New play says warzone is at home

The trauma of war doesn’t stop when our soldiers come home. It’s a message delivered with brutal blows in the powerful new Griffin Theatre production Motortown.

Written by British playwright Simon Stephens during the 2005 London bombings, the play looks at Danny’s struggle to reconnect with society after returning from a tour of duty in Iraq. This is a country where everyone is out for themselves – small time arms dealers, paedophiles and anti-war protestors looking for a threesome with a burly soldier.

For Danny, the war zone has moved from Basra to a morally shady Britain, but violence is still the only solution.

Motortown director Ben Packer drew parallels with Australian troops, due home from Iraq in the middle of the year.

‘It looks at how we deal with the consequences of a war that a lot of Australians didn’t want to get involved in. Although many people marched against the Iraq war on one day, most of the time we carried on as if it was business as usual. It might feel like the war doesn’t affect our lives, but violence filters all the way back to the centre of our society and creates big difficulties,’ Packer said.

More than 120 Australian soldiers already returned from the Middle East have been discharged for mental illness. Many of them have serious psychological problems, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and at least two have taken their own lives.

According to Paul Copeland, President of the Australian Peacekeeper and Peacemaker Veterans’ Association (APPVA), the first six months home are a very stressful period of adjustment for returned veterans.

‘Many have suffered severe psycho-social stress from seeing the carnage of war, fearing for their lives or being attacked. A number of them turn to alcohol and in some case illicit drugs. Longer-term, PTSD can come on with warning many years down the track,’ he said.

Copeland served 19 years in the army, including UN operations in Cambodia, Tonga Vanuatu and Sinai. In 1993, he was medically evacuated from Cambodia. He narrowly saved his right leg but was never adequately debriefed.

‘I remember sitting in the pub with crutches and my leg in a pin getting very angry with people around me for having a good time when I was thinking of the war-torn country I’d come from and the misery I’d witnessed there,’ he said.

Despite responding well to psychological treatment, he was medically discharged from the army. He suffered a breakdown and took several years to get back on his feet.

They will no doubt see many more soldiers like Motortown’s Danny, and Copeland ‘ angry, alienated and in pain ‘ amongst the 500 plus returning from Iraq in a few months.

Motortown is playing at the Stables Theatre in Kings Cross from 16 February – 8 March.

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