Bad news, it looks like: about 35 nurses from different branches of the service now working at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, DC, are being told they have 30 days to get their affairs in order.  Next stop, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, for about 5 weeks.  Then it’s on to Iraq.

The exact destination in Iraq is not stated, but they’re being assigned to field hospitals.  Whatever the destination, it’s serious enough that female nurses are getting buzz cuts. 

The 35 or so nurses being shipped out are the equivalent of one floor of round-the-clock shifts at Walter Reed, all of whom have heavy-duty experience in the shock trauma unit or the burns ward. All or most of them, in other words, are experienced in trauma. However, some are civilian nurses who joined the military for the steady job--and were guaranteed four years at Walter Reed--who still have most of that time left to serve. The need for nurses in the service is dire; a number of the nurses previously serving in Germany had their stints involuntarily extended and consequently decided not to re-up when their time to sign came back around.

Walter Reed Hospital

This group of nurses will arrive in Iraq around the beginning of May.

One immediate question is why. The optimistic view, if one could call it that, is that this relocation is a practical reorganization of medical personnel, sending nurses where they’re most needed. It seems a bit odd that they’re not being sent to Germany though, if so, since that’s where the state-of-the-art critical care facilities are.

The more sinister possibility is that this is one early warning sign of some new deviltry planned for Iraq by the White House. The quietness and abruptness of the move do not inspire confidence, though admittedly the quietness and abruptness could be a political response to a worsening combat situation that the White House will not acknowledge.

From any perspective, with our nurses going to Iraq, it is tragic that the military destroyed Iraqi hospital and medical facilities earlier.

If the administration had any desire to win hearts and minds, any desire whatsoever, one sure-fire way to do so would be healing the sick and injured, without regard to nationality – Iraqis, foreign workers and fighters, and “coalition” members, as well as U.S. troops.

But taking simple and lucid steps that might actually save American lives farther down the line seems not to be high among White House priorities. This whole global-war thing is the very reverse of “protecting and defending.”

[Update 2010: Army doctor Nidal Malik Hasan, alleged shooter in the Fort Hood killings, is among the physicians who worked at Walter Reed during this period. Hasan reportedly showed signs of stress and internal conflict over the U.S. mission in Afghanistan during his stint at Walter Reed.]