Private Battles

Just home from work, Charles McKinney sat in his Bedford home watching TV with his 13-year-old granddaughter. He glanced out the window of his front door and saw two soldiers in dress uniforms striding up his front walk.

He bolted into the kitchen, where his wife, Rhonda, was cooking supper. "Don't let them in!" he yelled. "Don't let them in!"

Charles knew there would be only one reason why the soldiers would be coming to his house: to inform him that his only son, 40-year-old Master Sgt. Jeffrey McKinney, had died during his second combat tour of duty in Iraq. The only question was how.

When they learned that their son had fatally shot himself, the McKinneys sat in stunned disbelief.

Suicides among service members have occurred with disturbing frequency during the nine years of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, leaving family members and military leaders struggling for answers.

Jeff's death, during a routine morning mission on July 11, 2007, was one of 115 suicides in the Army that year - a record total at the time, but one that would be broken continually over the next three years. In 2008, the number increased to 140, and last year, 163 soldiers took their own lives. Altogether, the Army's suicide total has doubled since 2004.

In Texas, Fort Hood has seen a similar spike. Military police are investigating four suspected suicides in the last 10 days. With 14 confirmed suicides already this year, Fort Hood is on pace to shatter its previous record of 14 suicides set in 2008.

The Army's vice chief of staff, Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, says the suicide issue is the most frustrating problem he has faced in his 38-year military career. The reasons for the rash of suicides are unclear. Combat deployment is not necessarily the prime reason for the increase, according to experts. The Army is one year into a groundbreaking study with the National Institutes of Mental Health that could help explain the root causes.

The Army, along with the other military branches, is adding mental health counselors and behavioral health programs to combat a problem still not fully understood. "It's about the mental well-being of the force, both soldiers and families," Chiarelli said.

For the McKinneys, the fact that Jeff could take his own life was the furthest thing from their minds. This wasn't the son they knew, the man with a wife and newborn son in Germany, where he was stationed before deploying to Iraq. This wasn't the beloved first sergeant who liked to sing Sesame Street songs to his men - some as young as 18 - to cut the tension during dangerous patrols. This wasn't the caring leader who always made sure his soldiers had their needs met before he ate or rested.

"No, he didn't do that," Charles heard himself saying to the soldiers who'd come to his door. "There's no way."

Top enlisted soldier

Whatever troubled Jeff McKinney is still not clear, even three years later. He did not leave a note. He wasn't having any financial problems. He was looking forward to retiring from the Army in about a year and a half.

Just two months earlier, he had been appointed first sergeant of his unit. "He was so proud," Charles said. "He e-mailed me and said, 'I'm the top enlisted man in the company.' "

At their modest one-story home in Bedford, Charles and Rhonda spend each day trying to balance the pain of losing Jeff with their fond memories of him. Charles remained close to his son after divorcing Jeff's mother when his son was in grade school. Jeff was an adult when Rhonda married Charles, but she loved Jeff like her own family.

Their living room is filled with mementos and photographs of their son. One photo placed prominently on the TV set shows their son at a castle in central Germany where he and his German bride were married in 2005. Jeff is smiling broadly and looking tanned and fit.

Another shows Jeff at about age 10, holding a .22 rifle and striking a soldier's pose. Jeff had always wanted to follow his father, a former Marine and Vietnam veteran, into the military. Jeff joined the Army while still finishing up at DeSoto High School, under a program that allowed him to complete boot camp the summer before his senior year. When he graduated in 1985, he was already ahead of most of his peers.

Jeff's best Army buddy was Kevin Floyd, a fellow first sergeant. He got to know Jeff at Fort Polk, La., and later joined him in Iraq. Jeff never showed any signs of depression, Floyd said. He loved fishing and mountain biking, and he spent many weekends at Floyd's house for crawfish barbecues. "He was always very outgoing and active," Floyd said.

