Treatment for PTSD and Traumatic Brain Injuries With Amazing Results

I recently took my 15-year-old grandson, who is autistic, to the Brain Treatment Center in Newport Beach, California. After five treatments, he is dressing himself for school and putting his pajamas on for bed. He has never been able to do this before. He is going back for further treatment in early March. While I was there, they found out I was a combat veteran of the Vietnam War and asked if I wanted to receive treatment. I have had sleep problems for over 30 years, and my ears have had tinnitus from the Battle of Tet in 1968 when the battleship New Jersey fired 16-inch rounds up within 50 meters of my squad. After one treatment, the tinnitus in my right ear disappeared. I have been sleeping between 7 and 9 hours a night, for the first time in many years. I have had a total of nine treatments, along two Electroencephalography (EEG), which measured voltage fluctuations resulting from ionic current flows within the neurons of my brain.  

Please understand, the BTC does not employ me, nor do I have a financial interest in the company. I'm just so blown away by the technology that I've seen that I am compelled to spread the word. This is not a new technology. Using an innovation called quantitative EEG and topographical brain imagery developed by Dr. Yi Jin's 35 years of research, they pursue therapy without drugs, talk therapy, or behavioral coping mechanisms. They directly address the underlying causative neurology dysfunctions that result in PTSD using MRT (magnetic resonance therapy). Veterans experience significant improvement within weeks of starting treatment - their outlook changes, hope, vitality, and energy return. They not only feel better, but many return to employment and become re-engaged with their families and communities.  

Here is a snapshot of the results out of the 36 PTSD / TBI veterans in their initial study:
1.    All 36 had anger issues and rage problems while driving before treatment. None do after two weeks of MRT treatment (most after 1st week).
2.    Seventeen carried weapons (knives, handguns, Tasers, etc.). None do after two weeks of MRT treatment.
3.    Twenty-nine started with tinnitus (ringing of the ear), only one still has tinnitus.
4.    Twenty-two started with severe alcohol and substance abuse. None have issues with alcohol or substance abuse after two weeks of MRT treatment.

Jon Warren is one of the 36 PTSD veterans in the study. Los Angeles Times did an extensive write up about his experience in a story entitled "Healing Sgt. Warren," which details a hellish day in Iraq as he watched his friend burn and his many months of anxiety, dread, and guilt that followed him home from war.
http://graphics.latimes.com/healing-jonathan-warren/

BTC now has over 110 PTSD and TBI veterans that have gone through the MRT program with 100% success in reducing the majority of their symptoms. They currently employ seven of the Veterans they have treated with MRT, and those veterans now treat other veterans. They have also helped over 160 family members of veterans, all free of charge.  

At this time, they are conducting a Double-Blind PTSD study (MRT-002) in Del Mar, CA, and are accepting veterans that meet the inclusion criteria for the study. Some more good news is that BTC does not charge veterans any money for the treatments. They vow to keep it that way, no matter how many veterans they treat. Their business plan is to partner with the VA to become an outsourced resource for treating PTSD.

I am also helping to coordinate putting a treatment center at Tinker AFB in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.  

Please go to the BTC website for more information: http://www.braintreatmentcenter.com/.

Doug Warden served in Vietnam with Company C, 1st BN (Airborne), 12th Cavalry, 1st Cavalry Division, May 1967 - May 1968, as well as the 1st Special Forces Group (Airborne), Okinawa, 1970 - 1972. He was medically disabled following a parachute training exercise. He is currently Vice President of 12th Cavalry Regiment Association and author of the book "Boy Sergeant."

Profiles in Courage: Veteran of Three Wars Under Three Flags

Lauri Allan Torni, later known as Larry Thorne, spent the majority of his life-fighting communists. First, the Soviets while in the service of Finland and Germany during World War II and then the Vietcong and North Vietnamese as a U.S. Army Special Forces officer during the Vietnam War.

Lauri Torni was born in Finland, the son of a sea captain, in 1919. He enlisted in the Finnish Army at the age of 18 and was near the completion of his enlistment when the Soviet Union attacked Finland in late 1939. With his service suddenly extended as part of Finland's mass mobilization of troops, Torni was transferred to the front line, where he began a reputation as a determined fighter and strong leader. His heroism fighting the Red Army in what became known as the Winter War quickly caught the attention of his commanders resulting in commissioning as an officer. The Winter War ended with the Moscow Peace Treaty in March 1940.

In 1941, when Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, Finland had little option but to agree to an informal alliance with Nazi Germany against their mutual enemy. Torni went to Germany to briefly train with the Waffen-SS. On his return to Finland, he cemented his heroic reputation in the Continuation War against the Soviets, in command of an infantry unit which came to bear his name - Detachment Torni. The unit was admired and feared by both sides for its exploits deep behind enemy lines.

