My son was featured in a story done about Pathway Home in the Mercury News on 2/10/2011.  My son was an inpatient at Pathway Home and at that time the founder and director was Fred Gusman.   I started having concerns about the program and contacted them and requested to talk to Fred Gusman.   He never returned my calls or e-mails.  I was so concerned that I was going to drive from Southern California to Napa to talk to them in person and my son convinced me he could handle it.

My son had completed an actual VA PTSD treatment program in 2008 at Palo Alto VA hospital and it was an EXCELLENT PROGRAM and saved my son’s life.   He started having problems again and we learned about Pathway Home and he entered their program in 2011.   My first concerns about Pathway Home was I found out they were having financial problems.  Since they didn’t have an instructor for their PTSD class, they were having my son teach the class since he had completed the Palo Alto PTSD Program.   I told my son that you’re there as a patient not a paid instructor.  My son’s life was also being threatened by his roommate and Pathway Home wasn’t doing anything to protect my son.   That is when I tried to contact the director and he never returned my calls or e-mails.   I was also contacted by a reporter doing a story on Pathway Home and I told him I had some concerns, but at that time there were so few programs out their that any program is better than none.   Pathway Homes was doing a lot of media at that time to promote their program and to get donations.  That is probably why Mercury News did the story on Pathway Home in 2011.  I was concerned that they were more focused on funding and not on the treatment of PTSD.

I know Pathway Home closed in 2015 due to financial problems and Fred Gusman left.   Then a new board was formed and it was opened again in 2016 or 2017.

When I heard about the shooting my heart stopped.   I don’t know how the current Pathway Homes is being managed, but my concern is what are they doing with problem patients such as Veteran Albert Wong.   When a problem patient is released from the program are they being offered alternate care or other resources?   What was done to prevent a Veteran with PTSD from returning as Albert Wong did and killing these innocent women and protecting other patients and staff?   What are they doing to make sure we don’t have another Albert Wong in the future?  As families dealing with loved ones with PTSD, we need to know!  

As a father of a disabled Iraq Veteran that has been dealing as a family with our son’s PTSD since 2006.   I want to make sure that these programs are doing all they can to help prevent and protect the Veteran, the staff and other patients from what happened at Pathway Home this week.

I have been a member of Military Families Speak Out since 2006 and with other members of our group that have lost their loved ones to suicide and like my family trying to keep our son healthy and alive as he suffers from PTSD.   We tell our stories and are a voice for our loved ones making sure that their problems with PTSD is being taken care of by the VA, DOD and other programs like Pathway Homes.

From the article: “Lauri Loving of Davis and Military Families Speak Out/Veterans for Peace decried the “spiritual death” of the U.S. and its military incursions all over the planet. “It’s time to bring the troops back and take [care] of them,” said Loving, whose son suffers from PTSD and other physical ailments because of his deployment in Iraq.

She criticized the “economic draft” that preys on young men and women in high school to use as “cannon fodder” in “unpopular, unwinnable wars.””

http://www.davisvanguard.org/2018/02/wave-arrests-california-u-s-promised-poor-peoples-campaign-citing-fight/

Take Out Your iPhone!

By Paula Rogovin, MFSO, Bergen County NJ

When I spoke at the Cranford, NJ Peace Fair on August 6, I started by telling about my distress during my son’s two deployments to Iraq, my friend, John Fenton’s, distress when he watched his son’s head shrink before he died in the hospital after being struck by an IED in Iraq, my friends, Kevin and Joyce Lucey’ distress when their son, Jeffrey, hung himself after he was told to return to the VA for help after he dealt with his alcohol abuse, and my friend, Marcia Westbrook’s distress, when she received the call that her son in the Special Forces, Tyler, had died by suicide.

I asked people in the crowd, “Why did the U.S. intervene in Iraq?” People shouted, “Oil!” Then I asked people to take out their iphones and hold them up high. So, why is the U.S. involved in Afghanistan and why is President Trump considering sending 3,000-5,000 additional troops to Afghanistan? Several people shouted, “Minerals!” This was a Peace Fair and many of the people read recent articles in the news. Yup, President Trump is concerned that we hadn’t really secured the oil contracts in Iraq and the mineral rights in Afghanistan during the time of Cheney/Bush. Now, he’s talking about securing the mineral contracts in Afghanistan.

