the Army—you already fucked around for 36 hours while some parent went up several walls wondering where a child was located.  Don’t even try to cover this shit up.  Someone was stupid, someone allegedly old and mature enough to be in uniform.  That means that someone is mature enough to take the responsibility and pay the price for a child being dead.

March 11th Update: The 19 year old boyfriend has been arrested for involuntary manslaughter in this case.  He apprently fed Leah Xanax and some other prescription pain killer that was crushed for her to inhale.  This resulted in her death.  He seems to have had a bit of a side-business going in illegal prescription drugs.

I was a military brat.  I was a military member.  I was a military spouse.  Frankly, the last one of those was my least favorite.  It was like being a second class citizen.  I was not allowed to do ANYthing without my “sponsor”—the military member, agreeing to it.  Not such a small thing as renewing my military ID card without him present.  And if there was a problem—say with houseing, the hospital or anything, I had to have him handle it.  Spouses are just relegated to “Don’t call us and we probably won’t call you.” status—at least in the Army.

So, in the course of that history,  I saw women in the military supermarket–the commissary, with black eyes, split lips, arms in slings.  I saw other women’s eyes slide over them and drop away, because we all knew the chances were good those injuries were no accident.  I knew and sheltered women beaten by their military husbands, sometimes opening the quarters’ door to the sound of weeping  at one a.m., to take in a neighbor.  She always went back, though.  It did no good to report it, and worse “endangered his career” and marked the woman as not caring about his career.  Worst of all is when the battered woman was married to a Military Policeman.

So, last night, when Katie Couric did a report on the recent over the top levels of abuse and even spousal murder  in the Army, I was very emotionally involved.  Their little director of family affairs couldn’t even tap dance through it….she had no answers for how a man could fill out his end of deployment papers saying that YES, in fact, he DID think he might harm his spouse and yet nothing was done.  No treatment, no intervention—and a year later he killed his wife.  Well, those of us who have been military are not surprised.  Sickened, but not surprised.

What sickens me more?  The kind of camo-green wall built by wives.  I came across a message board, by accident, for military wives.  Without even having seen the advertised news report, they were already talking about how it would probably be negative towards the military.  Excuse me?  More than ninety military wives murdered in less than a decade, more than 25000 battered—-and those are the tip of a very large unreported iceberg, I assure you; and you DARE to worry about the report being negative to the military?

Are you joking?  You sound like the spokesperson for the Vatican on the carpet about pedophiles, decrying “negative” reporting about the Church’s continual habit of sheltering these sick criminals out of concern for their “immortal souls.”  The wives and officials of the military make that same kind of plea, only instead of quoting the value of the immortal soul they plead for the “soldier’s career.”  Both Church and Army simply throw away the women and children locked in chains by this so-called moral equation.

You see, in civilian life, battered women often get the insidious message that “Well, if you STAY with him, you must deserve it.”  In the military it is worse.  They get several implicit messages such as:  “He needs you so he can do his job defending America.  Suck it up, he is under stress.”  and “If you mess up his career he will have nothing and NEITHER will you.” and “Don’t make him look bad, it makes all of us look bad and we are a military FAMILY—dont’ let the civilians have another reason to criticize us.”  Family, is it?  Could be, and a disfunctional one beyond compare.  The primary message of disfunctional families is that the individual is sacrificed for the group and that all secrets WILL be kept.

Couric’s story suggests that it is this bad because of the wars.  What an optimist she is!  This “hidden casualty” angle of the story sounds nice, but these casualties have been accruing for more than the decade she talks about on the video. (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/01/28/eveningnews/main4761199.shtml )

Seriously now, don’t you have to ask yourselves, why a soldier’s “career” as a probable bullet-stopper or IED absorber is more important than a woman living to dance uncrippled at the wedding of her son or daughter?   If you are a woman, especially if you are a military wife, how CAN you make the case for solidarity with the ABUSERS and not with the victims?  How can you protect the system that does NOT protect you?

Obviously, getting the DOD news releases with the names of those who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan is not one of the more pleasant parts of my daily life. But I find there is now an unpleasant undercurrent beneath the usual feelings of frustration and grief for those lost lives.

Every time I get a listing that is a woman’s name and the cause of death is given as “a non-combat incident” I feel myself tense up. My neck gets rigid and I have to fight the urge to clench my teeth. Always, I am reassured in print that “the incident is under investigation.” Right.

Like the woman who was found dead with evidence of rape, beatings and murder—-but was ruled a suicide? “Investigated” like that?  Like Jennifer Cole, who died August 2nd of a gunshot wound in a non-combat incident still under investigation? As much as I hate this kind of thing, I can’t even imagine the horror of family and friends getting said notification. How can you know what to believe of what the military tells you in the wake of a woman’s death in a war zone?  Almost 40% of the women who have died in this war have died in non-combat “incidents” and that seems mightily high to me.

