Woodlands Villager - News
Ex-soldier battles Gulf War illness
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| Johnny Phillips, at right, has been battling symptoms of Gulf War Syndrome since shortly after he left Iraq and Kuwait in the early 1990s. On Nov. 17 a federal study was released acknowledging the illness affects more than a quarter of all soldiers that served in Operation Desert Storm. |
By JAKE MUONIO
A study released in November by the Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans’ Illnesses only confirmed a reality Johnny Phillips has been living with for years.
Phillips didn’t need the government’s official documentation to familiarize himself with Gulf War Illness, also known as Gulf War Syndrome. The 39-year-old, who is senior vice commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 12024 in Oak Ridge North, was diagnosed in 1994, long before the extent of the disease’s prevalence was known.
Today, the Conroe resident is on 100 percent medical disability. He suffers from a range of physical maladies that include intense headaches and back pain, and severe stomach and lung problems.
Some days he barely has the energy to get out of bed.
“Before I was able to be real active,” Phillips said. “I was a scuba diver, an outdoorist, a bicyclist.”
Report findings
Among the findings detailed in the Nov. 17 report, compiled by a congressionally-mandated committee that included numerous scientists and medical doctors, is that Gulf War Illness affects at least 25 percent of the 697,000 U.S. soldiers who served in the 1990-1991 Gulf War.
“This complex of multiple concurrent symptoms typically includes persistent memory and concentration problems, chronic headaches, widespread pain, gastrointestinal problems and other chronic abnormalities not explained by well-established diagnoses. No effective treatments have been identified for Gulf War Illness and studies indicate that few veterans have recovered over time,” the report said.
The report, which was conducted for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, cites several possible causes or contributing factors, including a pill troops took as protection against nerve agents and pesticides. Also common among GWI sufferers, according to the report, was exposure to depleted uranium, used in armor-piercing munitions fired at Iraqi tanks by A-10 Thunderbolt planes. A third key finding detailed nerve gas exposure, including from a storage facility that was bombed by the United States, as a potential culprit for GWI.
According to the report, most likely GWI was caused by a combination of factors.
“A renewed federal research commitment is needed to identify effective treatments for Gulf War illness and address other priority Gulf War health issues,” the report said. “Adequate funding is required to achieve the critical objectives of improving the health of Gulf War veterans and preventing similar problems in future deployments. This is a national obligation, made especially urgent by the many years that Gulf War veterans have waited for answers and assistance.”
Tour of duty
Phillips was among the first soldiers to enter Kuwait during Operation Desert Storm.
As a member of the U.S. Army’s First Special Forces, Phillips crossed into Kuwait on foot in October 1990, months before war was officially declared.
His unit marched through the smoke of burning oil wells, counting bodies in bombed out tanks and vehicles, on the way to the Kuwait City airport. There, they captured the Iraqi soldiers and secured the facility ahead of its bombing. The unit then took control of the airport before the U.S. advance into the country.
For Phillips, a sergeant first class, his tour of duty ended in April 1991. He was captured after a fight in Kuwait City in which all of the other soldiers in his squad were killed. Phillips was shot in the chest and suffered a stab wound to the back. After three days in captivity he was part of a prisoner exchange and was flown out of the country to a hospital in Germany. From there Phillips spent five years in and out hospitals.
His Gulf War Illness symptoms surfaced a couple years after he left Iraq.
At first he started coughing up blood and waking up to find small pools of blood on his pillow. Doctors attributed the problem to the gunshot wound. He eventually had to undergo surgery on his esophagus and later his stomach — having two-thirds of it removed.
By 1993 he had become so weak, strength and endurance wise, that he could no longer pass his physical training tests.
“Some say it was the depleted plutonium that the rounds were made from … or the oil fires (that caused GWI)... They say every breath we took (of the oil fire smoke) was like smoking a carton of cigarettes. That’s what it did to our lungs,” Phillips said.
A survivor
Phillips said he doesn’t know of any other soldiers with the U.S. Army First Division who are still alive.
“My squad all died over there, and pretty much the rest of them have died since we got back (from possible GWI-related causes or suicide),” he said.
Phillips says the pain he feels is as bad, although somewhat different, as the full-body burning sensation he experienced after being shot.
“Excruciating,” he said.
To this day, Phillips said his doctors differ in their opinion as to what is causing his medical issues.
A psychiatrist has attributed his symptoms to a medical condition, and a neurologist and other doctors have told him the pain is all in his head.
“They pretty much told me I was a lost cause,” said Phillips, who is on 13 medications for his various conditions.
Among those is post traumatic stress disorder, which first manifested itself while Phillips was working as a special forces trainer at Fort Irwin in California. His flashbacks got so bad that he was eventually committed to a psychiatric ward. Since then he has been committed for inpatient psychiatric care several times, Phillips said.
He still suffers from flashbacks, which can come sporadically and without warning.
“He has a lot of nightmares… where he’s trying to get to the soldiers in his sleep,” said Cheryl Phillips, Johnny’s sixth wife.
One time before the two moved to Conroe, Cheryl Phillips said, Johnny was having a flashback and walked out into the woods near their house. She found him hours later, with the help of the family dog, curled up and lying in a thicket.
Cheryl said the challenges Johnny faces have been difficult, and it took her a while to understand her husband.
“Before, I thought it was him being mean,” Cheryl Phillips said. “It was hard on me. We separated a couple times before I really got to know who he was.”
One place the couple, who celebrated their fourth wedding anniversary in October, have turned to for support is the VFW, Cheryl with the organization’s Auxiliary.
