When the War Comes Home: Iraq Veteran at Fort Hood Speaks Out About Last Week’s Mass Shooting
Excerpt from Amy Goodman’s interview on Democracy Now! today (Nov. 9, 2009) with journalist Dahr Jamail and with Michael Kern, Active-duty veteran of the Iraq war stationed at Fort Hood. He is a member of Iraq Veterans Against the War.
To watch video of the interview and to read the entire transcript, go to http://www.democracynow.org/2009/11/9/when_the_war_comes_homes_iraq
. . .AMY GOODMAN: Well, I’m joined now by two guests. Private Michael Kern joins us on the phone from Fort Hood, Texas, where he’s an active-duty veteran of the Iraq war. He’s with Iraq Vets Against the War and returned from Iraq earlier this year. He’s been diagnosed with PTSD; that’s post-traumatic stress disorder.
Also with us via Democracy Now! video stream from California is independent journalist and author Dahr Jamail. His latest book is called The Will to Resist: Soldiers Who Refuse to Fight in Iraq and Afghanistan. His article for IPS, published just after the shootings, is called “The War Comes Home.” His latest article, at TomDispatch.com, “Where Will They Get the Troops: Preparing Undeployables for the Afghan Front.”
Michael Kern, let’s begin with you at Fort Hood. You were familiar with Major Hasan, the Army psychiatrist?
MICHAEL KERN: Yes, he was not my particular psychiatrist, but he did work in the building that I go to pretty much weekly. And, you know, the only conversation that we had was, you know, basic greeting: “Good morning, sir. How are you doing, sir?”
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about the unit that he works in, where you were being treated for post-traumatic stress disorder.
MICHAEL KERN: He works in a unit called the Medical Evaluation Board, where he basically sees soldiers, diagnoses soldiers with PTSD and other things like that, before they get out of the military, when they’re applying for an evaluation board to be medically retired from the United States Army.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about what you saw in Iraq, what it means to be treated for PTSD? You said he was not your psychiatrist, but you have commented on what he was hearing from his many patients, soldiers who had returned from the front.
MICHAEL KERN: Yeah, I mean, imagine just having a job where, you know, every soldier comes in and tells you the most horrible tragic stories about what happened in Iraq and what they’ve done in Iraq. And you have to deal with all these things, and then all of a sudden you get orders to deploy? That’s going to screw with anyone, mentally.
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about what happened to you in Iraq, Michael Kern.
MICHAEL KERN: Numerous things happened to me in Iraq. I actually engaged and shot and killed a child, believing at the time that it was a legitimate kill. That still troubles me to this day. You know, anything—we got hit with mortars, IEDs, EFPs, small arms fires, RPGs, anything you can think of. I lost a lot of good friends out there for a, you know, immoral and an unjust war. . . .
Tags: Amy Goodman, Dahr Jamail, Fort Hood, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Iraq war, Major Hasan, Michael Kern
