JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
At least six American service members have been killed in the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, and President Trump has suggested the conflict may continue for weeks, and he's not ruled out sending in ground troops. This uncertainty weighs on members of the military as well as their families. Kathy Roth-Douquet is the CEO of Blue Star Families, that's an organization that supports military families. She's here to tell us what she's hearing in her day-to-day work. Thanks for coming in.
KATHY ROTH-DOUQUET: Thanks so much for having me, Juana.
SUMMERS: Kathy, if you could, just start by telling us, what have you been hearing from families in this moment as there's so much uncertainty?
ROTH-DOUQUET: Well, we are hearing that the uncertainty is weighing on people and the distress of being a member of a military family during a time of war. Our military is young. They turn over frequently. Most of our military hasn't experienced wartime deployment. So people are addressing this for the first time. It's scary for the spouses. It's scary for the kids. It's scary for the moms and dads whose young service members are out there right now.
SUMMERS: I mentioned that this war has already claimed American lives, and President Trump has said that there will likely be more casualties. Kathy, how do you talk to families about that reality, and what kind of resources can you offer them?
ROTH-DOUQUET: We are talking to families because a large number of people are affected. We have between 50- and 60,000 U.S. service members deployed to that area. We have 20 ships. It's 40% of our naval fleet is over there. So our military writ large is feeling this deployment. So we're supporting them with a number of programs. We have a mentorship program to get new military spouses, for whom this might be their first combat deployment, connected to more senior spouses to get that sense of, here's how you manage this, here's how you go through it. But we also have mental health resources. We have financial services resources. Our military do not live on installations, by and large. They're in our communities, 70 to 80%. Our National Guard and reserve are deployed. The service members we lost were reservists...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
ROTH-DOUQUET: ...From Iowa. So even if you think you don't have military in your neighborhood, you, in fact, may have them there. So asking the question, is anyone here military connected, and if they are, how can we create fellowship for you? Those kinds of things makes - make a real difference.
SUMMERS: I mean, there's a mental health component to this conversation, but there's also a very concrete financial component. When military members are deployed or otherwise sent away from home, what are some of the financial challenges that that can create for a family?
ROTH-DOUQUET: People are sharing that with us. We've heard from some of our members that they've had to quit their jobs because suddenly the requirements for the child care, because there's been a short-term deployment, are such that they can't make it...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
ROTH-DOUQUET: ...To work. We're also finding that for some of the people who are living on installations - they can't, at the moment, get the access to day care centers or to some schooling because of the heightened security that's affecting the ability for people to come onto base to work, and that's spiraling.
SUMMERS: From a policy standpoint, are there policies in place - federal policies that you would like to see to better support military families in this country?
ROTH-DOUQUET: The No. 1 things military families are saying they need help with right now is child care, and this is a real cascading problem because everything shuts down when you can't take care of your children. Certainly, we need support around deployment support. If you're in a theater of conflict, you get some extra pay, but some people who are deployed aren't considered to be in that theater of conflict, and the family's still experiencing that challenge.
SUMMERS: When the U.S. goes to war, you often hear politicians across the political spectrum who encourage people in this country to support the troops. But I do wonder, how does that phrase land for you? What does it mean to support the troops in a moment like this, or what should it mean?
ROTH-DOUQUET: It doesn't mean being for or against the war. Any civilian is allowed to have any opinion they want to, and we want them to. But the service member is there to serve. The nation decides what they do. The service member follows the nation's bidding. What we need in return is to have the support at home so that we know that the military family is going to thrive even while we're in the midst of these challenging times.
SUMMERS: I know, Kathy, that you've been doing this work for quite a long time and that your own husband is retired military. You also mentioned the relative age of our military, the fact that we're talking about young men, young women, young families. When you're talking with one of these folks, what's the piece of advice that comes to mind that you give them? What do those conversations sound like?
ROTH-DOUQUET: Well, this brings back a lot of memories for me. I remember being pregnant, sitting on my couch, holding my 3-year-old - listening on NPR, in fact - while my husband invaded Iraq, wearing a biological chemical weapons suit, and expecting him to be under attack and feeling so very vulnerable to losing him and to my children losing their father. And it was really scary and really sad. And I was alone. I was far from family and friends. One of the reasons I started Blue Star Families was that so military families didn't have to feel that way anymore.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
ROTH-DOUQUET: Let's let you know that we know that you're going through something difficult in a difficult time, and we appreciate that you're doing it, as well as the more, you know, specific resources that Blue Star Families provides in terms of financial support, mental health support and those kinds of programs.
SUMMERS: Kathy Roth-Douquet, CEO of Blue Star Families. Thanks so much.
ROTH-DOUQUET: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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