[All of that sounds... very messy, and some aspects of it are uncomfortably familiar. Athrun knows he'd been a poor mentor for Shinn, who had carried his own trauma and rage for too long, channeling it into battle for a needless war, rather than getting the help he'd needed. And was Athrun so different, years ago? He'd joined ZAFT to avenge the murder of his mother and the fall of Junius Seven, fought against friends due to blind loyalty... nearly killed Kira, and might've even killed Cagalli at one point, had something in him not hesitated.]

I'm not at all privy to your situation, so I'm sorry if this is ignorant of me. But were those who recruited him so desperate for whatever skills he had that they'd willfully ignore that he needed help?