Obtaining and Using Documents to Support Your Claim [VA and SSA] - Repost

We are going to post a series of tips here to help Blue Water Veterans with their claims. The more information the Veteran can get for himself, the greater the control over his claim. That applies to those who are filing their own claims and to those using the services of a Veterans Service Officer.

It is important that all of your records be available to the Department of Veterans Affairs [DVA or VA], or the Social Security Administration [SSA] when you are filing a claim with either body. Even if you are working with a Veterans Service Officer, you should have copies of all the documents that are being submitted. Such documents include, but are not limited to:

1. Your complete medical records
2. Your complete service record
3. Your ship’s deck logs

We will tell you where to obtain these records, and why they are important.

First, however, here are some steps to take in the process of obtaining official documents or copies of official documents. Please note that these steps are common sense steps to help you stay organized throughout the process of your claim, and to make things easier for whoever is processing your claim. You never know when someone is grateful for you making it easy for them may be the difference in how he approaches the decision making process. If your case is close, it might make the difference. Also note that some of these steps may cost you a few dollars at a time, some more so, but in the long run may be worth much more in return.

Whatever official documents or certified copies of such you obtain, the first thing you should do is arrange a safe, fireproof location to store them.

Stop in at your local Staples, or office supply store, and get a couple of self-inking stamps made up. One should have your name, and address. A second should have your Name and VA Claim number. A third one is for Social Security and it should have your Name and Social Security number. Maximum cost for this should be under $30.

Next, either make or have 2 sets of copies made of all the official documents and certified copies. If you own a multipurpose printer [printer, copier, scanner, fax], you are in very good shape. The price of these has come down and their quality has gone up. Even if you have only a regular printer you can save a lot of time and aggravation. Count the number of copies you need to have made. Count out an equal number of blank pages and run them through the printer, placing your Name, Address, and VA Claim Number in the center of the page. [For copies for Social Security, use your Social Security number rather than your VA Claim Number.] Also, place the following words near your personal information: “Page ____ of _____ pages.” When the copying is done, you should serially number all those pages to help you, and anyone else working with the set of documents keep them in order. It also helps if one gets mislaid. You would then know which one must be replaced and can send it to whoever lost it. That is why you need to keep a second, working copy of your documents. Create separate file folders for them.

On the front of those pages, after they are printed, use your self-inking stamps to mark your name and VA Claim Number [or name and Social Security Number for SSA Applications], somewhere on the page where it does not interfere with what is on the page. Usually there is room at the bottom for this info. Stamp it on each and every page.

To the documents:

1. Medical Records:
Make sure that all your physicians, specialists and other health care workers [including hospitals…tell them to send a copy of all your records from your hospitalization to your family physician] send copies of any and all lab reports, and records of your visits and treatment plans, plus any prescribing information to your family physician. If you do this studiously, and you should insist upon it, then all of your pertinent medical records will be in one place: in the office of your family physician. When it comes time to gather all your current medical records, you only need to go to one place to obtain copies. Most physicians, when told it is for the VA or the SSA will cut you a break and either not charge you, or reduce the charge for copying. Most specialist do send a letter to your family physician and include copies of all test results and x-rays.

Make sure if you change physicians, you get a copy of all your medical records from the physician you are leaving and take them to the new physician and allow them to copy for their records. That gives them the records, and you then have a copy for all your records up to that date.

2. Your complete Personnel Record:
Most of the time, the VA and the SSA deal only with your DD-214 [Page 4 of the Navy Personnel File]. This usually has all the pertinent information, unless you served in more than one duty station or aboard more than one ship. It generally will only have your last duty station or ship and whatever personnel information to be recorded that was generated during that stay. This is important to understand especially if you were a Reservist, as well. Some reservists had several ActDuTra [active duty for training] periods before going on active duty, and may have had more after they came home from their two, three, or four year hitch on Active Duty. In such cases, this information may not show up on your DD-214.

Additionally, if you were TAD anywhere, having the rest of your personnel file should prove that, and that might be exactly the proof you need to prove “feet on the ground”, or a specific exposure.

To request your records, you should go to the following website:

http://www.archives.gov/veterans/evetrecs/index.html

This site will allow you to go to the National Archives and Records Administration [NARA] application for Military Personnel Records. Follow the directions carefully. This process in the past has taken over a year before the records arrived, so start now and be patient.