As the legendary leader of one of the most elite companies in the Finnish Army, one of the best armies of World War II, Thorne carried a price on his head, dead or alive, from the Red Army, reputedly the only Finnish soldier so singled out. The bounty was 3 million Finnish Marks or $700,000. He was also decorated with the Mannerheim Cross, Finland's most esteemed gallantry award, and equivalent to our Medal of Honor.

The Continuation War ended in September 1944 with the signing of the Moscow Armistice between Finland and the Soviet Union. The conditions for peace required Finland to cede territory to the Soviets, legalize the Communist Party of Finland, and drive German troops from Finnish territory, which lead to the Lapland War 1944 - 45.

So dissatisfied was Torni with the peace terms, and thus driven by the adventure of war, he joined a Finnish resistance movement orchestrated by the Germans with the aim of staging a Nazi coup d'etat in Finland. As a volunteer with the Waffen-SS, Torni received training in Germany in the art of sabotage and was there as World War II drew to a close. He surrendered to British troops but eventually escaped a POW camp to return to Finland, where he was arrested by the State Police. He was sentenced to six years in prison for treason for having joined the German Army but was pardoned by the Finnish President at the end of 1948.

Rather than live under constant suspicion in Finland, Torni escaped across the border to Sweden in 1949, then later traveled under an alias as a Swedish seaman aboard a ship bound for Venezuela. From there, he joined a Swedish cargo ship bound for the United States. 

While in the Gulf of Mexico, off the coast of Alabama, he jumped overboard and swam ashore. He made his way to New York City, where he was helped by the Finnish-American community in Brooklyn, finding work as a carpenter.

In 1953 Torni was granted a residence permit with the assistance of "Wild Bill" Donovan, the former head of the Office of Strategic Services - the U.S.'s wartime intelligence agency. Torni joined the U.S. Army in 1954 and adopted the name, Larry Thorne.

Thorne was befriended by a group of Finnish-American officers, who had similarly fought with distinction in Finland's war against the Soviets and had later immigrated to the U.S. Several were brought into the U.S. Special Forces when they formed in 1952, and Private Thorne soon followed them. 

He became an instructor in skiing, survival, mountaineering, and guerrilla tactics. After attending Airborne School, he quickly advanced in rank and was commissioned as an officer in 1957.

From 1958 to 1962, he served with the 10th Special Forces Group Bad Tolz, Germany. While there, he was detached to the Zagros Mountains of Iran as the second in command of a search and rescue mission, which earned him a notable reputation.

Deploying to South Vietnam in November 1963 to support South Vietnamese forces in the Vietnam War,

 Thorne and Special Forces Detachment A-734 were stationed in the Tinh Bien District and assigned to operate Civilian Irregular Defense Group (CIDG) encampments at Chau Lang and later Tinh Bien.

During a fierce attack on the CIDG camp in Tinh Bien, he received two Purple Hearts and a Bronze Star Medal for valor during the battle. This attack would later be described by author Robin Moore in his book "The Green Berets."

Thorne's second tour in Vietnam began in February 1965 with 5th Special Forces Group; he then transferred to Military Assistance Command, Vietnam - Studies and Observations Group (MACV-SOG), a classified U.S. special operations unit focusing on unconventional warfare in Vietnam, as a military advisor.

On October 18, 1965, he was supervising a clandestine mission during which his Vietnam Air Force CH-34 helicopter crashed in a mountainous area of Phuoc Son District, Quang Nam Province, Vietnam, 25 miles (40 km) from Da Nang. Rescue teams were unable to locate the crash site. Shortly after his disappearance, Thorne was promoted to the rank of major. 

Thorne/Torni was revered by all the men who served under him. The fact that his remains were undiscovered in the years that followed added to his cult-like status and many veterans who met annually to raise a toast to him, both in Finland and America, believed he was still alive.

In 1999, Thorne's remains were found by a Finnish and Joint Task Force-Full Accounting team excavated a helicopter crash site near Thorn's last suspected location. They recovered several fragments of bones and a Swedish-made machine pistol that Thorne carried with him. The remains were sent to the United States following a Hanoi Noi Bai International Airport ceremony that included Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Ambassador Pete Peterson.

Forensic and DNA tests eventually concluded that the remains were his and were buried on June 26, 2003, at Arlington National Cemetery, section 60, tombstone 8136, along with the Vietnam casualties of the mission recovered at the crash site.

Kate Smith Introduces God Bless America

Frank Sinatra considered Kate Smith the best singer of her time and said that when he and a million other guys first heard her sing "God Bless America" on the radio, they all pretended to have dust in their eyes as they wiped away a tear or two. 

