cover image A War of Nerves: Soldiers and Psychiatrists in the Twentieth Century

A War of Nerves: Soldiers and Psychiatrists in the Twentieth Century

Ben Shephard, Benjamin Heim Shepard. Harvard University Press, $27.95 (512pp) ISBN 978-0-674-00592-1

Psychiatrists were brought into war, independent historian and The World at War producer Shephard argues, because they seemed to be able to alleviate its mental traumas in ways both the military and civilian communities considered necessary. With a focus limited essentially to the British and U.S. experiences, with some references to German and French practices (and nothing at all about the Soviet Union), much of Shephard's text presents the personal and professional rivalries among individuals and movements firmly convinced of the validity of their particular patterns of treatment. Of greater significance, however, is Shephard's idea that modern military psychology can be thought of as an argument between ""dramatists,"" concerned with defining and analyzing traumas and symptoms, and ""realists,"" concerned with returning men not only to combat but to life. Since 1945, especially since Vietnam, according to Shephard, the ""dramatists"" have dominated, resulting in acceptance of a model of post-traumatic stress that assumes perpetual crisis and perpetual therapy. Shephard argues that, in at least one well-documented case, counseling professionals have perpetuated trauma-induced dysfunction by encouraging preoccupation with the trauma. In contrast, Shephard emphasizes the importance of social and cultural, as opposed to medical, responses to war stress: immediate local help, given by those who understand concepts of military group bonding, is crucial, underpinned by leadership and comradeship, dissociation and displacement; so are sex and memories of sex and ""above all, singing, humor, and alcohol."" Far from being placebos, he says, such defenses help contextualize traumatic situations by reasserting nontraumatic norms, even in combat. It is an argument currently unfashionable, but meriting correspondingly wide circulation and discussion. (Apr.)