3. Your ship’s Deck Log:
If your personnel record does not show proof of you being “foot on the ground” or in a place where you were exposed to Agent Orange, your ship’s Deck Log might very well be able to do so. Also, it would be additional documentary evidence in support of your claim as your Personnel Record will show you stationed aboard during a period the Deck Log makes reference to a working party ashore, or some such.

For most Blue Water Vietnam Veterans, ships Deck Logs are to be found at the Modern Military Branch of the National Archives, located just off the Washington Beltway in College Park, Maryland. It is a fascinating facility to visit, and you are encouraged to do so. If you do, go early and get your request in as soon as you get there, as it takes a while to pull the physical records from the archives. Logs from 1941 through those that are 30 years old or older are in the Modern Military Branch, National Archives, 8601 Adelphi Road, College Park MD 20740-6001 [telephone (301) 837-3510]. Be prepared for heavy security, and when you sign in you must answer some questions on a computer, sign some pledges dealing with the handling of documents, and get a photo ID good for one year. Repeat visits are somewhat easier to accomplish.

These are the smooth copied Deck Logs hand written by a revolving set of Officers on board the ship, copied weekly from the rough daily log. They are official documents and are signed by the ship’s Captain and countersigned by the XO.

You may not need an entire period, but just certain dates. If you have a Cruise Book, that can sometimes help you pin point the dates.

The cheapest route to take is to just get copies made of specific dates. These are on oversized [10x15 inch] paper [the Navy went to 8 ½ x 11 log books after we all got out!], so special copiers are set up to deal with the size. But the copiers are sometimes balky.

We copied one month’s worth of log entries, about 50 over-sized pages as most entries ran over onto the back of the page. Because we had waited so long for the box to come up with the log entries, and then the copier we were using was constantly changing the settings, we decided to contract the NARA staff to copy and ship me the rest. It came to about $230 for an additional eight months.

Here is what is contained in the deck logs according to Navy Regulations:

• Absentees
• Accidents [material]
• Accidents/Injuries [personnel]
• Actions [combat]
• Appearances of Sea/Atmosphere/Unusual Objects
• Arrests/Suspensions
• Arrival/Departure of Commanding Officer
• Bearings [navigational]
• Cable/Anchor Chain Strain
• Collisions/Groundings
• Courts-Martial/Captain's Masts
• Deaths
• Honors/Ceremonies/Visits
• Incidents at Sea
• Inspections
• Meteorological Phenomena
• Movement Orders
• Movements [getting underway; course, speed changes; mooring, anchoring]
• Passengers
• Prisoners [crew members captured by hostile forces]
• Propulsion Plant Status changes
• Receipts and Transfers [of Crew Members]
• Ship's Behavior [under different weather/sea conditions]
• Sightings [other ships; landfall; dangers to navigation]
• Soundings [depth of water]
• Speed Changes
• Tactical Formation
• Time of Evolutions/Exercises/Other Services Performed

This information can prove invaluable in supporting your claim. If you cannot go to this incredible facility you can probably call and get a researcher to collect the data for you, but that might be more expensive.

The facility is on its own campus, has good parking, and beautiful grounds. Inside in addition to the records and archives are a small book-gift shop, a small snack shop, and a large, well appointed cafeteria. Security is very tight, and you are not allowed to take anything onto the floors with you. There are rental lockers in the basement for handbags, coats, pens, pads, and other research tools. There is plenty of scratch paper and pencils around on the research floors. The check-in process takes about 40-60 minutes before you even get to the research floor.

Note: any Deck logs that are less than 30 years of age are in the custody of the Ships History Deck Logs Section, Naval Historical Center, Building 57, 805 Kidder Breese Street SE, Washington Navy Yard, DC 20374-5060. All inquiries concerning research access to logs that are less than 30 years old should be sent to the Ships History Deck Logs Section.

Logs that are less than 30 years old are held in either paper or microfiche form, stored in the Washington National Records Center, 4205 Suitland Road, Suitland MD 20746. Logs from 1979 through February 1993 are on microfiche in the Ships History Deck Logs Section. Logs from 1990 through 1993 are partly on microfiche in the Deck Logs Section, partly on paper at the Records Center. All logs from March 1993 are on paper and stored at the Records Center. The logs that are classified must be sent to the proper authorities for declassification review before they can be researched or copied.