As a soldier, Jeff was an "excessive perfectionist," Floyd said, always going above and beyond. He recalls an officer asking Jeff to put together a work space for a tactical operations center in Iraq. Most people would have shoved a few card tables together, Floyd said. But Jeff persuaded some civilian contractors to build a U-shaped desk space, complete with built-in shelving for TV monitors and other communications equipment. "It looked really awesome," Floyd said.

Jeff's first assignment took him to Germany. He fell in love with the country and managed to get stationed there three times, teaching himself to speak German fluently. He was assigned to Berlin during the Persian Gulf War in 1991 and thought he had missed his only chance at combat.

But in 2004, his turn came when he deployed to Iraq with the 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment out of Schweinfurt, Germany. His unit fought in the Battle of Samarra in central Iraq, which had fallen under the control of insurgents. He was repeatedly exposed to improvised explosive devices, known as IEDs. He was haunted by one battle in which his patrol fought insurgents holed up in a school and some children were killed in the crossfire.

"He lived with that every day afterward," Charles said. "He said he could still hear the mothers screaming and crying and wailing."

After that deployment, Jeff lost interest in hunting and the rifle his father had given him the Christmas before he left for Iraq. "I just don't think I like guns anymore," he told Charles.

He married his longtime girlfriend, Christina Maurer, in a church wedding in her hometown of Muehltal, a small community southeast of Frankfurt. By the time Jeff left for Iraq again in the summer of 2006, Chrissi was pregnant. That November, she gave birth to a son, Jeremy.

Jeff was doing a 15-month tour of duty in east Baghdad, a stronghold of the Sunni insurgency. Midway through, he was appointed the top sergeant of Alpha Company. In an e-mail on June 16, 2007, to wish his dad a happy Father's Day, he grumbled about the extended deployment and "brutally hot" temperatures. He said he was looking forward to retirement and to being "able to come home each day at a normal hour."

That was the last time that Charles heard from his son.

Enduring casualties

Five days later, on June 21, 2007, one of the 1st Battalion's Bradley armored vehicles drove over a roadside bomb, exploding into flames and trapping its five soldiers inside. Jeff and other soldiers arrived quickly but were too late to save the men.

Jeff stayed to help pick up body parts.

"This seemed to be the first of a few incidents that affected" Jeff, a medic told investigators, according to records that were released to the McKinneys. On June 24, another roadside bomb exploded two feet in front of Jeff's vehicle. His driver told investigators: "There is no doubt that if this IED had struck the vehicle, we all would have been killed."

After that, Jeff's behavior began to change. He openly worried that he wasn't doing a good job. His company commander said Jeff repeatedly expressed concerns that he was "failing the company" as the senior noncommissioned officer. "His complaints were unfounded, and I explained this to him each time," the commander told investigators.

On the Sunday before his death, Jeff called his wife in Germany. He told her he was having trouble sleeping. "We were talking, and he said he felt pretty weird and not right and very tired," Chrissi said. "He fell asleep on the phone, and I told him it's better for him to go to bed. He promised me to see a doctor in the morning."

The company commander also observed that Jeff wasn't sleeping and appeared gaunt. On July 10, the day before his death, Jeff met with the company commander, who later told investigators that he gave Jeff "a handful of Benadryl" - a decongestant and sleep aid - and ordered him "to get at least 10 hours of sleep" or else he could not go out on the next morning's mission.

The next day, as the platoon gathered for the pre-dawn patrol, Jeff was supposed to give the casualty evacuation briefing. But Jeff responded with only "a blank stare," the commander reported. "I took over the rehearsal and conducted the briefing."

Even so, the commander decided not to remove Jeff from the patrol. "If I would have sent First Sergeant McKinney back to his rack, I'm afraid his soldiers would have lost confidence in his leadership. ... I believe this would have broken him and his self-confidence," the commander told investigators.

According to statements from soldiers in Jeff's Humvee, he sat silent in the front passenger seat and played with a round from his M-4. When he got a call on the radio, he stared mutely at the receiver. "But we did not think anything of it," one soldier said, "just figured he was tired."

