Purple Heart Veteran Author Benjamin Sledge

About this video

Benjamin Sledge, a Purple Heart recipient and Bronze Star awardee who served 11 years in the Army with Special Operations, discusses his journey from joining in 1999 through deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. Sledge recounts his upbringing in Oklahoma, the influence of his WWII paratrooper grandfather, and his path into Civil Affairs and Special Operations. He contrasts how different generations of veterans processed combat trauma, arguing that WWII veterans had community support and purification rituals that Vietnam and GWOT veterans lacked, leading to higher PTSD rates in modern conflicts.

Key takeaways

• Sledge attributes differences in PTSD rates across wars to community support: he argues WWII veterans had nationwide backing and time to decompress, while Vietnam and GWOT veterans returned to indifference with rapid reintegration
• Sledge recounts that his grandfather, an 82nd Airborne paratrooper who missed D-Day due to pneumonia and became Patton’s scotch supplier, rarely discussed his combat experiences and only told Sledge “now you’re a man” after Afghanistan
• Sledge describes joining the Army in 1999 during peacetime to pay for college, then experiencing the complete transformation of military training and focus immediately after 9/11 when he arrived at Special Warfare training

Episode details: published August 12, 2024 · 20.8K views · 3:18:20 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. Stories told by Mike Ritland’s podcast guests are the guests’ own accounts, attributed to them — not independently verified. Commentary is Ritland’s, presented as his analysis.

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