When Clay Hunt returned home to Texas after two combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, the struggle didn’t end. Tormented by flashbacks and post-traumatic stress, he sought medical help from the Department of Veteran Affairs – but faced a pile of paperwork. While waiting for help, he turned his energy towards helping his fellow veterans, raising money for the wounded and appearing in public service announcements for veterans struggling, like him, with the psychological trauma of war.

Hunt took his own life on March 31, 2011. His disability checks arrived five weeks later.

Tragically, Clay’s story is not unique. Every day, 18 veterans of the nation’s armed forces become casualties by their own hands. One thousand more attempt to take their own lives every month. The numbers are as grim for active duty and reserve soldiers: The Army just reported 27 suspected suicides for the month of May, higher than any other month this year.

“Those numbers are just the tip of the iceberg,” Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, tells Danger Room. “This is a problem that’s clearly out of control.”

As Obama promises a drawdown of troops in Afghanistan and Iraq is coming to a close, the number of soldiers returning home is only rising. But after fighting for their country, these veterans are forced to fight a health care system that is not sufficiently able to help them. Last month the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals berated the Department of Veteran Affairs for delays in treating veterans who have the combat-related mental injuries that put them at an increased risk of suicide.


“The VA’s unchecked incompetence has gone on long enough; no more veterans should be compelled to agonize or perish while the government fails to perform its obligations,” the judges wrote in the majority ruling.

But it may be years before the situation improves. As of 2010, the VA had a backlog of over 1 million benefits claims. Veterans can wait a year or more for disability checks, and weeks for mental health referrals. The problem is only getting worse, with the influx of troops from Afghanistan and Iraq. Meanwhile, the rate of suicide for veterans is three times higher than the general public, according to a 2006 study.

“We’re almost 10 years into the war, the backlog has gone up, and it doesn’t look like things are getting better,” Rieckhoff says.

While the number of stories like Clay Hunt’s are on the rise, the concern over veteran suicides is not new. Over seven years ago, the Bush administration commissioned the VA to overhaul its mental health system. The “Mental Health Strategic Plan” that followed promised all sorts of improvements: better screening for at-risk veterans, more urgent health care, less waiting time for treatments and benefits claims. But a 2007 report (.pdf) by the Office of the Inspector General concluded that much of that plan had not been implemented. It found that almost two-thirds of the Veterans Health Administration facilities lacked a suicide prevention strategy to target returning Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, and 70 percent didn’t have a system to track veterans who showed risk factors for suicide.

Since then, the VA has made continued efforts to strengthen its suicide prevention program. The Veterans Crisis Line (1-800-273-8255) was opened in 2007 to provide telephone access to trained counselors 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

“The hotline has grown tremendously over the last four years, to about 500 calls a day,” says Janet Kemp, the national director of the VA’s suicide prevention program. In April, the hotline fielded more than 14,000 calls, the most ever for a single month. Kemp credits the hotline with saving over thousands of lives, but admits that the VA could do better.

“People do wait too long to get the services they need,” says Kemp. “Hopefully we’re putting those into place.”

The Veterans Affairs Department says that it is not only making strides in treating post-traumatic stress disorder and brain injuries and in preventing suicides, but is also upending its reputation for bureaucratic delays and unresponsiveness.

It is easy to be skeptical. But then there is this: a small wing of a V.A. hospital in Canandaigua, N.Y., where a staff of about 120 runs a national phone and Internet chat service for veterans in crisis. Its mission is to connect veterans to help as quickly and efficiently as possible. One online-chat counselor, Laurie Courtney, told me proudly that this was “the new V.A.” She and three colleagues, in a brightly lighted room with barely enough space for their computers, chairs, coats and handbags, handle online conversations all day. Dozens of others staff the phone lines.

