Blame the victim

[unixronin]

The Charleston Gazette, of Charleston, West Virginia reports on West Point graduate 1st Lt. William Rebrook, who was forced to take a medical discharge after being wounded in Iraq last year ... and was forced to pay for his body armor because no-one recorded that medics cut it off his body and burned it as a biohazard.

Rebrook was standing in the turret of a Bradley Fighting Vehicle when the roadside bomb exploded Jan. 11, 2005.  The explosion fractured his arm and severed an artery.  A Black Hawk helicopter airlifted him to a combat support hospital in Baghdad.

He was later flown to a hospital in Germany for surgery, then on to Walter Reed Army Medical Hospital in Washington, D.C., for more surgeries.  Doctors operated on his arm seven times in all.

But Rebrook’s right arm never recovered completely.  He still has range of motion problems.  He still has pain when he turns over to sleep at night.

Even with the injury, Rebrook said he didn’t want to leave the Army.  He said the “medical separation” discharge was the Army’s decision, not his.

So after eight months at Fort Hood, he gathered up his gear and started the “long process” to leave the Army for good.

Things went smoothly until officers asked him for his “OTV,” his “outer tactical vest,” or body armor, which was missing.  A battalion supply officer had failed to document the loss of the vest in Iraq.

“They said that I owed them $700,” Rebrook said.  “It was like ‘thank you for your service, now here’s the bill for $700.’  I had to pay for it if I wanted to get on with my life.”

Rebrook says other troops have also been forced to pay for equipment destroyed in battle.

“It’s a combat loss,” he said.  “It shouldn’t be a cost passed on to the soldier.  If a soldier’s stuff is hit by enemy fire, he shouldn’t have to pay for it.”

You know, it must really suck to be the driver of an M1A2 Abrams or an M2 Bradley lost in combat.  Those things are expensive.

Comments

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

You know, you get enough of these and you're gonna get a mutiny.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Especially considering he wanted to stay in, but they kicked him out instead of finding him a desk job.

[lonewolf545.livejournal.com]

West Point must not have taught him how to work the system to straighten messes like that out. My brother's unit had a laptop stolen while everybody was on predeployment leave, and he was afraid the duty NCO would get stuck with the bill (in fact, he planned to pay it himself if necessary), but he found the right path through the regulations so the NCO wasn't considered responsible for it. Sorry, it sounds like this guy didn't fight it properly.

[koyote.livejournal.com]

yes and no. this guy didn't have access to the proper people at that point. He was undoubtedly sitting in a holding company, where nothing works anyway (I speak from experience) with a possibility of fighting something that could take weeks to months to straighten out. That would put him on hold doing basically nothing for several months while people chased paper-as was stated in the article- he wanted to get on with his life.

It's possible he could have found some old E9 hiding in an office somewhere who would have taken pity on him and made the problem disappear through creative regulation usage, but with the current state of things, the Fairy Godmother department could be a bit overextended.

What I want to know is, why is this effort even necessary? why are we even having this discussion? even if the LT in question could have finessed the system and stuck around on hold for 2 months while things got figured out, he shouldn't have to. And if it's happening to more than one person, something is broken and not being fixed. Blaming the people who are most affected by the breakage isn't really productive in a case like that.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

What koyote said.

[lonewolf545.livejournal.com]

Huh? He should be able to contact somebody from his old unit about the mission in which he was hurt. If they're still deployed, there's a rear detachment commander he can contact. All he needed was a statement of loss for the equipment, which was all the BN CO was asking for. Hell, there was probably an officer assigned as liason for him when he was injured, to pass information to his family (we got a phone call within 24 hours of my brother being injured, and the officer gave us his personal cellphone number and strongly implied that we could call anytime day or night with questions), and that officer should have been able to assist, as well. Hate to say it, but a fair amount of equipment IS going walking and winding up on eBay (there's an older set up now that hasn't been found and shut down yet), which is probably the reason for requiring signed statements of loss.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

The article reports he tried to straighten it out, but couldn't get a superior officer to sign off on it.

[koyote.livejournal.com]

see, Kerry had it wrong. His mantra should have been-

"wrong war, wrong LEADERS, wrong REASONS"

It'd be nice to get a president in there who could understand responsibility as well as authority.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Not that I'm too happy with Kerry either, given his highly visible hypocrisy on RKBA issues.

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

I voted for a guy that said basically that, in fact.

-Ogre

[olafthunderfoot.livejournal.com]

this is insane!

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

I can see why they want to make soldiers responsible for the equipment issued to them, but combat injuries should kick them over into a far less stringent accounting of their gear when they get home...

No brain.

-Ogre

[lonewolf545.livejournal.com]

Which is why it's interesting that he, according the public affairs officer at the 1st Cavalry division, is the first soldier to have to do so, despite at least 21 similar cases. And he has since been informed that he will be reimbursed for the body armor.

There's a process. Failure to follow the defined process is NOT an excuse. Whining to the media is a symptom that West Point obviously failed to imbue him with the appropriate sense of how to accomplish the mission. I'm tempted to drop an email to one of his fellow 2004 graduates to get their impression of him (brother's best friend, also in the 101st, is a graduate of the Hudson River School for Troubled Youth as well). In other news, my brother should be back on patrol in a week or so from his injuries a few weeks ago.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

And he has since been informed that he will be reimbursed for the body armor.

Well, that's a good thing.

In other news, my brother should be back on patrol in a week or so from his injuries a few weeks ago.

That's even better news.