Objective To investigate the correlation between force nurses' mental health and the coping style and social support under military stress. Methods An on-scene investigation into 138 force nurses who had participated in the military training was conducted by using a symptom checklist (SCL-90), a simple coping style questionnaire (SCSQ) and a Social Support Rating Scale (SSRS) respectively and the data were processed by t-test, correlation analysis and path analysis. Results The SCL-90 factor scores of force nurses under military stress were significantly lower than Chinese norms (P