If you read excerpts from the articles below, you will see that there is lots of lithium – which used in iPhones and other devices. We know that it’s not OUR oil or OUR minerals. To sacrifice the lives and well-being of U.S. service members and their families for profit, for greed, is totally unacceptable!

I told the crowd at the Cranford Peace Fair that Military Families Speak Out says: NO military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan! Bring the troops home NOW!

The crowd agreed and shouted: Bring the troops home NOW!

Trump Finds Reason for the U.S. to Remain in Afghanistan: Minerals (New York Times). (By MARK LANDLER and JAMES RISENJULY 25, 2017
“The lure of Afghanistan as a war-torn Klondike is well established: In 2006, the George W. Bush administration conducted aerial surveys of the country to map its mineral resources. Under President Barack Obama, the Pentagon set up a task force to try to build a mining industry in Afghanistan — a challenge that was stymied by rampant corruption, as well as security problems and the lack of roads, bridges or railroads.

None of these hurdles has been removed in the last eight years, according to former officials, and some have worsened. They warn that the Trump administration is fooling itself if it believes that extracting minerals is a panacea for Afghanistan’s myriad ills…..

But for Mr. Trump, as a businessman, it is arguably the only appealing thing about Afghanistan. Officials said he viewed mining as a “win-win” that could boost that country’s economy, generate jobs for Americans and give the United States a valuable new beachhead in the market for rare-earth minerals, which has been all but monopolized by China….. Mr. Silver, the chemical executive, may head an effort to maximize the rights for American companies to extract these minerals, according to a senior official.”

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, March 25, 2017
“Here is part of the list: “gold, copper, lithium,uranium, iron ore, cobalt, natural gas and oil. Afghanistan’s resources could make it one of the richest mining regions in the world.

According to a joint report by the Pentagon, the US Geological Survey (USGS) and USAID, Afghanistan is now said to possess “previously unknown” and untapped mineral reserves, estimated authoritatively to be of the order of one trillion dollars (New York Times, U.S. Identifies Vast Mineral Riches in Afghanistan – NYTimes.com, June 14, 2010, See also BBC, 14 June 2010).
“The previously unknown deposits — including huge veins of iron, copper, cobalt, gold and critical industrial metals like lithium — are so big and include so many minerals that are essential to modern industry that Afghanistan could eventually be transformed into one of the most important mining centers in the world, the United States officials believe.
An internal Pentagon memo, for example, states that Afghanistan could become the “Saudi Arabia of lithium,” a key raw material in the manufacture of batteries for laptops and BlackBerrys…..

“There is stunning potential here,” Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of the United States Central Command, said… “There are a lot of ifs, of course, but I think potentially it is hugely significant.”

The value of the newly discovered mineral deposits dwarfs the size of Afghanistan’s existing war-bedraggled economy, which is based largely on opium production and narcotics trafficking as well as aid from the United States and other industrialized countries. Afghanistan’s gross domestic product is only about $12 billion.

“This will become the backbone of the Afghan economy,” said Jalil Jumriany, an adviser to the Afghan minister of mines. (New York Times, op. cit.)
Afghanistan could become, according to The New York Times “the Saudi Arabia of lithium”. “Lithium is an increasingly vital resource, used in batteries for everything from mobile phones to laptops and key to the future of the electric car.” At present Chile, Australia, China and Argentina are the main suppliers of lithium to the world market. Bolivia and Chile are the countries with the largest known reserves of lithium. “The Pentagon has been conducting ground surveys in western Afghanistan. “Pentagon officials said that their initial analysis at one location in Ghazni province showed the potential for lithium deposits as large as those of Bolivia” (U.S. Identifies Vast Mineral Riches in Afghanistan – NYTimes.com, June 14, 2010, see also Lithium – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Psychologists James Mitchell and John “Bruce” Jessen were the architects of the CIA’s torture program. Now, in a groundbreaking lawsuit, three survivors and victims of the torture program are seeking to hold Mitchell and Jessen accountable.

This Friday in federal court in Spokane, Washington, Mitchell and Jessen’s lawyers will argue that they can’t be held responsible for their actions. In an extraordinary legal filing, Mitchell and Jessen claim they aren’t legally responsible to the people hurt by their methods because they “simply did business with the CIA pursuant to their contracts.”

