European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - April 14, 2007, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Saturday april 142007 stars and stripes pages study shows military divorce up by Pauline Jelinek the associated press Washington divorce in the nations military was no higher after four years of War than it was in peacetime a decade earlier de spite the stress of Long and repeated Tours of duty a yearlong study by Rand corp says divorces Rose from 25 percent of military marriages in 2001 to 3 percent in 2005 but that is still Short of a previous Pentagon theory that marriage breakups had been soaring due to the Strain of fighting the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan Lead researcher Benjamin Karney said thursday he cautioned that the review of service records could not foresee whether More divorces will occur in years after troops leave the service and he also said the yearlong study on Tan relies under stress did not look at other possible consequences either current or future such As increases in alcoholism or the toll on orphaned or emotionally stressed Chil Dren of troops the future is Uncertain the full Impact of these conflicts on military families May not be known for years Karney said but in the Short term we can say that we Are not seeing what everyone thought we were going to see on the subject of divorces he said the study came out a Day after the Penta gon said it was extending the Tours of All a Tiv duty soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan about 100000 15 months from the current one year that was the latest in a series of extended deployments and repeated callus of Reserve units that have strained the army and its troops Over More than five years of warfare defense department officials in 2005 had announced a huge jump in the divorce rate saying cases doubled from 5658 to 10477 be tween 2001 and 2004 among Active duty army officers and enlisted personnel some officials surmised it was partly due to stresses of deployments and the department asked Rand to study it Rands National defense research Institute a federally funded research and develop ment Center sponsored by the Pentagon found in the new study that after declining from 1996 to 2000 divorces Rose gradually in the following years divorce separation and annulments across All branches of service Rose to 3 percent of military marriages in 2005 the same As in 1996 when soldiers did not routinely face the Battlefield deployments that Are common today Rand said in a state ment theres no comparable system for tracking the National or civilian divorce rate though the centers for disease control said in 2005 that 43 percent of All first marriages end in divorce within 10 years everyone is saying that they Are very very stressed but the genuine stress int necessarily leading to elevations in divorce Karney said the study Analysed personnel records for some 6 million men and women who served in the military the five years before the sept 11 2001 terrorist attacks on american soil and the five years after researchers also looked separately at just those who had deployed As Well As previous studies on military marriages finding that troops who had been deployed longer had a lower risk of divorce that s very unexpected Karney said add ing that he  explain it military divorce the divorce rate among military families has slightly increased since the Start of operations in Afghanistan and Iraq according to a new study divorce rates among enlisted in Active duty service 9 enlisted female enlisted male 3 28 fy96 98 00 02 0405 source Rand National defense research Institute of nato Soldier killed two wounded in afghan fight the associated press Kabul said a firefight in the South Fri Day killed one of its soldiers and wounded two others a British Soldier from the 1st battalion the Royal Anglian regi ment was killed and the two wounded troops were hospitalized and their condition was not serious nato said Helmand is the focus of counterinsurgency operations by for eign troops the Natoley International be major 4tffi admission free parking full catering purity assistance Force is engaged in operation Achilles launched last month to Tants from the Northern tip of the opium producing province most of the nato troops in the South which also includes the former Taliban stronghold of Kan Dahar Are British or Canadian a series of bomb and gun at tacks have killed 11 nato sol Diers since last weekend despite Superior firepower and support from the strained afghan army Roadside bombs struck two nato convoys in the East thurs Day killing two soldiers another nato Soldier was wounded most Alliance soldiers in the East Are american a bomb in the South wednes Day killed two Canadian soldiers and wounded three others another six canadians died in a single bomb attack on their Convoy on sunday the worst combat loss for the Alliance this year fighting is also going on in Zabul a province on the Paki Stani Border where officials re ported 35 suspected militants killed in an airstrike called by used troops on thursday also on thursday us and afghan troops rescued five civilian Nelson fairs Tel 01263 711994 la  country fair hours of operation 13 april 1400 14 april 11001900 15 april 11001600 open to us id card holders 13 a pro at Leoo directions from a7 off at exit 107 8470 toward bad Windheim Iffe Neim is 6 Miles from autobahn nurn8erg Blue 6300 412th iiangm1 Stork Barracks contractors pinned Down by Small arms fire from insurgents in Central Afghanistan after their helicopter made an emergency Landing due to mechanical fail ure the used coalition said the helicopter sent a distress Call and landed near the Village of Malehe Ghafur in Ghazi prov Ince before troops including us special forces came to the res Cue the statement said a coalition aircraft attacked the militants killing three it said the contractors were evacuated to a nearby coalition base where they were treated for minor injuries the statement said Gates troops May fill nato training spots the associated press Quebec wants about 3400 More trainers for the Afghanistan army and police and the us May fill some of those jobs despite difficulties finding Avail Able troops defense Secretary Robert Gates said thursday the United states probably would be responsible for fewer than 1000 of the training spots while us officials Hope Europe an nations will provide the rest we would like to try and fill some of them but quite frankly were having trouble identifying troops Gates said speaking to re porters on the plane returning to Washington from meeting with Al lies on the Afghanistan War Effort we can fill some of them but we dont have the ability right now to fill All of them Gates said the us troops would come from new forces that would be deployed to Afghanistan he said part of the problem is that Many of the trainers Are National guard forces and we have a hard time identifying who would go