Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs William Winkenwerder Jr. made the same claim:

“This news caught me — as it did many other people — completely by surprise,” he told the press.

Funny how if you work in government nobody ever tells you anything, no matter how high or how low on the totem pole you are.

Because not only did Salon publish those two articles, they specifically brought them to the attention of the good folks who run Walter Reed:

In early 2005, Salon brought to the attention of Walter Reed officials disturbing information based on interviews, medical records and other Army documents which showed that soldiers receiving outpatient treatment for mental wounds were suffering from a shocking pattern of neglect. At that time, Walter Reed officials refused to discuss Salon’s findings. Instead, they issued a statement saying it just wasn’t so: “We are satisfied that there is a very high level of patient satisfaction with their treatment,” the statement read.

In early 2006, Salon alerted Army and Walter Reed officials to a very similar set of concerns: Some soldiers with traumatic brain injuries were not being screened, identified or treated. They were falling through the cracks. The Army and the hospital declined to talk with Salon about those issues, this time citing privacy concerns of patients. “I cannot arrange an interview,” Lt. Col. Kevin V. Arata, an Army public affairs officer, wrote in an e-mail. In a separate written statement to Salon, Walter Reed said it had a good program to take care of brain injuries.