The link at the bottom will take you to a video showing the very first public singing of "GOD BLESS AMERICA." But before you watch it, you should also know the story behind the first public showing of the song. 

The time was 1940. America was still in a terrible economic depression. Hitler was taking over Europe, and Americans were afraid we'd have to go to war. It was a time of hardship and worry for most Americans. 

This was the era just before TV when radio shows were huge, and American families sat around their radios in the evenings, listening to their favorite entertainers. No entertainer of that era was more significant than Kate Smith. 

Kate was also large; plus size, as we now say, and the popular phrase still used today is in deference to her, "It ain't over till the fat lady sings." Kate Smith might not have made it big in the age of TV, but with her voice coming over the radio, she was the biggest star of her time. 

Kate was also patriotic. It hurt her to see Americans so depressed and afraid of what the next day would bring. She had hope for America and faith in her fellow Americans. She wanted to do something to cheer them up, so she went to the famous American song-writer, Irving Berlin (who also wrote 
"White Christmas") and asked him to write a song that would make Americans feel good again about their country. When she described what she was looking for, he said he had just the song for her.  

He went to his files and found a song that he had written 22 years before - way back in 1917, but it was never published. He gave it to her, and she worked on it with her studio orchestra. She and Irving Berlin were not sure how the public would receive the song, but both agreed they would not take any profits from God Bless America. Any profits would go to the Boy Scouts of America. Over the years, the Boy Scouts have received millions of dollars in royalties from this song. 

This video starts with Kate Smith coming into the radio studio with the orchestra and an audience. She introduces the new song for the very first time and starts singing. After the first couple of verses, with her voice in the background still singing, scenes are shown from the 1940 movie, "You're In The Army Now." At the 4:20 mark of the video, you see a young actor sitting in an office, reading the entertainment newspaper Variety is none other than Ronald Reagan. 

To this day, God Bless America stirs our patriotic feelings and pride in our country. Back in 1940, when Kate Smith went looking for a song to raise the spirits of her fellow Americans, I doubt whether she realized just how successful the results would be for her fellow Americans during those years of hardship and worry, and for many generations of Americans to follow. 

Now that you know the story of the song, we hope you'll enjoy it and treasure it even more. On, by the way, most people don't know there was a lead into the song since it usually starts with "God Bless America ....." So here's the entire song as sung initially.....enjoy! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnQDW-NMaRs

Battlefield Chronicles: The Wereth 11 - Murder in the Ardennes

In the early hours of December 16, 1944, Adolf Hitler's army launched a massive surprise attack on Allied lines across the frozen, forested landscape of Belgium. Caught off-guard, the Americans fell back into defensive positions. For a few desperate days before Christmas, the outcome of the war in Europe hung in the balance.  

Desperate battles to stem the German advance were fought at St.-Vith, Elsenborn Ridge, Houffalize, and Bastogne. As the Germans drove deeper into the Ardennes in an attempt to secure vital bridgeheads, the Allied line took on the appearance of a large bulge, giving rise to the battle's name: Battle of the Bulge.

The brutality rivaled that of the Eastern Front; no quarter was given. Incidents like the Malmedy Massacre became well-known. On the afternoon of December 17, 1944, over 80 GIs who had been taken prisoner were gunned down by men of the 1st SS Panzer Division. Some escaped to spread the story, which led to a steely resolve on the part of American troops. 

But later that night, another massacre occurred that received little attention during or after the war.

Shortly after the outbreak of Hitler's Ardennes Offensive, members of the all-black 333rd Artillery Battalion were just eleven miles behind the front lines. With the rapid advance of the Germans, the 333rd was ordered to withdraw further west. Still, two batteries, Charlie and Service Battery, were ordered to stay behind to give covering fire to the 106th Infantry Division. 

On December 17th, the 333rd were overrun with most killed or captured. The remnants of the unit were ordered to Bastogne and incorporated into its sister unit, the 969th Field Artillery Battalion. Both units provided fire support for the 101st Airborne Division in the Siege of Bastogne, subsequently being awarded the Presidential Unit Citation.

Eleven soldiers, however, from the 333rd, were separated from the unit shortly after they were overrun by the Germans. These men wound up in the little Belgian hamlet of Wereth, just 25 kilometers southwest of Malmedy, Belgium, site of another much more well-known WWII atrocity.

At about 3 pm on December 16, 1944, the 11 men approached the first house in the nine-house hamlet of Wereth, owned by Mathius Langer. A friend of the Langer's was also present. 

The men were cold, hungry, and exhausted after walking cross-country through the deep snow. They had two rifles between them. The Langer family welcomed them and gave them food. But this small part of Belgium did not necessarily welcome Americans as "Liberators." This area had been part of Germany before the First World War, and many of its citizens still saw themselves as Germans and not Belgians. 

