When I came back from the Lebanon in 1983, I was put into the hospital at RAf Wroughton and then sent for rehab to just outside London. I was out of action for four months and did not receive any outside help.
It is remarkable how little is done for service personnel when they are injured. This has been going on since WW2 and before, and yet, everytime it appears in the news the general public are surprised!
I think it was because we had some extent become used to hearing about wounded personnel coming back. I spent time with a lot a chaps who had been wounded in Ireland. They too received treatment in a military hospital and then returned to their units. No one in particular gave us a second glance as we hobbled or wheeled our way to the pub! Or when we staggered back! We did receive sort of welfare visits from the WRVS and the Buffs, I later joined the Buffs after I left the mob.
I support the fund raising for the wounded by am disgusted by the penny pinching attitiude of the government. I suspect that they are trying to prove that the NHS can cope with all the wounded. the sad fact is that they would be better off in a military hospital surrounded with people who are service personnel and who can sympathise with what thwe wounded have gove through and can understand thier experiences.
