Grinker discusses 'the relationship between states of fatigue and war neuroses' and finds the good formulations: 'Emotional or psychological stress fatigues the soldier's resisting powers against neurotic reaction', and, 'An important symptom of war neuroses is a state of fatigue'.

'Every person, no matter how strong he may be, will develop a war neurosis if the stress that impinges upon him reaches his personal threshold.' Those persons, however, who break down first are weakened in their power of resistance by latent neurotic conflicts rooted in their childhood. Grinker discusses especially the regression to passive-dependent patterns of behavior—called by him 'the syndrome of ego depletion'. His ideas are in full accord with Freud's concept of traumatic neuroses.