Word leaked out from a Nazi sympathizer in the area that the men had been sheltered and were hiding in the Langer home. When the SS troops approached the house about 4 pm that day, the eleven Americans surrendered quickly, without resistance. The Americans were made to sit on the road, in the cold, until dark. The Germans then marched them down the road, and gunfire was heard in the night. 

In the morning, villagers saw the bodies of the men in a ditch at the corner of a cow pasture. Because they were afraid that the Germans might return, they did not touch the dead soldiers. The snow-covered the bodies, and they remained entombed in the snow until January when villagers directed members of the 99th Division's I&R platoon to the site. 

In the official US Army report, it was revealed that the men had been brutalized, with broken legs, bayonet wounds to the head, and fingers cut off. It was apparent that one man was killed as he tried to bandage a comrade's wounds.

In 2001, three Belgium citizens embarked on the task of creating a fitting memorial to these men and additionally to honor all Black GIs of World War II. With the help of Norman Lichtenfeld, whose father fought and was captured in the Battle of the Bulge, a grassroots publicity and fund-raising endeavor was begun. The land was purchased, and a fitting memorial was created. There are now road signs indicating the location of the memorial, and the ​​​Belgium Tourist Bureau lists it in the 60th Anniversary "Battle of the Bulge" brochures. The dedication of the memorial was held in 2004 in an impressive military ceremony. 

It is believed that this is the only memorial to Black G.I.s and their units of World War II in Europe. Norman's goal is to make the Wereth 11 and all Black G.I.s "visible" to all Americans and to history. They, like so many others, paid the ultimate price for our freedom. 

Please visit his site where you can learn more about this dark and virtually unknown chapter from WWII. http://www.wereth.org/en/home

Military Myths and Legends: Civil War's Only Woman Doctor

Mary Edwards Walker, was an American feminist, abolitionist, prohibitionist, alleged spy, prisoner of war and surgeon. She is also the only woman ever to receive the Medal of Honor.

Prior to the American Civil War, she earned her medical degree, married, and started a medical practice. The practice didn't do well, and at the outbreak of the War Between the States, she volunteered with the Union Army as a surgeon. Despite her training, however, she initially had to work as a nurse. At the time Union Army Examining Board felt women and sectarian physicians were considered unfit as surgeons. Proving her skills as a physician, she eventually became the Army's first female surgeon while serving with the 52nd Ohio Infantry.

Known to cross enemy lines in order to treat civilians, she may have been serving as a spy when Confederate troops captured her in the summer of 1864 and sent to Castle Thunder, a converted tobacco warehouse for political prisoners near Richmond, Virginia. Four months later, she was released as part of a prisoner exchange and returned to duty.

After the war, Walker was recommended for the Medal of Honor by Generals William Tecumseh Sherman and George Henry Thomas. On November 11, 1865, President Andrew Johnson signed a bill to present her the medal, making her the only woman to date to receive the decoration. 

In 1917, the U.S. Congress created a pension act for Medal of Honor recipients and, in doing so, created separate Army and Navy Medal of Honor Rolls. Only the Army decided to review eligibility for inclusion on the Army Medal of Honor Roll, resulting in the revocation of the award of 911 non-combatants, including those of Dr. Mary Edwards Walker and William F. "Buffalo Bill" Cody. None of the 911 recipients were ordered to return their medals. However, on the question of whether the recipients could continue to wear their medals, the Judge Advocate General advised the Medal of Honor Board that there was no obligation on the Army to police the matter. Dr. Walker continued to wear her medal until her death two years later in 1919.

Walker felt like she was awarded the Medal of Honor because she went into enemy territory to care for the suffering inhabitants when no man had the courage to respond in fear of being imprisoned. 

She had no such fear, resulting in her doing what her calling was, which was becoming a doctor. 

An Army board restored Walker's Medal of Honor in 1977, praising her "distinguished gallantry, self-sacrifice, patriotism, dedication and unflinching loyalty to her country, despite the apparent discrimination because of her sex." She was one of six people to regain their awards that had been stripped from them in 1917.

Walker herself was a center of controversy throughout most of her life. Early on, she was a strong advocate for women's rights and dress reform. She later resorted to dressing in men's clothing, a practice that got her arrested several times. 

Dr. Walker was born, raised, and died in Oswego, N.Y. at the age of 86 on February 21, 1919. A statue of her was unveiled in Oswego Town Hall in May 2012.

FACT:  Contrary to popular belief, the official title of the highest U.S. military distinction is simply the Medal of Honor, not the Congressional Medal of Honor. The confusion may have arisen because the president presents the award "in the name of Congress." There is, however, a Congressional Medal of Honor Society, which represents recipients of the Medal of Honor, maintains their records and organizes reunion events, among other responsibilities.