Bipolar General

My Forever War With Mental Illness

By MAJ GEN Gregg F. Martin, and Reviewed by John P. Ringquist

Article published on: September 1, 2025 in the Winter 2025 edition of Army History

Read Time: < 4 mins

Naval Institute Press, 2023
Pp. xi, 245. $27

Military forces demand soldiers and leaders that have inner fire and drive, the ability to generate enthusiasm, and an unquenchable desire to complete the mission. These same forces historically have viewed mental illness as a form of weakness or imperfection. This viewpoint has affected enlistment policies, security clearance checks, medical treatment access, and retention and has led to the ostracization of soldiers and their ultimate removal from military service. When soldiers—especially leaders—mask mental illness and the impact of trauma on their mental health, the outward appearance of vigor and energy may conceal the sort of “cycling” that persons with bipolar disorder experience. Those affected with bipolar disorder experience the manic highs and depressive lows that derive from their body’s brain chemistry and potential trauma-induced changes to it. The resulting behaviors can be mitigated through coping strategies, and as Maj. Gen. (Ret.) Gregg F. Martin has written in his book, Bipolar General: My Forever War with Mental Illness, when soldiers and leaders with bipolar disorder are able to mask their condition, they frequently are perceived as model soldiers and leaders. However, when the bipolar disorder overwhelms coping strategies or medications, those with bipolar disorder can be dangerous to themselves and their subordinates and can damage their careers.

General Martin served thirty-five years as an engineer in a career that included multiple overseas tours and appointments as the commander of the Corps of Engineers Northwest Division, commandant of the Engineer School, commander of Fort Leonard Wood, deputy commander of the Third U.S. Army, commandant of the Army War College, and president of the National Defense University. He is a highly educated professional with a doctorate and multiple master’s degrees. Despite these impressive achievements, Martin admits that his bipolar disorder, though diagnosed officially only at the end of his long and distinguished career, always has existed.

In Bipolar General, Martin provides an unflinching account of how combat trauma triggered the disorder, which then reordered his life. He chronicles a series of gradually intensifying incidents that typify Bipolar Disorder Type I, with manic highs and paranoia accompanied by crushing lows. The incidents that Martin cites are shocking in retrospect, and readers can take note of the signs that Martin gives of his bipolar disorder and the effects on his leadership, philosophy, and mental processes. Each stomach-churning incident illustrates Martin’s inability to recognize the potential impact of his actions and choices while under mania and the pernicious mental distortion of paranoia. His actions built upon themselves until the level of Martin’s mania, exceeding the ability of others to excuse his behaviors as eccentric or aggressive, moved into the realm of dangerous and transgressive. The culminating crash of his career—his actions and reactions to external events while serving as the president of National Defense University—and the subsequent official diagnosis of his bipolar disorder can give readers insight into how a senior leader’s mental illness can affect everyone around them to the significant detriment of their command.

Leaders of all ranks will be able to draw valuable lessons from Bipolar General’s Chapters 13 and 14, which focus on how treatment for mental illness is conducted and the general structure of mental health treatment regimens. One significant take-away should be an appreciation of how mental illness treatment requires more than medication. Martin’s major lifestyle changes and restructuring of coping mechanisms reflect a painful recognition that what worked while he was a soldier and leader, subjected to an untreated bipolar disorder, are no longer appropriate. He offers a valuable selection of resources and material for readers to explore for their own education and to help understand bipolar disorder’s effects. He advocates for the adoption of a 360-degree leader evaluation system and for a senior mentor system that can help determine if senior leaders have been impacted by detrimental behaviors or masking (219).

Bipolar disorder is not a voluntary condition; it is a biochemical one that combat or a similar trauma can trigger. Unlike visible wounds that immediately manifest, the biochemical imbalance can develop after the triggering event and manifest decades after. Martin recognizes this and cautions the reader that bipolar disorder never lets up; once diagnosed, treatment can never cease. Military members, their families, and those who have been diagnosed, as well as those that wish to help persons with mental illness will find much to consider in Bipolar General.