Forward, limp

Having already been subject to a congressional investigation over providing inadequate medical and mental health treatment to U.S. veterans, Fort Carson has a new stink wafting about its Colorado corridors. According to staff e-mails obtained by The Denver Post, it appears soldiers unfit for active duty are being shipped back to Iraq in order to meet troop quotas.

Master Sergeant Denny Nelson says he’s one of several dozen who left Fort Carson without a clean bill of health. Having fractured his leg and torn the tendons in his foot, the 38-year-old was in no condition to leave home, according to Fort Carson’s Soldier Readiness Process. Procedure called for Nelson to be sent to a specialist. Instead, he was sent to Kuwait with the understanding he’d be rehabilitated while overseeing 52 soldiers, also receiving treatment. He arrived to learn the 52 had been returned to combat, as he would soon be. A physician on base intervened and Nelson was sent back to the U.S.

An e-mail from Fort Carson’s 3rd Brigade Combat Team Captain, Scot Tebo, laments that “issues reaching deployable strength” have necessitated redeploying “some borderline soldiers.”

by Scott Saxon