Their work has the relentlessness of battlefield medicine, with pleas for help coming from all sides. One Vietnam veteran has struggled with survivor’s guilt for 43 years. Another has lost his job and his marriage, and agrees to try V.A.-sponsored therapy, “if it will stop these dreams.” Transcripts of the chats, redacted for privacy, show counselors using gentle questions and encouragement: “How can I help you?” “It sounds like you have some good friends.” “Thank you for your service.” “I’m going to have someone call you right now.”

The counselors aren’t therapists or case managers; they just tell people where and how to get care and then follow up if they can. They can’t always know if a person really is in crisis or is even a veteran. But they say that dealing with the occasional pranksters and harassers is a necessary part of a program that tries to be radically open and welcoming. That, for the V.A., would be a sea change.

There are now two million veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, a small but growing portion of the total veteran population of 23 million. Not all saw combat; not all bear physical or psychological scars. Those who do pose a challenge this nation is only beginning to confront.

In May, a federal court blisteringly criticized the V.A. for “unchecked incompetence” in failing to provide mental health care to veterans. The judges cited backlogs of hundreds of thousands of benefits claims and the lack of suicide-prevention experts in hundreds of outpatient clinics. Veterans can wait months for treatment and years to have their disability claims processed.

The Veterans Outreach Center in Rochester, barely a half-hour from the Canandaigua V.A., is another part of the solution. The independent program offers job training, art therapy and other services, and houses troubled vets with rap sheets and addictions. Its director, James McDonough, a retired Army colonel, praises the V.A. for having skilled professionals and expert care, but says it needs to do a much better job of working with community-based programs like his to broaden and strengthen the web of care.

Lost in the headlines about the mind-numbing debt ceiling debate and Japan’s Women’s World Cup victory, the unemployment rate for new veterans jumped to 13.3 percent in June, four percent higher than the national average. Last time we polled IAVA’s membership, they reported close to 20% unemployment. In states like Michigan, Indiana and Minnesota, that figure is as high as 30 percent.

In real numbers, that’s only about 260,000 new veterans struggling to find work. That’s a number small enough that if our nation really focused on it, we could make a real dent. Especially when you consider a company like Walmart employs more than 2 million people alone. We all know most of the jobs (for veterans, and anyone else) have to come from the private sector. But Washington can play a critical role too.

A positive first step is The Veteran Opportunity to Work (VOW) Act, recently introduced to the House by Republican VA Committee Chairman Jeff Miller of Florida. The VOW Act would open doors for new veterans by creating the job training needed to stay competitive in this economy. It would mandate Transition Assistance Programs (TAP) for all separating service members, help military personnel acquire civilian certificates, and strengthen USERRA laws to protect Reservists and National Guardsmen who leave civilian jobs behind when they deploy. It is an important piece of legislation, and similar to the Hiring Heroes Act of 2011, which is currently making its way to the Senate floor under the guidance of Senate Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Patty Murray of Washington.

The VOW Act would have a huge impact on the lives of veterans like Nick Colgin. While serving in Afghanistan with the 82nd Airborne Division as a combat medic, Colgin proved himself over and over again. He saved the life of a French soldier that was shot in the head, and was ultimately awarded the Bronze Star for his actions over the course of his deployment.

Yet when Colgin got back from his tour, he was unable to find a job anywhere in the medical field. He was looking to work as a first responder in Wyoming, which was the equivalent of what he did overseas, but employers said he lacked the proper credentials and certificates. He eventually got the right paperwork, but only after using up some of his valued GI Bill benefits to take classes at a local community college (classes he could have taught).

This Congress hasn’t exactly been the job-creating machine we were all promised. And all Americans have a right to be frustrated. Not a single jobs bill has passed out of Congress yet this year. But these current pieces of legislation in the House and Senate can and should be the first ones. Both the VOW Act and the Hiring Heroes Act should be above typical Washington politics. As evidenced by the hard work and dedication of Chairman Miller, a Republican, and Chairman Murray, a Democrat, helping veterans find jobs is absolutely a nonpartisan issue. All Americans can – and should – support that. To find out if your Representative and Senator are one of them, check the list of co-sponsors here.