Phi Beta Iota: The below reference is of human interest, but lacks context. Three major follow-on studies are needed, if someone can find a Member of Congress willing to ask for them:
1. Actual number of amputations including number of limbs per person amputated.
2. Suicides both while in service and post separation or retirement.
3. Follow-On Gulf War Syndrome and other self-inflicted bio-chemical-radiological wounds and conditions sustained in relation to depleted uranium and other toxic by-products associated with conventional munitions.
There is another point that CRS needs to look into, this one most ably emphasized by MG Robert Scales, as documented the Notes of his 27 September 2010 presentation at the Brookings Institute:
His focus is on the reality that 4% of the “total force,” the engaged infantry, bear 80-81% of the total casualties, but receive less than 1% of the over-all acquisitions and training budget. He calls this, rather memorably, a “cosmic incongruity.”
