Op-Ed in Anchorage Paper Reveals Suicide of Eskimo Who Served in Iraq

By: Greg Mitchell For nearly five years, E&P has tracked the growing number of suicides among U.S. military personnel in Iraq and after they return home. The deaths are usually branded as simply from "nonhostile" causes by the Pentagon, and the real news often emerges only from local newspapers. It has happened again, via an opinion piece in the Anchorage Daily News.

There, Soren Wuerth tells the story of a friend named Merlin, who had graduated from the village school where Wuerth teaches. Merlin had returned to the school, where he had run cross country, to talk about joining the Army and surviving basic training.

After he left the village, "I wondered if Merlin would return home," Wuerth writes. "He was the first Cup'ik Eskimo to go to Iraq with the Army....While some in the school flaunted students who, like Merlin, join the military, I was concerned -- a naive young man entering what I knew to be a horrifying, ignoble and illegal war.

"I wrote Merlin's e-mail address on the board and encouraged students to correspond regularly. The last time a senior left his village, to attend college on a full-ride scholarship, he was back after six months -- homesick.

"I fell out of contact with Merlin. An e-mail in February went unreturned. Two weeks ago, I got a call from a friend in the village. Merlin was dead.

"After his first tour in Iraq, Merlin only hinted that he'd seen a lot of things. Due to report back, he decided to stay in Chevak. With the threat of repercussions from his AWOL looming, Merlin committed suicide."

An online search turns up that Wuerth first wrote about Merlin (and much of this background information) for an online site more than two years ago, expressing fears for his future then.

Now Wuerth recalls that the last time he saw Merlin was at a community dance, and he told the younger soldier to stay safe. "I worried the war would kill him," Wuerth concludes. "I just never thought it would kill him at home."
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Greg Mitchell's new book has several chapters on vet suicides and related issues. It is So Wrong for So Long: How the Press, the Pundits -- and the President -- Failed on Iraq.