© AP PHOTO/JOHN MINCHILLO
In this Oct. 16, 2011, photo, former Marine Capt. Timothy Kudo sits outside his apartment in the Brooklyn borough of New York.
In this Oct. 16, 2011, photo, former Marine Capt. Timothy Kudo sits outside his apartment in the Brooklyn borough of New York.
"I can't forgive myself," he says. "And the people who can forgive me are dead."
With American troops at war for more than a decade, there's been an unprecedented number of studies into war zone psychology and an evolving understanding of post-traumatic stress disorder. Clinicians suspect some troops are suffering from what they call "moral injuries" - wounds from having done something, or failed to stop something, that violates their moral code.
Though there may be some overlap in symptoms, moral injuries aren't what most people think of as PTSD, the nightmares and flashbacks of terrifying, life-threatening combat events. A moral injury tortures the conscience; symptoms include deep shame, guilt and rage. It's not a medical problem, and it's unclear how to treat it, says retired Col. Elspeth Ritchie, former psychiatry consultant to the Army surgeon general.
"The concept ... is more an existentialist one," she says.
Comment: Indeed, the similarities are so striking that this brief but succinct summation barely even scratches the surface. Stay tuned for the next volume of the 'Secret History of the World' series, in which Laura Knight-Jadczyk will be taking a close look at the Fall of Rome.