ReleaseWire Connect

For years now we've been out here doing the work no one else is doing.

As is the case with many newer and smaller non-profit organizations, the Uniformed Services Justice & Advocacy Group (USJAG) has faced many challenges. For start-up veterans organizations the barriers to success are much higher than they are for non-profit organizations in other realms of social justice advocacy. First of all, there have been Chartered veterans service organizations listed as 501 (c) 3 entities since the First World War. There are 47 Congressionally-Chartered Veterans Service Organizations and a large number of Military and Veterans Associations. A wide variety of newer non-profit organizations have appeared in the wake of the Global War on Terror (GWOT). The most successful of these organizations were founded and subsequently run by former military officers and they began with substantial financial backing. For former enlisted personnel dealing with readjustment or reintegration-related issues and competing for funding, recognition and building organizational infrastructure the hurdles are numerous and the barriers are substantial. If you are a start-up organization dealing with a specific set of issues that might be deemed in any way controversial the difficulties multiply exponentially. USJAG is a unique organization dealing with controversial and misunderstood issues.

Crowdster is proud to be supporting the Uniformed Services Justice & Advocacy Group in its efforts to ensure that all members of the United States Armed Forces return home with the dignity, honor, and support they deserve.

We're all familiar with the popular television series. An entire generation of Americans has sat transfixed as, night after night, a dedicated team of police officers and prosecuting attorneys chase down a never-ending chain of child molesters, murderers and rapists. They are the perennial good guys, continually frustrated by the manipulations of clever defense attorneys who avail themselves of dirty tricks and legal loop-holes and the bad guys get away.

Who is Staff Sergeant Lewis T. Foutch? Well, he is-or at least he was-a soldier in the United States Army. We use the past tense due to the fact that on Monday, April 25, 2016 he was separated from service with a General Discharge at Ft. Campbell, Kentucky. SSG Foutch, prior to being so ignobly tossed aside by the nation to whom he has given his all, served with the D. Company, 2nd Battalion, Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR). The unit is part of the Joint Special Operations Command or JSOC, the most elite soldiers the US military has to offer. These are the guys they make movies about. SSG served a total of six combat tours in Afghanistan for a total of 17 months. He served an additional two combat deployments for a total of 11 months, but the nature of those deployments is classified—we don't know exactly where he went, but we can be sure the destinations were harrowing. During the course of his service he was awarded the Army Air Medal, Army Commendation Medal, 3 Army Achievement Medals, Good Conduct Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Afghanistan Campaign Medal, Global War on Terror Service Medal, NATO Medal and a Combat Action Badge (CAB). Foutch was a first-tier soldier.

At some point, you stand there shaking your head: When reality collides with fiction and there arises no seeming distinction between the two, the perversion multiplies exponentially. In the final summation, can we tell the difference any longer?

On December 7, 2015--Pearl Harbor Day--the Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics released its somewhat overdue national survey on veterans in prison and jail. The last national survey was conducted in 2004 and was released in 2007.

America once loved the little guy who fought the long odds and won. For those familiar with advocacy and funding on behalf of soldiers and veterans some very salient facets emerge: One of which is that those who benefit most are seldom the regular fighting men and women, the veterans themselves. This is an untold story--or series of stories--that the media has largely failed to tell. The Uniformed Services and Justice Advocacy Group (USJAG) invites the press to remedy this shortfall.

Last week, twelve members of the United States Senate called for an investigation into the discharge, under Other Than Honorable (OTH) circumstances, of 22,000 combat veterans of the United States Army. These soldiers, who had often served multiple tours in Iraq or Afghanistan, were diagnosed with combat-related mental health disorders and discharged without benefit of proper medical review. The Uniformed Services and Justice Advocacy Group (USJAG), the Colorado-based organization which has led the nation in the realm of advocacy on behalf of such soldiers, is calling for other members of Congress to join in the call for an investigation. Georg Andreas Pogany, the Chief Executive Officer of USJAG, notes that we have heard a great deal of hollow rhetoric with regard to "honoring the troops" and that we have further recognized the "Invisible Wounds of War" yet the drum beat which has mustered out tens of thousands of emotionally and mentally scarred combat soldiers continues unabated. Pogany asserts that the 22,000 soldiers in question represent the tip of the iceberg.