The invisible wounds of war are not new to our Warriors,
Veterans and their loved ones. For many, “coming home” is not
the end of war—far from it. Leaving the battlefield far behind,
the war often continues—in hearts and minds, relationships and
communities following deployment. War is hell . . . as can be
peace. As James Hillman aptly put it, “peace for veterans is not
an absence of war, but its living ghost in the bedroom, at the
lunch counter, on the highway . . . The return from the killing
fields is more than a debriefing; it is a slow ascent from
hell.” As always, we must remember history’s lessons of war and
its human toll . . . War changes everyone – as Robert Emmet
Meagher states, “there is no such thing as inflicting casualties
without enduring them. Every wound inflicted upon another is a
wound within.” Sophocles, a General during the time of the
ancient Greeks, wrote the story of Ajax, a Warrior of renowned
strength and courage, tested by combat, who became depressed and
died by suicide near the e