One other thing: If for some reason the above does not contain specific enough information to satisfy either the VA, or SSA, or both, and your claim involves combat action, you may need one other resource: The Navy Historical Society mentioned above also stores all ships’/units’ action reports, which were required after every engagement. That might be another source for validation of your claim, as it is usually more specific than the deck logs.

There you have it. IF you are doing your own claim [probably online] via VONAPP or on the Social Security website, you will be required to provide verification of your claim. The above documents are, in most cases, all you will need. We packed ours up into several small boxes [about a ream of paper in each] and shipped them to the VA with our claim number on the outside of the boxes. We also shipped them return receipt requested. That proved they got to where they were intended, and showed us the date when they arrived.

If you are ill and can no longer work, you should apply for Social Security Disability in addition to your VA claim. It too can be a long and ugly process, but in the end, if you go to a hearing, things will work out. You must have an attorney for the appeal to Social Security and the attorney is paid from your lump sum if you win, up to a maximum of $5,400. Our appeal took almost 18 months from initial rejection to the hearing. Nevertheless, when that lump sum comes in, it is a huge load off your mind, as is the monthly income.

VA claims, at least to date, are not permitted to use attorneys to argue the claim before the Board. So there should be no fee for any VA claim, though Congress may change that at any moment.

The SSA almost automatically denies about ¾ of all claims up front [ours was denied before we even finished submitting our paperwork!] forcing the engagement of an attorney and the paying of a fee out of your lump sum. If you lose your appeal with Social Security, there is nothing owed to the attorney. In other words, the SSA is using private attorneys that you must hire to cut down on fraudulent claims, and forcing the claimant to pay for it. Something is very wrong with that.

Good luck, endure, and keep the faith.

VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." -- President Abraham Lincoln

"Without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious." --President George Washington

Copyright © 2007: VNVets Blog; All Rights Reserved.

PTSD is not caused by society

War has been part of man's culture since he picked up the first rock and threw it at his neighbor. But PTSD has been there longer than that. Watching your family get eaten alive by a saber-toothed tiger would cause it. Seeing the stragglers in your column of family get overtaken by molten lava would cause it.

And I'll bet he had nightmares about it, too.

Do you think there was no "shell shock", or "Battle Fatigue" or PTSD after the Civil War? After the Revolution? Do you think Civilians did not experience it during the French and Indian Wars, or the Indians experience it after what we did to them during our westward expansion? Do you think Napoleon's troops did not experience it after their march home from Moscow -- those that survived?

Do you think that little boy down in Florida doesn't grow up with PTSD after seeing an alligator eat his little sister?

Do you think the young mother who lost her baby in a tornado as it was ripped from her arms doesn't have PTSD?

Do you think the four survivors of a train wreck that killed 150 people don't have PTSD?

The only influence war has on PTSD is the statistically increased occurrences in war that provide the stressors that trigger it.

Culturally, it is our prejudice against persons with any form of mental condition, be it a disease, or a birth defect. In fact, no mental illness, or disease, no abnormalities are caused by the individual in whom the illness or abnormality exists, yet we shun and mistreat, bully and mock, belittle and ostracize those who are retarded, mentally ill, insane, or scarred from a stroke, a brain injury, a long bout with a high fever, or a tumor. Our ignorance is based on old societal fears and the fact that in general we know so little about the brain and the mind and what makes it work, though we are a lot farther down the road than when I was taking psychology courses forty years ago.

[For what it is worth, and this is NOT scientific, I suspect that PTSD is the result when the mind is so overwhelmed with horror that the normal mechanism of coping, forgetfulness, is unable to kick in. I think there are a few in whom PTSD is controllable...perhaps recurrences only happening once or twice a year...you can function like that...but of the rest, I believe that most who have it hide it, either trying to "man up", or ashamed of the perceived weakness, when it is, indeed, not a weakness, but an illness. But there is a stigma attached to any form of "mental condition" because of which most who have PTSD will not come forward about their own problems.]

Mostly, it is ignorance that allows people to treat persons with brain disorders the way we do. How we treat PTSD victims comes from the same root of ignorance in the way we treat Schizophrenics when we call them "Schiz", or say, "He went all schizoid on me!", and the same root as when we refer to the Mentally Retarded as "Tards" or "Morons", or confuse a person who is recovering from a stroke with a drunk, or a retarded person. Ignorance.