When the mission ended about 2 p.m., an Iraqi interpreter asked for a ride back to base. After some grumbling from the other soldiers, Jeff ordered them to make room for the interpreter.

Then, according to statements from soldiers at the scene, Jeff threw down the round he'd been holding, opened his door and yelled "[Expletive] this!" He took a couple of steps and fired two rounds into a vacant building. Then he placed the muzzle of his M-4 under his chin and pulled the trigger.

"As he pulled the trigger, I saw in his face that he realized what he was doing and did not want to do it," the Humvee's driver said. "He tried to move his head, but still the round caught him."

'He just cracked'

Jeff was buried near his wife's home in Germany. Charles and Rhonda traveled from Texas to the memorial service and were joined by more than 200 soldiers from their son's base in nearby Schweinfurt. But the ceremony provided no emotional closure.

"We expected that he possibly could get shot by somebody or by a roadside bomb ... but not this," Charles said. "This wasn't planned suicide. It wasn't a premeditated suicide. I think Jeff was in a daze. He just cracked at that time."

The autopsy report indicated there were no drugs in Jeff's system. But photographs of his barracks that came with the investigative report showed several bottles of sleeping pills, including Ambien. The McKinneys have requested but have been unable to get any records from the Army that would shed light on their son's medical history.

Still, the photographs offer clues to Jeff's mental state during his final days. He was a stickler for neatness from the time he was a child, but his sleeping area was in complete disarray. "That wasn't like him," Charles said.

Charles believes his son was probably taking sleeping pills and that might have affected his thinking. He also believes Jeff was probably suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder or a traumatic brain injury aggravated when the bomb exploded in front of his vehicle three weeks before his death.

Rhonda and Charles fault the commanding officer for allowing their son to go out on the patrol - even when he was acting strangely during the pre-mission briefing. "I'm not a military person, but wouldn't that be a red flag?" Rhonda asked.

For a long time, Charles had trouble sleeping. "I would wake up at night sobbing having had a dream that I'd been with him," he said.

Because he couldn't easily visit his son's grave, he started attending other military funerals. "I didn't have him nearby to go visit. I needed to pay my respects somewhere, so I'd go do that," Charles said. "I felt like I could relate to those people, and I needed to be there and share their grief. I would stand off to the side and just observe the funeral."

Charles and Rhonda eventually found support among other military families who, like themselves, had suffered the loss of a service member. That led them to the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors, a national, nonprofit organization. They met and bonded with other families grieving over the loss of loved ones.

Two years after Jeff's death, Charles decided to fly back to Germany and visit Jeff's grave. He stayed for 10 days. "I spent hours at the cemetery by myself with Jeff," he said. "I cried a lot. I just kind of poured it all out. I just had to get it out, because we never really let go.

"And when I left there, I felt like a weight had been lifted off of me. It was like Jeff had said, 'OK, Dad. I'm fine. I'm not hurting anymore. You need to get on and live your life.' I was able to come back home."

Focus back on Fort Hood after recent rash of suicides

KILLEEN - A wave of apparent suicides, including a suspected murder-suicide of a soldier and his wife, has once again thrown the spotlight on Fort Hood and mental health issues at the country's largest base.

This year, officials have confirmed 14 suicides of soldiers and six more suspected suicides, according to figures released by Fort Hood and the Army Suicide Prevention Task Force. That's an increase from the 11 suicides of Fort Hood soldiers confirmed in 2009. It equals the record high of 14 recorded in 2008.

Maj. Gen. William Grimsley, the post's senior commander, called the most recent cases "very frustrating. ... Soldiers, for whatever reason, make a conscious decision to choose a terminal solution to what most often are temporary problems."

The suspected suicides include four deaths reported in the last 10 days. All four soldiers had overseas combat deployments, including one who had served four tours in Iraq and was found dead of a gunshot wound in his home near Fort Hood.

With 46,500 troops, the sprawling Central Texas base is the largest in the United States. Most Fort Hood soldiers are assigned to high-tempo units that have deployed more than once. But Grimsley said he doesn't believe deployments are a primary factor for the suicides. "Some have a deployment history and others don't," he said.

