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Having been to war myself I want to point this out. Most all conscripted soldiers are "children" even in the US armed forces.

When I was drafted for Vietnam I was 19 years old. I know many of my comrades were even younger, having lied about their age, but nobody was older than 20 unless they were career military. Are you really a fully functional and developed adult at 19 years of age?

The concept here is that of "cognitive dissonance". This, along with the biological nature of adrenal memories is the entire basis of PTSD. CG is the contrast between the worldview you hold, and the real world you experience.

Hence, a kid who has never seen a dead body or someone blasted apart or a 9 year old kid toss a fragmentation grenade killing 4 or 5 of his buddies and blowing the arms or legs of some others (and let's face who has?) experiences a real shock when these things are witnessed as they collide with his previously held world view.

But a child that is say, 8 or 9, has not truly developed their entire personal worldview. This makes it easier to change their worldview as the masters of war desire. But it also makes the trauma much greater and enduring in twisting the kid's soul and character. Such a child can recover, but never totally.

Yet, I do not think any solider who has been there and done it totally recovers either. Things he got praise and ribbons for in war are things he would be sent to prison for or put on death row for doing at home. Again we have the cognitive dissonance issue.

Next when we lets consider US soldiers returning from a war. The political and social context they return to is critical to their re-assimilation into the social order, if that is ever to happen.

First, anyone they previously knew, who was their age before they left, is a stranger to them now. A girlfriend might be the exception but those types are very, very rare and generally won't re-associate with the returning soldier anyway. The kids they knew when they left seem so very much younger to the vet when he gets back, they have no longer anything in common. Hence, he feels isolated

Second, in my case the political atmosphere for returning Nam vets was very poor. Television shows were habitually showing us a "deranged killers" and "assassins" in the many and various "police dramas". The general public either thought, we were just that and "baby killers" to boot, or the old WW2 guys tried to keep us out of the VFW because we "lost the war".

The result is vets associate with other combat

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