Fort Hood forced soldiers to take part in 'mandatory fun days' to 'rebuild trust in the Army' after Vanessa Guillen's death and other suspicious disappearances
- Vanessa Guilen was murdered in April 2020 and over the coming months, another four people died and others went missing
- 13 soldiers killed themselves at Fort Hood in a single year
- In September, the Army launched 'Operation Phantom Action' to 'rebuild trust'
- But the soldiers viewed the effort more like 'mandatory fun days', according to Vanity Fair
- The Army said the days included 'in-depth counseling' in an October press release
Fort Hood made soldiers take part in a weeklong retreat that they considered to be 'mandatory fun days' after the murder of Vanessa Guillen and a series of other suspicious deaths on the Texas army base.
The idea was to rebuild trust between leaders and soldiers following a spate of disappearances, murders and suicides on the base last year.
It was called Operation Phantom Action. The army touted it as a way for them to repair broken bonds but according to a new Vanity Fair article about the sinister army base, soldiers viewed them as 'mandatory fun days'.
These are some of the images the army shared last year of 'Operation Phantom Action' which they said was designed to 'rebuild trust' after the deaths of several soldiers at Fort Hood
The weeklong set of exercises included 'in depth' counseling, according to the army
The Fort Hood soldiers viewed the days more like 'mandatory fun days' they were forced to take part in
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It's unclear what exactly the soldiers had to do as part of the retreat but in October 2020, the army blasted a press release about it.
'Operation Phantom Action kicked off here, Sept. 28, with the main goal being to restore trust between Soldiers and their leaders,' it said.
Command Sgt. Maj. Cliff Burgoyne Jr., III Corps and Fort Hood command sergeant major, said: 'Because we are really close to losing public trust, and our Army depends on the public being able to trust us.
Vanessa Guillen vanished April 2020 after reporting sexual harassment at the base
'Our Soldiers have to be able to trust us, and so everything is based on trust.
The point of the 'Operation' was to 'eradicate' what it called 'three corrosives' at Fort Hood - sexual assault and harassment, extremism and racism, and suicide.
Part of it included 'in-depth counseling'.
Guillen's murder was on April 22, 2020. Her remains were found scattered along a river in June.
Aaron David Robinson, who she'd complained to her family was harassing her, was accused of the murder in a federal complaint but he killed himself before ever going to trial.
In 2020, 39 Fort Hood soldiers died or went missing including 13 who killed themselves and five who were killed.
Some of the deaths remain unsolved and the victims' families largely blame the leadership at the army base for what happened to them.
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