During a press briefing on Thursday, Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll described his meeting with the families of five soldiers who were wounded during a shooting at Fort Stewart on Wednesday.
00:04You got a chance to meet with the families, and obviously we won't have that chance.
00:08You got a chance to meet with them, talk to them.
00:10You seem very proud of how everyone reacted.
00:13Can you tell us what that was like, meeting with the families?
00:16What state are they in right now?
00:17Share what the public was concerned about these folks who obviously didn't serve the charge.
00:21Brian is heartbreaking sitting in there and seeing their soldier, their daughter, sitting behind them struggling.
00:33Our hearts broke with them.
00:35We tried to hug them.
00:36We tried to convey from the President and the Vice President and the Secretary of Defense that our entire nation warrants with them.
00:43We stand behind them.
00:44It has been only a couple of hours for them.
00:47I think they are still processing through it.
00:48But what we wanted to convey is we will be here with them every single step of the way.
00:54The United States Army is committing every resource we need to to get these soldiers back into their formations as quickly as we possibly can.
01:03And then one of the things that we had said at the meeting earlier with the soldiers in this unit is General Lucas and I were reflecting on this in the car ride.
01:12These kind of moments, especially if you've deployed, you've got to see them more frequently.
01:16The trauma from them often doesn't hit for weeks or months on it.
01:21It doesn't come as quickly as you might think.
01:24And so what we try to encourage for all of our soldiers is to speak up, lean on each other, lean on your leadership, and we will provide the resources, the care, and the love that they need to recover.
01:35General, can you take that on the floor, too, real quick, just about what it was like to meet with those families as well?
01:39Yes, sir. Thank you for the question. It's heartbreaking. It's painful to see them struggling with a wounded family member.
01:48They expressed that they were incredibly proud of their soldier, as we are, and they asked for prayers.
01:55So we appreciate all the prayers that have been sent away, and we would ask you to keep them coming.
