By Hannah Knight

Chris Kyle sits in the living room of his family home, his gaze fixed on the empty black screen of the television in front of him, his stare focused yet somehow glassy. The ricocheting sound of helicopters overhead echo around the room, intertwined with panicked shouts from the ground. He does not hear his wife enter, nor her attempts to make conversation with him. Later he joins her in the garden; they watch as their children play and friends enjoy the barbeque they have prepared under the tepid Texan sun. Despite the chatter surrounding him, Kyle seems distracted by his youngest child, who is engaging in a seemingly harmless game of tug of war with the family dog. The boy slips, and the dog starts to lick his neck affectionately as he lies face down on the ground. But this is not the reality that Kyle sees. To his eyes, his son is being viciously mauled by the animal. Kyle jumps to his feet, hatred in his eyes, and roughly drags the dog away by its collar, raising his arm and clenching a fist, preparing to strike as his wife, children and friends look on in horror…

 

Whilst based on a true story, this is a well-known, exaggerated scene from multiple Academy Award-nominated film American Sniper, depicting a war veteran’s struggles with mental health following his return from a particularly harrowing detachment. But in reality, the psychological damage faced by military personnel can take form across a much wider, more subtle spectrum of reactions. According to the NHS, anxiety disorders commonly seen in servicemen and women such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), can manifest themselves through a vast variety of symptoms - ranging from nightmares, flashbacks and insomnia right through to severe cases of domestic violence, self-harm and even - in extreme cases - suicide. 

 

The Ministry of Defence (MoD)’s annual report on mental health in the UK armed forces, shows that 2.9% of personnel were assessed for mental disorders by the MoD’s Specialist Mental Health Services last year. This figure has risen steadily since 2007/08’s report, which showed 1.8% of the forces population were assessed, and now the figure exceeds the 2.4% of civilians evaluated for psychological disorders.  There is currently no compulsory requirement for serving personnel to undergo counselling or any form of therapy on return from detachment; they are given one or two days of rest and recuperation time before returning home to their families, and from there are thrust back into military life on home turf.

 

 

 

 

Ken Prescott is a retired Royal Air Force (RAF) Warrant Officer, who served almost 40 years in the military. During his service as a technician he embarked on a number of detachments across the world, including visits to Oman, Singapore and Saudi Arabia, as well as campaigns during conflicts in the Falklands, Kosovo, Sierra Leone and Iraq, spending up to eight months at a time away from his wife Jane and the rest of his family. Prescott witnessed a number of marriage break-ups and psychological damage through his colleagues, and remembers the lack of any real guidance for young servicemen like himself at the beginning of his career: “The RAF did nothing at that time in the way of support or counselling.” He says: “Even through the Falklands War and after, I did not see any tangible support for the guys that returned.”

 

Prescott recalls one incident in particular in which he believes more accessible psychological support could have proven helpful, concerning one of his young airmen who was due to be deployed to Sarajevo during the Balkans crisis: “He tried everything not to go from faking illness, many interviews with the Padre, even his Mum wrote to the CO with some weird excuse why he could not go.” Prescott explains: “When I talked to him he told me he was afraid and did not join the RAF with the expectation he might have to actually go to a war zone.”

 

While studies are carried out by the MoD and various mental health charities, aiming to understand the consequences of experiencing trauma faced by members of the armed forces; there is less emphasis on the effects that the stresses of military life can have on those closest to them - in particular their families. Twenty-year-old Chelsea Tyrrell is the daughter and sister of former and current Army servicemen. She has personally experienced the hardships of being in a forces family, from moving home every few years and beginning a new life, to experiencing the constant tension that goes hand-in-hand with having a loved one serving a detachment in a war zone. Chelsea says that emotional and mental changes for military personnel are not always as dramatic and destructive as people may think: “My brother went away 3 years ago and he came back a totally different person; he was more grown-up, and got engaged less than a year after,” she says. “He said that he realised what he wanted from life while he was away.” Ken Prescott remembers a similar incident in which a young, “immature” serviceman returned from Iraq and completely changed his attitude to work. When Prescott asked him what had prompted the turnaround, he told him that “what he saw made him feel how lucky he was in [the] UK, and he did not want to waste his career”. 

 

 

 

 

As psychological guidance is not a requirement for those returning from detachments, mental health support platforms are aiming to provide support specifically for former and serving members of the armed forces, as well as their families. Help for Heroes is one of the most well-known of these organisations, but Combat Stress, Mind and SSAFA are also known for their work with the military. The implementation of technology to give support is also playing an increasingly significant role; Big White Wall is an online network where users can anonymously talk to others suffering with mental health problems, and is free to use for the armed forces, veterans and members of their family who are over 16. Sylvia Christie, the organisation’s Senior Communications Manager, says their trained counsellors are on-hand at all times, and are prepared to assist with a plethora of situations. She says: “This 24/7 support also includes tools, information, and structured online courses covering topics from managing depression and anxiety, to reducing alcohol consumption or stopping smoking.” 

 

However, these supporting organisations can struggle to reach their intended audience. Whilst Chelsea Tyrrell believes that services like Big White Wall are useful, she says they lack sufficient advertising, as she and her family are largely unaware of the existence of online platforms outside of groups on social media sites like Facebook: “I know Mum is part of an online army wives support network type thing,” she explains. “But to be honest, that’s about it.” A spokesperson for Blesma, the limbless veterans charity says they try to spread the word about their organisation in a number of ways: “The magazine, members’ bulletin, website, social media, email, telephone and face to face! Depending on [what] the veterans need, our welfare team respond and help.”

 

 

 

 

Existing research seeks to understand the reasons why some military personnel experience mental disorder, whilst others who are in identical situations do not. Sade King works for the NHS East London Foundation Trust; her psychology research extends to the study of PTSD in members of the armed forces. “A lot of the time we see common pre-existing factors which can lead to PTSD after coming home from war,” says King. “People who have been detached on a high number of deployments and have a lower level of education can be more vulnerable, and studies show the same for personnel who are women or of a certain ethnic minority.” 

 

Figures released by the MoD also show a differentiation in the number of psychological assessments in different areas of the armed forces, with more patients seen in the RAF and Army than in the Royal Marines and Royal Navy. Their report states this could be due to differing recruitment processes. Ken Prescott believes changing the way in which recruits are hired in the RAF and Army could decrease mental disorder in these sectors, but could also cause further problems: “It could prove an extra expense the Services do not want to absorb, especially when budgets are being cut,” he says. “There is also the failure rate they may have to face; it could be that for every 100 potential recruits that walk through the door, only a small number make it through the evaluation.”

 

The government announced in 2015 that its military expenditure would be remaining at 2% of the nation’s GDP, in accordance with NATO targets. Despite The Guardian reporting that there would be an annual increase in the defence budget “in real terms”, budget cuts by successive governments have meant that spending on the sector has decreased steadily since 1953, when the government’s 9.9% budget was almost five times its current allowance. 

 

Whether the solution lies in an increase in defence spending to fund more accessibility to psychological therapy, a change in the recruitment process, or an alternative, the data does not distort the clear fact that mental disorder in the military is on the rise. But as Ken Prescott summarises, the first step to improving the issue could be as simple as merely accepting it exists: “I do not believe the various governments want to fully admit there is a problem. It is a very touchy subject.”