“It’s nice to be around people that understand, and that you don’t have to explain things to,” Phillips said. “Then you’re able to talk to somebody that knows when you need to.”
The report
The full report “Gulf War Illness and the Health of Gulf War Veterans” is available in PDF format online. To read the 465-page document, click here.
Phillips didn’t need the government’s official documentation to familiarize himself with Gulf War Illness, also known as Gulf War Syndrome. The 39-year-old, who is senior vice commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 12024 in Oak Ridge North, was diagnosed in 1994, long before the extent of the disease’s prevalence was known.
Today, the Conroe resident is on 100 percent medical disability. He suffers from a range of physical maladies that include intense headaches and back pain, and severe stomach and lung problems.
Some days he barely has the energy to get out of bed.
“Before I was able to be real active,” Phillips said. “I was a scuba diver, an outdoorist, a bicyclist.”
Report findings
Among the findings detailed in the Nov. 17 report, compiled by a congressionally-mandated committee that included numerous scientists and medical doctors, is that Gulf War Illness affects at least 25 percent of the 697,000 U.S. soldiers who served in the 1990-1991 Gulf War.
“This complex of multiple concurrent symptoms typically includes persistent memory and concentration problems, chronic headaches, widespread pain, gastrointestinal problems and other chronic abnormalities not explained by well-established diagnoses. No effective treatments have been identified for Gulf War Illness and studies indicate that few veterans have recovered over time,” the report said.
The report, which was conducted for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, cites several possible causes or contributing factors, including a pill troops took as protection against nerve agents and pesticides. Also common among GWI sufferers, according to the report, was exposure to depleted uranium, used in armor-piercing munitions fired at Iraqi tanks by A-10 Thunderbolt planes. A third key finding detailed nerve gas exposure, including from a storage facility that was bombed by the United States, as a potential culprit for GWI.
According to the report, most likely GWI was caused by a combination of factors.
“A renewed federal research commitment is needed to identify effective treatments for Gulf War illness and address other priority Gulf War health issues,” the report said. “Adequate funding is required to achieve the critical objectives of improving the health of Gulf War veterans and preventing similar problems in future deployments. This is a national obligation, made especially urgent by the many years that Gulf War veterans have waited for answers and assistance.”
Tour of duty
Phillips was among the first soldiers to enter Kuwait during Operation Desert Storm.
As a member of the U.S. Army’s First Special Forces, Phillips crossed into Kuwait on foot in October 1990, months before war was officially declared.
His unit marched through the smoke of burning oil wells, counting bodies in bombed out tanks and vehicles, on the way to the Kuwait City airport. There, they captured the Iraqi soldiers and secured the facility ahead of its bombing. The unit then took control of the airport before the U.S. advance into the country.
For Phillips, a sergeant first class, his tour of duty ended in April 1991. He was captured after a fight in Kuwait City in which all of the other soldiers in his squad were killed. Phillips was shot in the chest and suffered a stab wound to the back. After three days in captivity he was part of a prisoner exchange and was flown out of the country to a hospital in Germany. From there Phillips spent five years in and out hospitals.
His Gulf War Illness symptoms surfaced a couple years after he left Iraq.
At first he started coughing up blood and waking up to find small pools of blood on his pillow. Doctors attributed the problem to the gunshot wound. He eventually had to undergo surgery on his esophagus and later his stomach — having two-thirds of it removed.
By 1993 he had become so weak, strength and endurance wise, that he could no longer pass his physical training tests.
“Some say it was the depleted plutonium that the rounds were made from … or the oil fires (that caused GWI)... They say every breath we took (of the oil fire smoke) was like smoking a carton of cigarettes. That’s what it did to our lungs,” Phillips said.
A survivor
Phillips said he doesn’t know of any other soldiers with the U.S. Army First Division who are still alive.
“My squad all died over there, and pretty much the rest of them have died since we got back (from possible GWI-related causes or suicide),” he said.
Phillips says the pain he feels is as bad, although somewhat different, as the full-body burning sensation he experienced after being shot.
“Excruciating,” he said.
To this day, Phillips said his doctors differ in their opinion as to what is causing his medical issues.
A psychiatrist has attributed his symptoms to a medical condition, and a neurologist and other doctors have told him the pain is all in his head.
“They pretty much told me I was a lost cause,” said Phillips, who is on 13 medications for his various conditions.
Among those is post traumatic stress disorder, which first manifested itself while Phillips was working as a special forces trainer at Fort Irwin in California. His flashbacks got so bad that he was eventually committed to a psychiatric ward. Since then he has been committed for inpatient psychiatric care several times, Phillips said.
He still suffers from flashbacks, which can come sporadically and without warning.
“He has a lot of nightmares… where he’s trying to get to the soldiers in his sleep,” said Cheryl Phillips, Johnny’s sixth wife.
One time before the two moved to Conroe, Cheryl Phillips said, Johnny was having a flashback and walked out into the woods near their house. She found him hours later, with the help of the family dog, curled up and lying in a thicket.
Cheryl said the challenges Johnny faces have been difficult, and it took her a while to understand her husband.
“Before, I thought it was him being mean,” Cheryl Phillips said. “It was hard on me. We separated a couple times before I really got to know who he was.”
One place the couple, who celebrated their fourth wedding anniversary in October, have turned to for support is the VFW, Cheryl with the organization’s Auxiliary.
“It’s nice to be around people that understand, and that you don’t have to explain things to,” Phillips said. “Then you’re able to talk to somebody that knows when you need to.”
The report
The full report “Gulf War Illness and the Health of Gulf War Veterans” is available in PDF format online. To read the 465-page document, click here.
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