"Given that many veterans rebound successfully from their war experiences and some flourish as a result of them," Sontag and Alvarez observe, "veterans groups have long deplored the attention paid to the minority of soldiers who fail to readjust to civilian life." "Clearly," they aver, "committing homicide is an extreme manifestation of dysfunction for returning veterans, many of whom struggle in quieter ways."
This "extreme manifestation" is indeed extremely rare. The Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) and other veterans' advocacy groups are absolutely correct that not merely "many" but the vast majority of veterans not only remain completely law-abiding but go on to lead stable and productive personal, professional, and civic lives. Assuming 121 homicide cases in relation to 749,932 total discharges through 2007, 99.98 percent of all discharged Iraq and Afghanistan veterans have not committed or been charged with homicide.
And assuming 121 cases and 749,932 total discharges, the homicide offending rate for the discharged veterans would be 16.1 per 100,000. The U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) has demographic data aplenty on homicide offending rates. For instance, in 2005, for white males aged 18-24, the rate was about 20 per 100,000. The Times opined that 121 was the "minimum" number, even as it counted veterans charged but not convicted with veterans tried and found guilty. Doubling the number to 242 would double the rate to 32.2 per 100,000.
Such crude but contextualizing calculations aside, the right question to ask is whether the veterans, other things being equal (controlling for age, race, gender,
education, income, prior criminal history, and other variables), offend at rates that are significantly different from otherwise comparable groups (including groups that have an extreme PTSD incidence). Without doing the relevant statistical (multiple-regression) analyses with all the requisite empirical data, it is impossible to say.
In April 2007, BJS issued a detailed report showing that veterans were half as likely as non-veterans to be in prison, but that was explained mainly by the fact that two-thirds of male veterans in the population at large were aged 55 or older (older people are less likely to be found behind bars). The incarcerated veterans were somewhat more likely than incarcerated non-veterans to have committed violent crimes, and far more likely to have committed violent crimes against females or minors. There is, however, no evidence at all that ex-military personnel, including veterans who served in combat theatres and saw action, figure significantly or disproportionately in murder, rape, robbery, burglary, or property crimes.
The "Deadly Echoes" story spotlighted an important issue and sensitively profiled several tragic incidents. In many respects it was a model piece of journalism. But, in such a lengthy report, the Times should have done more to put its 121 cases against a broader data backdrop or two, been clearer about what nobody really knows about the subject, and taken much greater care than it did to avoid echoing what the VFW, in a 2006 story referenced by the reporters, rightly rejected as the "wacko-vet" myth. John J. DiIulio Jr. is a contributing editor of THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
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