The latest name, btw, was one Janelle King. I went to school (back when dinosaurs roamed the earth) with a Janelle. She was a smart, sweet, pretty girl…I imagine an awful lot like this one who shares her name. I mentally cross my fingers and hope it was some terribly ordinary cause of death like a vehicular accident or a fall. But, usually they say if it was some automotive mishap or illness or simple accident. And “non-combat incident” just means it didn’t happen because of the war per se.

I’d like to presume it was something relatively innocent, but my aching neck isn’t having any of it. Why don’t we have a right to the truth about what happens to the women in uniform? Who speaks for them? Who questions on their behalf? Aren’t they the troops we are to be “supporting” too?  Forty percent of them are not dying of combat related causes, so just whose fault is it and why can’t we get a straight answer?

NOT!

Yes, the count of women service members killed stands at 100. It got me thinking as I looked thru a portrait gallery of their faces. I read the listed reasons of death. More than 15% were listed as the result of “non-hostile incidents”…which means the enemy didn’t kill them. Nor did illness or vehicular accidents; those are listed differently. Three were described as “weapons discharge” and some of those had the additional notation “suicide.”

Those should have made more noise, don’t you think? One, a talented young woman skilled at languages, an Arabic linguist, with a psychology degree and trained at Ft. Huachuca to be an interrogator. They must have neglected the newer “enhanced” techniques. Less than a week on the job she objected to the techniques used, and soon after that left a note and shot herself to death.
Well, is it horrible or sadly inspiring to think that at least one young American couldn’t stand seeing her country stoop to such methods? Rest in peace, Alyssa Peterson.

Melissa Valles, from a tiny border town in Texas, was the second female fatality in Iraq. She was one of the “non-hostile weapons discharge” listings. She died of a gunshot wound to the stomach.
I was in the Army. I used an M-16. If that was the weapon that killed her, I cannot imagine how it happened. Neither can her mother, and the Army sends updates and says it is investigating; but it has been years now. Where is the answer to how a young woman “accidentally” shot herself in the stomach? Rest in peace, Melissa; those who survive you have no peace, wondering how you died so young and far from home.

And the British Army lost a female soldier, Denise Rose, to suicide as well. Her family simply asked to be left to grieve in peace. She was a member of the Royal Military Police in the Special Investigation Branch. One wonders what investigation pushed her past the point of wanting to survive to go home. Rest in peace, Denise Rose. You are missed, more than words can tell, I am sure.

One of the worst cases was young Lavena Johnson, nearly at the end of her tour at war and making plans with her family for her homecoming. She died of a ‘non-hostile weapons discharge’ which the Army labeled suicide. So, how, pray tell me, did a right handed young woman shoot herself in the left side of her head with an M-16 rifle and without leaving gunshot residue upon her hands? And how did she beat the hell out of herself FIRST? Did she also try to set her body afire to cover up her own “suicide”….this one is infamous, folks. It deserves the truth; that she was likely assaulted and killed to silence her. Rest in peace, Lavena. And may your killer(s) and those who covered their tracks get what they deserve. Death is tragic, glossed over murder labeled suicide….well, tragic doesn’t begin to describe it.

Debra Banaszak’s mother doesn’t understand why her daughter would kill herself when she had a teenaged son to return home to and was happy serving her country. She concludes that if what the Army tells her is true, it was something in the war that caused it. She is without her child, her grandson is without his mother. And the answers are too few. Rest in peace, Debra; I am sorry you could not see your son graduate college, and begin manhood before your eyes.

Tina Priest was born prematurely and weighed barely a pound, but she beat the odds and survived to thrive. Well, until after the Army discounted and botched investigating her claim of having been raped in Iraq, that is. The Army said there was “insufficient evidence” to continue the investigation. Gee, sounds like Army code for “Boys will be boys, honey…and you know the WACS were called the “Whore Corps” …what else are you here for?” The Army said she was “romantically involved” with the man she accused of rape. Did she commit the ultimate female sin and say “No.” when he wanted to hear yes? She is said to have shot herself in the chest. Charges against her accused rapist were dropped a few days later. Her parents gave the Army a patriotic young woman and a casket is what they got back. Rest in peace, Tina. I hope the man who raped you dies a horrid and lonely death—as you did.