War does not cause PTSD, it provides the stressors that do, and they are different for each and every individual affected. Our culture does not cause PTSD. It is not something inflicted by our society.

I will repeat, The only influence war has on PTSD is the statistically increased occurrences in war that provide the stressors that trigger it.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

The Wives' Letters

[Note: This is a reposted and updated entry that needs to be put up over and over to remind folks of the role played by the wives in all of this struggle.]

They write. They call. They fax. They file form after form. They drive wherever they need to go in order to document, present, appeal, or argue their case. And they are frequently shut out.

No sailor wants to make that last voyage without providing for his widow, and/or his family. One of the ways to do so is to file a claim with the Department of Veterans Affairs under the Agent Orange Act of 1991. Unfortunately, and apparently illegally, the DVA stopped approving claims in 2002 for Navy Veterans who served in the “off shore waters of Vietnam”.

…John was hospitalized three nights ago with what has been diagnosed as pneumonia resulting from multiple myeloma. The doctors aren’t holding out much hope. What can I do? We’re out of money. John’s claim was denied because he did not set foot on the ground…

In many cases, those sailors with pending claims died before their claims were decided. Their claims died with them. Their widows got…absolutely nothing.

In 2002, the DVA modified their procedural manual to stipulate that a veteran filing for Agent Orange Presumptive benefits must provide proof that he actually set foot on the ground in the Republic of Vietnam. The DVA made this change after issuing a “precedential opinion” in 1997 from their own office of General Council. They did all of this on their own, without any instigation from Congress, or the various Veterans Service Organizations. But they also made the manual change without offering it up for public comment first.

…My husband served three tours on Destroyers off the coast of Vietnam between 1965 and 1971. He never set foot on the ground there. In 1998 Bob was diagnosed with Type II Diabetes, and a year later with cancer of the prostate. They operated, and he tested clear of the cancer for a while, but in 2005 his PSA suddenly skyrocketed. He went in for tests and they found the cancer was back and it had spread throughout his body. They removed one of his lungs late last year, but by summer the other was full of cancer. He was hospitalized repeatedly. None of the treatments really worked. They sent him home last week, in time for his 60th birthday, with days to live. His claim with the VA died with Bob this morning at 5:17 AM. I have no idea what I will do now…

I receive four to seven of these a week. Every week. Fifty two weeks a year. I read them through my tears, and theirs. God! How could so many sailors have been so blessed with such strong wives!?

How could an agency of the United States Government act in such a crass and inhumane manner? Not only was their action illegally done, it was unjustified and unjustifiable, and we felt confident the court would say that in its decision in the Haas case. It was a cruel and heartless action, done coldly. My first claim was rejected in 2003 with the words, “You did not serve in Vietnam.” I have the medals, and the cruise book, and the envelopes and letters sent home free from the combat zone to prove it.

To be perfectly honest, I pray that people like Anthony Principi, Jim Nicholson, and the author of the precedent that was used to change the manual, May Lou Keener, rot in the lowest level of Hell for all eternity. So grievous were their actions that even that fate may be too good for them.

…he had been treated for heart disease and other problems for about five years, all after being diagnosed with Type II Diabetes. Yesterday after lunch he went in to take a short nap. When I went to wake him for our afternoon walk, he was gone. He should have gotten VA benefits, but he was denied and never appealed it. The Lord knows we could use the money for his funeral, and to pay off the mortgage on the house. I don’t want to lose this place. It has too many memories of us in it…

They come in emails, and in their words, through our tears, I see theirs. And in their words I see behind their tears an aura of nobility, grace and strength. These are not women to be trifled with, to be shunted aside with barely a glance, or ignored completely.

These women fulfilled a compact with their sailors, and because their sailors fulfilled a compact with their government, and died as a result of that compact, their wives must be compensated, even though their husbands were not.

We strongly urge the citizens of this nation to take up this cause and make it one of their goals, to see that justice is done for these good and strong women – the wives, widows, and daughters of our Blue Water Naval Veterans of the Vietnam War.

What the DVA did in 2002 was not only illegal, but because it was illegal, it was stupid. Because they did not follow due process of the law, they made a clear and unmistakable error in changing their policy without asking for public comment first, as required by law. Any of their actions subsequent to that policy change are therefore illegal if the DVA personnel followed that policy in the changed manual section.

