Veterans: Needed Training Going In and Need Training Getting Out!

      Both enlistees and inductees receive basic and supplemental training when they begin their military service. The purpose of this is obviously and rightfully to erase the characteristics they have developed to survive as civilians and  provide them the characteristics they will need for the rigors of military service including surviving when called to serve in a hostile environment.  While there may be some overlap in characteristics required for survival in both a civilian and military environment, for the most part, those for the military will be new and with continued service will become inbred and dominant.  But what happens at the end of their service?

      For the most part it's surrender your gun, maybe a thank you and good bye. Is this enough for the many who have served a tour or successive tours often under horrific conditions?  Is this enough for those who have traded, whether voluntarily or through activation or "call-up", the freedom and lifestyle they enjoyed as civilians to  protect and preserve ours?  Do we owe them more?

      I  believe YES!  And, its more than the VA benefits they have earned and are eligible for when they get out, which arguably may not be adequate compensation for what they have been through and done.  The more I am talking about would occur even before they left the active ranks.  For the lack of a better term, lets call it Exit Training.  Like the fixed period of basic training at the beginning, there should be a similar fixed period of training before the end and the return to life as a civilian.

      Exit Training should be designed as preparation course for a return to civilian life.  It should include an orientation to changes in living and working conditions that may have come about while they served. It should cover what they can expect when returning to their loved ones, looking for employment, getting their financial house in order, and getting the assistance  (VA or other) that may be available to them should the need it.  How the skills they acquired while in the military can be used productively in civilian life should also be discussed.. This Exit Training should also include an evaluation of the departing service members' ability to make the transition, their mental and physical state, and provide for the immediate referral for assistance when problems are identified.  Yes, this may be a costly addition to our military budget, but whatever that cost may be, it will never be enough to repay those who were in a position to have to give their lives, so we could have ours.

Harold Vogt