War Trauma and its Aftermath

An International Perspective on the Balkan and Gulf Wars

Laurence Armand French, Lidija Nikolic-Novakovic

• Publisher: University Press of America
• Edition: 1
• Year: 2011
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Eastern European History
• eBook ISBN:
  9780761858027
• Index: Psychology

War trauma has long been associated with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a term coined in 1980 to explain the post-war impact of Vietnam veterans. The Gulf and Balkan wars added new dimensions to the traditional PTSD definition, due largely to the changing dynamics of these wars. With these wars came unprecedented use of reserve and National Guard personnel in U.S. forces along with the largest contingent of female military personnel to date. Rapid deployment, sexual assaults, and suicides surfaced as paramount untreated problems within coalition force. Rapes, torture, suicides, and a high prevalence of untreated civilian victims of the Balkan wars added to the new dimensions of the traumatic stress continuum. Suicide bombers and roadside bombings added to the definition of combat stress, as military personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan were forced to be constantly vigilant for these attacks—regardless of whether they served in combat areas.

Table of contents

• Chapter One: Introduction to Psycho-cultural and Historical Precedents to Classifications of Traumatic Stress
• Chapter Two: Continuum of Socio-Cultural Adjustments to War trauma from Sublimation to Suicide
• Chapter Three: The Neurophysiology and Neuropsychology of Trauma Adjustment
• Chapter Four: Dimensions of Gulf War Trauma
• Chapter Five: Dimensions of Balkan War Trauma
• Chapter Six: Assessment and Treatment of Trauma
• Chapter Seven: International Trauma Bibliography
• Endnotes