WhatsItLikeBeingACombatVeteranInTheUS?

I almost feel intrusive posting here because I am the furthest away from being a military/combat veteran as it is possible, in fact I‘m from a European Non-Nato country, so Combat Veterans are a very foreign concept to me and the society I live in.

This however makes me wonder, what is it like being a combat Veteran in the United States specifically? Does the government take care of you? Are the veteran programs effective? How does society treat Veterans who returned from GWOT tours? I‘ve only read stories about it but I would be really interested to hear it directly from people who have experienced it.

Additionally I would be really interested in why people joined the army back then that deploys their soldiers to active war zones and what they were expecting (I‘m not sure if this falls under the „do not solicit stories“ rule, if it does I apologize and feel free to ignore this question)

I‘m sorry for these probably very commonly asked questions, I would just very much like to understand this part of the military that we don‘t really have in my country