The Courts, or better yet, Congress, which could save the Veterans and their Wive's a lot of unnecessary legal action, should issue a law connecting prior claims denied under these illegal changes. Because the DVA erred, anything that was ruled subsequent to that error based on that error, must be reviewed and overturned and benefits issued retroactive to the date of the claim. That includes any claims that died when the claimant died, any claims that were rejected based on the erroneous policy change, and appeals that were denied based on that change. Everything in those categories should be reconnected and reprocessed back to the date of the original claim, non-severed by any failure to appeal as well. It was the DVA that erred, not the claimants.

The court or Congress, should also rule that all these claims should be processed to the issuance of benefits within 6 months, including retroactive benefits.

…God gave me thirty wonderful years with my sailor, and I treasure every second of those years. Even the cross words that were sometimes exchanged will be sorely missed. When he took that final voyage last spring, the VA had not completed his claim. Now they won’t even answer my letters and calls. I had to put the house up for sale last summer, and am now living in a small apartment downtown so I can get around. But it is a dangerous neighborhood. I’ve been mugged twice, but all they got was a few dollars. They could have asked me for it and I would have given them the money. Ralphie would have given them each a bloody nose for their trouble. Sometimes, when I am trying to make a decision, I think, “what would he have done?” I was a housewife, I get no retirement from Social Security. I have a little bit left from Ralph’s IRA, and from the sale of the house, but that will be gone in a few years. I don’t know what I’ll do then…

We owe these courageous women a debt that goes far beyond mere gratitude. In many cases, we owe them our lives. Not many of us are financially secure. The presence of VA Benefits will go along way toward building that financial security for us to leave behind. Our wives, and children deserve it because we earned it, and they did, too. They care for us in our pain and illness, they comfort us, they haul us around to doctors, clinics, labs, and offices, and in between all that other stuff they write, phone, fax, and email on our behalf.

Gentlemen, Attention on Deck! To the indomitable and courageous wives, widows, sweethearts, and daughters of the Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans, hand salute!

Two!

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Veterans and Political Partisanship Just Don't Mix

Political partisanship in this country has descended to a level reserved for those who insist they are right, even when the facts speak against them. The result is that political debate has become political shouting matches, and the gift of the Internet means that any yahoo with an opinion will voice it.

What is particularly disturbing is the venomous and vituperative tone such opinions have taken on. One envisions an editor or a writer pounding the keyboard, while foaming spittle flies onto the monitor screen. It is not really opinion any more, it is screed.

And both sides are extremely guilty.

Inference and innuendo has now been replaced by outright accusations that result from Internet hearsay. In other words, somebody made a WAG [Wild A**ed Guess] about someone, and sent it whispering down the lane of the Internet.

Albert Einstein wrote, "It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs." He is correct. But the active word in play here is "validity". Owners and editors of Internet Sites are not News Reporters [though even that term has become something different these days], or News Editors. They write "opinion pieces" and make them out to be breaking news stories of terrible things done by members of the political opposition...and no argument is tolerated..."it's the truth about those hypocrites! It comes from reliable sources...inside sources!"

Actually the national news media does a fine job of sniffing out the foibles of our elected and appointed officials, thank you, further sliming is wholly unnecessary.

Besides, what is gained by such smearing on the part of the Internet writers? The reputation that they can dig deeper than the media can? To what end? A scandal is a scandal, and no matter what, the other party will get caught doing the same thing! Or worse!

But when this is done by an organization with the best interests of the Veteran supposedly at heart, something has gone horribly wrong.

The late, great American philosopher and humorist Will Rogers once called politics "applesauce." But he also wrote, "The more you read and observe about this politics thing, you got to admit that each party is worse than the other. The one that's out always looks the best." We think Rogers is dead on target. We also believe that when it comes to Veterans neither party stands on high ground. Indeed, both parties treatment of Veterans, and that is treatment by partisans of both parties in Presidential Administrations, Federal Court Appointees, and in Congress, is absolutely abysmal.

We have three Federal Holidays memorializing and Celebrating American Veterans and their accomplishments, yet not one single administration [with varied and few exceptions] has done anything to stop the degrading slide in governmental esteem toward the American Veteran. Harding, Coolidge, Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt made the Doughboys of WW I wait 18 years before they got their Veterans Bonus money, a hideously insulting tactic from which the current day "Delay, Deny until they die!" comes from. The Veterans waited fourteen years, marched on Washington DC and were brutalized by Army troops under the Command of General Douglas MacArthur. It took four more years before Franklin Roosevelt was given the opportunity to make things right, and give the men their bonuses. Despite please from his wife Eleanore, he still vetoed the legislation which Congress, then in an election year, overrode! For those keeping score that is three Republican Presidents, one Democratic President, and one Republican General.

