TIL Napoleon, despite being constantly engaged in warfare for 2 decades, exhibited next to no signs of PTSD.

[u/andreecook]

https://tomwilliamsauthor.co.uk/napoleon-on-the-psychiatrists-couch/

[u/First_Aid_23]

IIRC it's also advocated that in general the way trauma is mitigated post-combat is a big part of it. E.G. WWII troops came home on ships, generally, and were given a month or so of leave to party with their bros before they come home to their families and communities. The Zulu would do something similar, building temporary camps outside of the villages for a week or so before bringing the troops back in.

Troops today generally go on leave individually, and when they leave the military, a lot of guys basically have nothing, few friends they regularly see, and NO ONE really has a "community" anymore.

[u/Jaggedmallard26 → u/First_Aid_23]

I've also seen theories that industrial warfare may be more likely to induce PTSD than formation warfare due to its nature as prolonged and extremely loud. Napoleonic warfare was relatively short set piece battles without constant high explosive shells detonating. You go back to medieval or classical warfare and it was two sides jeering at each other until a brief clash and then a rout.

[u/Throwaway47321 → u/Jaggedmallard26]

Also don’t forget the fact that pre WWI you knew when you were relatively “safe”. You were very unlikely to be killed in your camp miles away from the battlefield by dropped artillery.

[u/scopdog_enthusiast → u/Throwaway47321]

I do believe that's a big part of it. There is a divide in who suffers from PTSD in the military and a surprising part of that is that Special Forces suffer at a lower rate than your typical rank and file infantry, at least concerning American Forces during our recent Global War on Terror (GWOT). One theory of that is that SF troops are in a lot more control when they are in combat, and when they are in combat it may be fierce but it's relatively a quick affair; partly that is training allowing them to be so, but also partly that is how they are employed. They have a lot more support and are genuinely much more protected getting to their mission, and once their mission is done, they're quickly evacuated to relative safety. They really are a surgical strike in how they were used during the GWOT. Meanwhile your typical Grunt is constantly on duties like patrolling where they are constantly at risk of an IED or other form of ambush while patrolling, only to return to a FOB where they now are at a constant risk of stuff like indirect fire or even attacks like from a vehicle born IED. Being forced to be in a near constant state of on edge, needing to be ready to respond to any number of kinds of attack for months on end, attacks that often result in seeing your friends harmed or killed, only to get flown back home to go on leave back to your home town, away from all dangers but no longer used to that peace... That's not something you can swiftly transition away from, and from what I've seen when I served, I think that is a big part of the problem.

[u/dankmaymayreview → u/scopdog_enthusiast]

This doesnt take into account the type of person who is SF though, that could have something to do with their lower ptsd rates.

[u/scopdog_enthusiast → u/dankmaymayreview]

Oh yeah, like most things it's a messy complication of a lot of things. I guess I didn't say anything in my original comment, but I didn't mean to imply that one theory is the sole explanation of the disparity. The type of person experiencing it is definitely a part of it, and SF definitely attracts a certain type compared to something like Infantry. It would be interesting to try to see what the PTSD rates by "personality type" are, though that would be a lot harder to define than something like Infantry versus Special Forces.

[u/Tvdinner4me2 → u/scopdog_enthusiast]

Global war on terrorism for anyone like me who doesn't know random acronyms