Hidden Wounds
Hidden Wounds: The problems of Northern Ireland veterans in Civvy Street
By Aly Renwick
Published by Barbed Wire, Price £4.99
This slender volume feels like an introduction to a more substantial piece
of work. Renwick sets out to explore the reasons why so many former British
army soldiers, particularly those who have served in Ireland, end up
serving prison sentences, often for crimes of quite astonishing brutality.
However, the work he has done raises more questions about the topic than it
manages to answer.
The central premise of the text is that many of these former soldiers are
suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), brought about by
their experience of the conflict in the Six Counties. Their brutalization
in the `morally corrupting' atmosphere of colonial warfare creates, Renwick
argues, a trauma which is directly played out both in psychological
breakdown and psychotic behaviour after their return to civilian life.
Although Renwick has done some good research - the book is crammed with
instances of former soldiers indulging in violently criminal activities -
what it lacks is a sufficiently coherent and systematic analysis of PTSD
and its external effects. Merely describing the symptoms and providing
anecdotal evidence of their effects is not enough, and several promising
avenues of investigation are left unexplored.
For example, one question which arises is this: Is there a difference in
the type of PTSD experienced by those who have witnessed atrocity during
conflict and those who have indulged in it? Much of what Renwick has
discovered suggests strongly that there is a qualitative difference in the
behavioural patterns of men who have been traumatised by what they have
seen and those who are traumatised by what they have done. What, if any,
relationship is there between indulging in random violence or atrocity
whilst in military service and subsequent violence in civilian life?
It is interesting in this respect that Renwick uses Shakespeare's
description of the heroic soldier of Henry IV Part I, Hotspur, to
illustrate the effects of PTSD; sleeplessness, loss of appetite and libido
and the onset of depression. No accusations of atrocity can be levelled
against Hotspur and a useful Shakespearean comparison of his symptoms might
be made with those experienced by Macbeth, who descends from being a
fearsome soldier who has ``supp'd full with horrors'' of battle into a
calculating criminal who indulges in a murderous rampage of unparalleled
ferocity, including the slaughter of women and children.
Furthermore, it can be argued that Macbeth's brutality is latent in his
psychological makeup and is merely triggered by his encounter with the
witches. In Renwick's account, what is also left unexplored is whether
those with previously undiscovered violent or socially deviant tendencies
are drawn towards the armed forces where those tendencies are often given
full rein. To understand why one soldier commits atrocities it is surely
necessary to understand why another, in the same situation, does not, and
understanding this may also illuminate the variations in the effects of
PTSD on different individuals.
But perhaps in arguing this I am letting the army off the hook, because
illustrated very well by Renwick in his use of soldiers' accounts is its
absolute ability to churn out amoral killers. One former soldier explains
that, ``...The circumstances of our training, coupled with our peculiar
existence in Northern Ireland ... turned us into savages. We begged and
prayed for a chance to fight, to smash, to kill, to destroy...''.
d although this book is superficially about soldiers, those who were
fought, smashed, killed and destroyed haunt its pages like Banquo's ghost.