Price of being in the Paramilitary
‘The more you sweat in peace, the less you’ll bleed in war’. So goes the old adage, so aptly followed by the military and the paramilitary when it comes to physical training, stamina and resilience building. They do invest a lot in keeping the soldiers fit and ready to face all eventualities. Of course there is another adage that goes like this: ‘most battles are won in the mind’; and we sort of like to downplay its importance when training our soldiers or designing curriculum for them. If we could juts invest equal efforts in training soldiers to be mentally resilient, many suicides, attrition or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) cases can be prevented.
Yesterday, there was a front page article that highlighted the plight of soldiers in Indian paramilitary forces, and how attrition has risen and suicide levels reached unacceptable and unforeseen levels. Apparently
it took a study by IIMA to conclude and find the reasons behind this- continuous posting in difficult areas, long working hours, sleep deprivation, denial of leave, lack of health care facilities and delay in promotions and pay parity were cited as reasons for unbearable stress among the personnel. While some of these are avoidable and can be taken care of (like rotation of postings in peace areas, timely leave grants), other factors - like sleep deprivation, lack of health care facilities, long working hours – are part n parcel of being a soldier.
In a war, be it an internal war with the naxalites, you cannot hope to have a relaxed atmosphere- the soldiers of course signed up for this- this serving their country by fighting atrocities is what drives them and made them chose a career in the forces in the first place. However, when they signed up for this, they believed that their paramilitary/ army training will adequately equip them to deal with the hardships, trauma and ravages of war; in this they were taken for a ride- while their training makes them physically capable of fighting in the moment; no psychological efforts are spent in making them mentally fit for the war conditions. We have counsellors to treat them post facto, but not Cognitive Behaviour Therapists who can equip them not to fall in the stress mindset/ negative appraisal trap.
As Brig. Gen. Rhonda Cornum, PhD, MD, director of what’s being called the Comprehensive Soldier Fitness program in USA puts
“Modern warfare is characterized by demanding missions, extreme climates, sleep deprivation, cultural dissonance, physical fatigue, prolonged separation from family and the ever-present threat of serious bodily injury or death. Waiting for illness or injury to occur is not the way commanders in the U.S. Army approach high-risk actions, and it is not the way we should approach high psychological risk activities.”
USA has again taken a lead here- they have deployed comprehensive soldier fitness program based on positive psychology principles, and that includes Master Resilience Training (MRT) program based on the proven Penn University’s Penn resilience Program. Now you may call me a Positive psychology fanatic, but the program designed amongst others, by Martin Seligman, has been getting rave reviews from the participating soldiers and hopefully will be substantiated soon by quantitative data that shows a decrease in suicides/ PTSD cases etc.
It’s important to note it was launched when ‘suicide rates of (US) Army soldiers had reached a 28-year high’; its effectiveness is still anecdotal, but that’s no reason not to try the same model here.
The MRT is a ‘train-the-trainer’ model where psychologists and army personnel train the non-commissioned- officers in positive psychology principles and practices like identifying and developing ones core signature strengths so that they can providing meaning and act as buffer in times of stress. They are also taught about resilience - ability to persist in the face of challenges and to bounce back from adversity, even using adversity as a springboard for growth – and how to cultivate it. They are instructed in Albert Eliis’s ABC (adversity- belief-consequence) model whereby they recognize that what is more important is not the activating event, but their beliefs about that. They learn about their explanatory style (how to cultivate optimism by changing that), their decision making and happiness biases and also how to t positive relationships by active and constructive listening. And all this happens not as theoretical teaching, but as activities, breakout sessions and role plays where they practise what they learnt and are about to preach to their soldiers.
The above is just a glimpse of what all is possible- and dearly needed- to address the morale and psychological problems plaguing the paramilitary forces. Of course we can continue to be reactive and focus on providing those affected better mental health care and access to counsellors- or we can focus on changing the ground conditions/ avoiding wars - another option available to us is to accept the detrimental effect that war, internal or external, has on human psyche and prepare our soldiers mentally for that experience. If we use positive psychology approaches to screen, identify and intervene those soldiers who most need it, then we will be solving the problem at its roots.
Having a certificate in positive psychology from UPenn, I’ll be all too happy to assist, in any way possible, the army/ paramilitary to design such a course. If we really value our soldiers, let us not make them pay too steep a price of choosing to serve in the paramilitary.
Soldiers and suicides
Suicides in the 1.1 million-strong Indian Army have come down marginally in recent years. From an all-time high of 129 in 2006, they dipped to 102 in 2011. But until July 31 this year, 62 Indian soldiers have taken their lives. Every such incident will remain a cause for concern. The suicide of a soldier at an Army unit in Samba in Jammu and Kashmir led to a round of tensions involving officers and soldiers this month. The case of an Army man who spent five days atop a mobile phone tower in the heart of Delhi to highlight his grievances — he threatened to jump but was somehow brought down safely this week — seemed to epitomise the crisis. Incidents of ‘fragging,’ or the fratricidal killing of fellow soldiers or superiors, also continue. It is clear that measures that were put in place by the armed forces after a study done by the Defence Institute of Psychological Research to identify stress-points are not efficacious enough. Some senior officers have contended that more than the physical and mental strain that extended deployment in counter-insurgency roles exerts, domestic, family and financial problems account for much of the distress. Defence Minister A.K. Antony, who is known to have taken a personal interest in the issue, has written to Chief Ministers to make the administration more responsive to the grievances and complaints of serving soldiers and their families. The Ministry of Defence appointed more psychological counsellors at the unit level, introduced yoga sessions and also issued guidelines to liberalise leave-granting practices. But more needs to be done. The armed forces have to introspect on how far the issue of the quality of its leadership at multiple levels may be involved here.
It is cold comfort that in India, suicide rates in the armed forces are less than those of the general population. The argument that in affluent countries such as the United States, military suicide rates have been rising at an alarming rate does not help the debate either. While the U.S. military reported 301 cases of suicide through 2011, this year the rate seems set to reach one a day. In fact, in the U.S. armed forces, suicide as a cause of death has overtaken combat deaths and motor vehicle accident deaths. At the end of the day, it all boils down to the question of the general morale of a force. Suicide is a tough enemy, but one that can be beaten with the right measures. At the force level, individuals need to be aided to improve their resilience and helped to cope with what life throws at them. The military, it seems, also needs to battle some demons within.
