ABSTRACT
For years, news services have routinely published freshly calculated statistics showing rising rates of suicide in the military. To date, the U.S. military has lost more troops to suicide than to combat in both Iraq and Afghanistan (Donnelly, 2011). Non-military estimates reveal that a million people worldwide die annually by suicide (World health Organization, n.d). In the United States, suicide is the fourth leading cause of death in the general population overall, and the third leading cause of death in those aged between 15 and 24 (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2010). Ostensibly, suicide is not strictly a military problem—nor is it purely a civilian problem. Suicide is clearly a human problem.