A key part of Mitchell and Jessen’s argument hinges on the claim that poison gas manufacturers weren’t held responsible by a British military tribunal for providing the Nazis with the gas because the Nazi government, not contractors, had final say on whether to use it. They argue that they are like a corporate gassing technician who was charged with and acquitted of assisting the Nazis because “even if [Mitchell and Jessen] played an integral part of the supply and use of” torture methods, they had no “influence” over the CIA’s decision to use them and can’t be accountable.

On July 6, 2016 President Obama announced his intention to maintain 8,400 troops on the ground and in harms way in Afghanistan.

That announcement was followed by news that the President had authorized an additional 500 troops for Iraq, bringing the total authorized US force in Iraq to over 4,600. There are reportedly hundreds, if not thousands, of further US troops in Iraq in Syria on ‘rotational’ deployments and non-disclosed missions.

Miiltary Families Speak Out [MFSO] opposes this continuation of ENDLESS WAR that has neither reduced incidences of terrorism throughout the world, nor made life safer for the people of Afghanistan or here at home. After nearly 15 years, it is time to end, not prolong, the war in Afghanistan. This has to stop.

Bring Home Our Troops, Take Care of Them When They Get Here!

Take Action:

• Sign The Petition
• Contact President Obama! E-mail, Call (202)-456-1111, or Fax (202)-456-246
• White a letter to the editor or op-ed
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We are very sad to hear that that since the recent influx of troops and airstrikes in Iraq and Syria, the first US soldier was killed today. This soldier’s is the first American to die in combat in Iraq in four years. And so another American has died in this administrations futile attempt to stabilize a country that we never should have attacked in the first place.

Before more troops and airstrikes were sent to Iraq last year, MFSO warned this administration that if more troops were killed in Iraq, it would likely cause us to slide down that “slippery slope” of deepening our involvement in Iraq. And although Press Secretary Peter Cook called the raid “unique” and said, “US forces are not in an active combat mission in Iraq”, they actually are in combat and we believe this could be the beginning of further involvement. This brings the total of US troops that have been killed in Iraq to 4,494.

Sadly, all this comes on the heels of President Obama’s recent announcement, one we had all been dreading, that he was extending American troops presence in Afghanistan- a decision that looks more and more like we will have our troops there beyond the Obama administration. Please take a moment to read MFSO member Larry Seyverson’s interview, which he conducted  the day after Pres. Obama’s announcement. Larry speaks for all of us when he describes how military families feel about keeping our troops  in Afghanistan and he expresses our despair of being dragged deeper and ever closer into “endless wars”.

How often in our lives have we heard the phrase ‘sick and tired’ either from the mouth of our mothers or from our own mouths for our children? I remember a comedy routine by Bill Cosby when he was referencing his childhood and his mother was scolding him with the beginning of the phrase ‘sick’ and he finished the ‘and tired’ and said he doesn’t remember anything after that. It is a phrase uttered by mothers when they are just at the end of the line and fed up with whatever situation is going on with the family.

I am a mother of a soldier now veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. I’m not a politician, lawmaker, general or leader of a country. I do not make the decisions to send soldiers off to war but I do see first hand the destruction that war produces – not only on the body but on the spirit of the soldier as well as the family and those who love them. And yes, I’m sick and tired of wars in our world. As with so many mothers it isn’t the labor of pain that is unbearable, it is watching one’s child in pain – whether physical, mental or spiritual that is the most unbearable pain of all. I can look at my son see gaping wounds in his soul that need to heal for they are festering wounds of the horror the war left behind. I know my son doesn’t see the wounds that his family sees. He believes if he just gets his life back in order everything will be okay as before his multiple deployments.

PTSD falls heavy upon the soldiers but it also falls upon the family and friends of the soldier. My son is a veteran of two terms of deployment in Iraq and one in Afghanistan. He was sent to Iraq at the beginning of the war, remaining 12 months; came home for six months, went back for 12 more months, returned home for a year and then was sent to Afghanistan for 15 months. He is now out of the military at his choosing because his young family fell apart while he was at war on his third deployment and his children needed him home. It was a painful decision because he loved being a soldier and the military life. He is the type of soldier the military needs but the destruction that he could not stop, the protection he could not provide was happening to his young family and he made the decision to leave in order to be more for his children.