Amy Duerksen was the beautiful 19 year old daughter of an Army chaplain. She died in Iraq of a gunshot wound to the chest, a non-hostile gunshot. I found no explanation and her parents did not press the Army for answers. Perhaps that would have hurt more than losing Amy? How does that happen, how does a lovely, vibrant young 19 year old girl get shot in the chest? Is the Army hiding “friendly fire” deaths under the title ‘accident’? Rest in peace, Amy. I’m sorry the idiots of the Westboro Baptist Church marred your funeral, and I am grateful that the Patriot Guard Motorcycle riders were there for you.

And Hannah Gunterman, of California, but serving with a unit from my neighboring Ft. Lewis, Wa. died of a non-hostile cause. An un-named cause that is “under investigation.” Not a vehicular accident, not an illness—no those are listed eagerly enough. Why did you die, Hannah? Does Governor Swartzenegger’s statement about your gallant service to you country comfort those doing without you now? Rest in peace, Hannah. I hope you enjoyed Washington State and its beauties before you went off to the desert to die.

Denise Lannaman died in Kuwait, where her mission was supporting the war in Iraq. And Jane Lanham died in Bahrain, likewise supporting the war. Lannaman’s death is (as are so many) “under investigation”, while Lanham’s has been called “natural causes.” But unlike other natural causes that are named: heart attack, cancer, blood vessel clogs, aneurysm—I find no named cause.
Yes, I am paranoid. I want to know what took these skilled women out of life, out of action, out of the story of this war. Rest in peace, Denise and Jane; I never met you and I miss you anyway. I hope it all was something “natural” and not the opposite. The stories of women in this war make me nervous and untrusting.

Major Gloria Davis was a career Army officer with 18 years in service. She was a mother and grandmother who died of a non-hostile gunshot wound. Some sources list it as being decided as suicide. This after she recorded herself reading Sesame Street for her grandchild? She was no youngster shocked at being far from home, she was a professional and gave no signs of distress.
Yes, yes, the Army is “investigating.” But you see, they say she shot herself after being caught taking bribes on her job as a contracting officer in Kuwait. The Army worked to freeze her assets. Gee, they should be so quick to nail Blackwater. Rest in peace, Gloria—since you aren’t here to defend yourself, I guess nobody else can.

Jennifer Valdivia, another death from non-hostile causes, was listed in the Bahrain newspapers as a suicide. But her death is under investigation and one wonders….will these investigations ever answer all the questions? Rest in peace, Jennifer. Your shipmates must be grieving.

Kamisha Block is another “non-hostile” death that the Army is “investigating.” Is that a new word for stalling, obscuring, or obfuscating? Her parents say it was friendly fire that killed their pretty daughter and they just “want to know the truth about it.” Rest in peace, Kamisha, the MPs surely miss your steady presence.

Roselle Hoffmaster was a doctor, likewise killed in a non-hostile incident. I know she will be direly missed. Like Jeannett Dunn , Jennifer Valdivia, and Christine Ndururi —another victim of a death at hands not Iraqi. But that doesn’t mean those deaths were non-violent, or innocent, or accidental. About 20% of all fatalities are from what is termed non-hostile causes. Some of those are illness and vehicle related deaths, of course. But with the women, entirely to many were in suspicious circumstances with little in the way of answers. Christine Ndururi’s mother spoke to her the day before her death, said she was fine and not sick—but the military says she died of “illness.”

Some were more than suspicious: Genesia Gresham and her friend Anamarie Sannicolas Camacho were shot to death by a fellow servicemember at their naval base in Bahrain. He shot himself as well, but he did not die. And one of the officers of the base thinks the best solution is for the fellow sailors of the dead women to “get over their anger”?? Gee, I never had the privilege of meeting the victims, or their grieving families, and I have a burning desire to punch some officer who thinks ‘getting over the anger’ is the cure. Vice Admiral Cosgriff? You need to get over your stupidity. Rest in peace, Anamarie and Genesia; at least your families can’t be told it was an accident.

Knowing the worst is perhaps an odd kind of solace, but questions other families can’t get answered must tear at hearts and minds for a long time. I know, if I looked, I’d find even more among the men—deaths that make you shake your head in frustration. There are many more men who have died. Not every family has the luck of the Tillman family in forcing the military to confess the truth. So, I stick to the women, and wonder ever more about stories of rape and harassment; about women afraid to go to the latrines at night. Every feminine name I write, that has “non-hostile incident ” for the cause of death makes me reflect upon those stories. I try not to be the fire-breathing and utterly intemperate feminist I was in my own Army days; I try to look at both men and women as members of the same species: human. But sometimes, like tonight, it seems women face some extra risks at war. And not from the expected enemy. It is insult to fatal injury that the military seems to hide the sad truth and not root out the causes.