The Fort Hood suicides reflect those across the Army, Grimsley said. The soldiers tend to be under 25 years old - junior-grade enlisted personnel who are struggling with financial problems and multiple deployments. Some of the cases involve substance abuse. The majority of cases, he said, involve "a significant relationship or emotional issue."

Grimsley said that Fort Hood soldiers from the rank of sergeant and below - more than 32,000 soldiers - were scheduled to receive visits in their barracks or off-post homes this past week to get "a better sense" of how they are doing. Their superiors also will make sure weapons privately owned by soldiers are properly registered, he said.

In the aftermath of the Nov. 5 shootings at Fort Hood, in which Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan is accused of killing 13 colleagues and wounding 32, base officials began a concerted campaign focusing on the psychological needs of soldiers, civilians and military family members at the base.

One phase of the plan involves quarterly comprehensive surveys of health care providers, soldiers and their families to learn the mental health needs of the military community.

Fort Hood has begun putting emphasis on proactive programs that help soldiers maintain good mental health and resiliency. Last fall, Fort Hood opened its Resiliency Campus, the Army's first multifaceted facility intended to help soldiers and families prepare for the stress and uncertainty of combat deployments.

The Army is trying out some new programs to better engage soldiers. At Fort Hood, more than 15,000 soldiers have participated in role-playing exercises aimed to spark conversations and raise awareness about suicide, said Tim Block, who runs Fort Hood's employee assistance program.

"We're trying to turn the tide on suicide and reduce the stigma of folks asking for help," he said.

ROTC cadet's suicide spurs parents to speak out about depression

Nobody wants to help distressed soldiers get help more than Maj. Gen. Mark Graham and his wife, Carol. In June 2003, their 21-year-old son, Kevin, a promising ROTC cadet at the University of Kentucky, killed himself. He had been diagnosed with depression.

"I think we've come a long way. It will never be fast enough for any of us," said Mark Graham, deputy chief of staff of Forces Command in Georgia. "And it's not an easy issue. If there's a physical wound you can see, it's a lot easier to tackle it."

Kevin was the middle child of three children and was more sensitive than the others, Carol Graham said. His older brother Jeffrey, nicknamed "G.I. Jeff," looked forward to a military career. Kevin wanted a similar career, but on the medical side. "From the time he was a child, he'd always wanted to be a doctor," Carol Graham said.

The moves that military families make every two to three years helped the Graham kids draw close together. "They were each other's best friends," said Carol Graham. Later, when Kevin followed Jeff to the University of Kentucky, they shared an apartment.

The Grahams were aware that Kevin suffered from clinical depression and was taking Prozac, an anti-depressant medication. At the time, Carol thought that Prozac was like taking an antibiotic and that, after a while, he wouldn't need the pills.

In fact, Kevin stopped taking his medication at some point in the spring of 2003. He was scheduled to attend an advanced ROTC training camp that summer and didn't want to report that he was taking medication for depression.

"He was the top ROTC cadet," Carol said. "He had been selected to be battalion commander his senior year. He didn't want anyone to know."

But in June 2003, he hanged himself in his apartment at the University of Kentucky. "We blame ourselves, and we always will," Mark Graham said. "We missed it and didn't see it coming with Kevin."

That tragedy was compounded eight months later when Jeff died in Iraq after a bomb exploded while he led a foot patrol.

The Grahams mourned privately for several years. But as the military struggled with an increase in suicides, they decided to tell their story to raise awareness about depression.

"Kevin wanted to be a doctor, and he wanted to help other people," Mark Graham said. "We decided that if people wanted us to talk, we would do that, especially if it could help other people become aware so this wouldn't happen to someone else."

Mark Graham was a featured speaker at a spring conference in Dallas sponsored by Contact Crisis Line, the nonprofit 24-hour suicide prevention hotline.

The Grahams plan to continue telling their story as long as needed.

"People need to know that you can die from depression. You can die from untreated depression," Mark Graham said.