For so many years I spoke out against the abuse of our soldiers by our government for treating them as robots and androids as though their lives and their families’ lives are expendable. A few years back I had the privilege to sit down with six other military families members to speak to Ohio Senator George Voinovich. I brought the picture of my son and his family and showed him that my son is not a robot or an android but a human being putting his life on the line for our country. I wanted justification for the multiple deployments that ignore the needs of the humanity of the soldier. I also had the privilege of being included in a conference call with Ohio Senator Sharrod Brown in which I asked him when all our soldiers are finally home from these wars and later into their lives when all the horror they experienced comes vomiting out of them – who will be there to help clean it up and to help them heal.

There are two losses from such wars – the physical loss of life and the loss of a part of one’s soul/spirit. The men and women from these two wars have experienced over and over again and again one deployment after another without having a chance to heal from the last deployment. It didn’t help that a representative from Ohio commented that the lives our young men and women was a small price to pay for this war. It doesn’t help that the military and society has this hang-up about seeking mental help – viewed as a weakness more than a definitive need. And it certainly didn’t help when the country was told to look away and ‘pretend’ there is no war and to go about our lives as though everything is just fine, while a certain segment of our society – the military suffered in so many ways.

Those of us in military families who have spoken out against the war are met with ugliness and destructive comments from our fellow citizens among which we are called unpatriotic and un-American. I’ve had friends tell me to stop speaking out because it would ‘hurt my son’s career!’ Really? He’s been thrown into the fires of hell with several deployments for a war that was a lie and I’m hurting his career? Of course none of them had a loved one in the military so I ignored their ‘concern.’ I had other friends tell me that, hey, this war isn’t as bad as Vietnam – there haven’t been that many deaths! I sat and wondered – well tell that to the mother and dad, or the wife and children of the soldier who just died or to the young mother of the warring country holding her dead toddler in her arms and tell them that this isn’t as bad as Vietnam.

As a mother I want to just explode and say to others who seek war, who seek to destroy our world that “I’m Sick and Tired!” Somewhere leaders and fanatic religious within our world have decided that children – our children are needed to fight ‘their wars – their beliefs.’ As mothers of the world, who are we allowing to take our babies we now nurse and turn them into killing machines? As mothers of the world, who are we allowing to convince our children that suicide is a good thing to promote fanatic beliefs? As mothers of the world who are we allowing to use our children as robots while ignoring the humanity our child?

Have we learned nothing from our past histories that violence and killing only causes more violence and more killings? Holy prophets of all the great religions have been sent to give the message of peace and love. Why do powerful leaders and religious fanatics seem to always turn a deaf ear to such messages and why do they seem to have such a fear of these messages? Even in what they call justified wars it often leads to more wars and more killings of the innocents.

As a mother, I want to take these leaders who want war and killings and put them into a room and sit them down. They will be forced to come to a conclusion or never leave the room. Basically a permanent time-out until matters are resolved. However if they insist that fighting is the only answer then they are to strip and be naked of clothing and weapons, along with no food or water; just four walls and a concrete floor. The room could be freezing cold or horrifically hot. There will be no bodyguards, no one protecting them. It’s not about making things nice for them it is about facing their decision and not using others to make it happen. War is ugly and if they choose to fight then so be it – but no longer on their terms of using others. They will have to face each other because mothers around the world have decided that our children are not going to be used by such people for their agenda of violence.

No I’m not a politician, lawmaker, general or leader of a country. I’m also not naiveté of the powers of evil within our world or the need for military presence. I’m an American citizen and a mother of a veteran who has had enough. There is a March for Life happening every year in our nation’s capital with the focus on the life of the unborn. I believe that if people take the time to march for the child within the womb, then they must not stop “marching for life” once the child is born.

I’m a mother who is just sick and tired of the fact that we fail to learn these many years the destruction that war does to a person, to a family, and to a nation and ultimately the world. It must never be a knee-jerk reaction but the very last resort and then think again. I’m a mother who is so sick and tired of those who feed into violence as the only solution to a challenging situation. It is time for mothers to state; ‘not with my child and mean it.’

By Susan Handle Terbay