The event was blacked out to the press.
Hanks came back just shy of the 30-day mark, when he would have become eligible for a desertion charge. With an otherwise unblemished military career, he now faces a possible court martial and jail time.
Diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder since his return from a tour in Iraq in 2008, Hanks, whose 101st Airborne Division has been repeatedly deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, is one of thousands of traumatized American soldiers facing redeployment.
He tried to seek treatment at Fort Campbell last month during his mid-tour leave from Afghanistan, and when his commanders ordered him back to Afghanistan, he went home to North Carolina.
In Iraq in 2008, Hanks' vehicle was struck by an improvised explosive device, and he saw the aftermath of a car bomb outside his base in Balad in which many Iraqi civilians, including a young girl, were injured. He thought about going into treatment when he got back from Iraq, but feared becoming an outcast, ridiculed by his fellow soldiers.
Redeployed to Afghanistan, Hanks had a panic attack at the airport so severe that he had to be treated in the local emergency room.
He returned to Fort Campbell to get mental health treatment, but was told instead to get marriage counseling when he returned to the States and ordered back to Afghanistan.
He sees his redeployment being the cause of his marital and family problems, not the other way around.
He was deployed to Afghanistan in May still suffering from headaches caused by a mortar explosion; still haunted by the screams of wounded soldiers waiting for medical evacuation.
A civilian psychiatrist who assessed Hanks while he was AWOL found that he was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, a concussion and hearing loss, which could worsen during another combat tour.
Hanks said he went AWOL because he felt "pushed into a corner". The military, he said, will continue seeing high rates of suicide and substance abuse if it ignores the mental health problems of soldiers like him.
Video of Hanks' press conference.
Hanks has the backing of the organization Iraq Veterans Against the War.
