Sonny Martin was only 23 years old when he returned from Viet Nam with a grim reminder of his season in uniform: an addiction to heroin. Martin became the drug to help prevent the memories of his time in Southeast Asia, where they had bribed the villagers for information that will help you to identify and "eliminate" Viet Cong contributors. In the United States, he found few people willing to help heal invisible wounds that remained of his time in that brutal war.
"I had to have it all in," said Martin in a life of July 1971 history of the magazine that illuminated the struggles - and addiction - short so many veterans return to civilian life. According to the life article, "the number of addicts is not yet confirmed. Congressman Robert Steele (R - Connecticut) and many veterans return estimate that 15 percent of men in Viet Nam are hooked to heroin. The army says that the figure is 2 per cent". The actual numbers, not helped because the drug was so easy to find: just two dollars would ensure a dose of heroin of high quality - high that, for a time, anxiety, shock and loneliness that defines life after the war many veterans, Mellado.
Here, on the heels of reports recent about the enormous difficulties (unemployment, horrible suicide rates and more) against American Veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, LIFE.com recalls that article long ago time and stories of the all too familiar of young men struggling to rebuild their lives after serving his country in a divisive conflictendless.
In 1971, addicted veterans who wanted to kick his heroin habit could investigate places such as Ward 4B2 of Palo Alto Veterans Administration Hospital in California. There, doctors and nurses used the synthetic opiate methadone to "buy time" while experimenting with one-to-one and small group therapy sessions, urging the men to put their problems of head and face the. But the veterans will not able to enter in Palo Alto and the hope of a cure: had to demonstrate a genuine commitment to their own recovery. That meant hard times for the men as 22 years Dan Patterson (see Gallery above), that inhaling heroin on a trip to the city since he had been admitted to the program in Palo Alto. The doctors and nurses voted: came out. That could come when I was helping itself seriously.
Hoping to see more places as 4B2 Ward, in 1971 the Nixon Administration set aside $14 million to 13 more programs in place before year's end. The new Ward 4B2 of orientation programs; But 4B2 was, of course, much still his way feels to follow. It was unclear whether the combination of drugs and therapy could become independent truly an addict of both methadone - which is itself addictive - and heroin.
While today the doctors, psychologists and therapists have a firm understanding of mental health and substance abuse problems that made many of his colleagues at the time of Viet Nam, yet much more to address to ensure more productive, stable living for returning veterans. Sonny Martin and Dan Patterson were only two victims in a long line of men and women who suffered and continue to suffer a nightmare grab bag of debilitating emotional, physical and psychological problems after leaving the service. The United States Veterans Affairs Department recently reported a 44 percent increase in suicide rates between 18 to 29 years old male veterans between 2009 and 2011. Between 10 and 18 percent of the troops serving in Afghanistan and Iraq they returned with post traumatic stress, up to a quarter suffers from depression, and others engage in excessive use of alcohol and tobacco.
In this photo gallery, LIFE.com recalls very personal war so many that returned from Viet Nam - as well as internal conflicts plaguing veterans today in the wake of witnessing, direct and personal, unlimited capacity of humanity for brutality.
Thean Tara is a writer and graduate student in biological sciences at the University of Cambridge. Follow her on Twitter @tarathean.
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