Are you starting to get our drift here? On a more modern note, we note that President G. H. W. Bush advanced and signed the Agent Orange Act of 1991, one of the positive exceptions. It did not take a march on Washington to do this, but from the end of the Vietnam War era, to 1991, Presidents Nixon, Ford, Carter and Reagan were in office...three Republicans and one Democrat who over a twenty year period, ignored the Agent Orange issue.

Then in 1993, The Clinton administration’s Department of Veterans Affairs began dismantling the Agent Orange Act of 1991 by declaring, without a shred of scientific evidence, that the Air Force was not eligible for presumptive exposure to herbicides because, hey, they flew over it, and therefore did "...not serve in Vietnam." Clinton, a Democrat, was followed by G. W. Bush, a Republican who implemented a Clinton VA Legal precedent that did the exact same thing to the Navy: "You did not serve IN Vietnam." Bush's successor, Barack Obama has not changed the policies or mindset of the Department of Veterans Affairs one inch to the positive. Indeed, shortly after Obama took office in January two policy clarifications were issued further restricting the Blue Water Navy Veterans from possible benefits under the Agent Orange Act of 1991, and currently that same Obama Department of veterans Affairs is fighting a disinformation war in Congress against HR 2254, the Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009, which would undo the Clinton, Bush, and Obama changes and restore the benefits that were once paid to those Veterans.

Lacking so far in the exemplars is any discussion of Congress and the Courts. In the case of the Courts, the record is clear that they seldom rule against the government and for the Veterans. An exception is the Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims that for the past few years has been fighting a pro-Veteran battle with limited scope, as defined by Congressional law.

As for Congress, their absence in all of this is deafening. They have sat idly by while the Administrations of both parties, and courts, have abused and misused Veterans laws to the point of an extremely adversarial attitude toward Veterans.

In case anyone missed it, the point here is that party simply does not matter when it comes to Veterans Affairs. What matters is not even whether Democrats or Republicans are in office, but simply who holds the power...that is, which individuals are in the White House, the Speaker's chair, and the floor and caucus leaders in the House and Senate. That is all that matters. Why? Because there is absolutely nothing partisan about treating Veterans the way they should be treated by the Government. And, conversely, there is absolutely nothing partisan in the way the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the US Government currently treats its Veterans. It transcends partisan politics. Party affiliation is, and always has been irrelevant when it comes to Veterans Issues, no matter what your Congressional, Senatorial, or Presidential candidate says.

And if the elected officials of our country are not careful, [and their history shows them to be careless about this] continued mistreatment will cause enlistments to dry up when young people see that Veterans more often than not do not get treated the way they should by the Government. Who then will fight the nation's wars? Draftees? That worked in WW I, and WW II, and in Korea, but it failed miserably in Vietnam...so miserably that the Pentagon went to an all-volunteer Army for the post-Vietnam Wars and actions.

We have said here repeatedly, ”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield." Indeed, dealing with the Department of Veterans Affairs is likely a cause and/or aggravating factor in Veterans PTSD illnesses. That is not a joke, it is a reality. The veteran faces a "hamster wheel" effect of denials, appeals, remands, denials, appeals and remands, etc. that can take as long as ten or more years to resolve. Imagine, a sick and dying Veteran being forced to go through the same arguments over and over while the DVA plays games with his claim. It is depressing, humiliating, frustrating, enraging, and when it happens repeatedly is a likely stressor for PTSD. And no, this is not an exception; it has become the norm, especially for cases that are not direct combat wounds. There are far too many "anecdotal stories" for the problem to be anecdotal.

The Department of Veterans Affairs mindset is a house built by both parties in a truly long term bi-partisan effort. Eschewing partisanship when talking Veterans Affairs is the honest thing to do, and raises the level of discourse above the level where we are now, which is wholly and totally ineffective. After all, do we not all pledge to leave no one behind? Then why ruin the reputation of an organization with constant partisan smearing and invective?

Do folks really think politicians don't read what the major Veterans websites say?

A friend once told me "The Veterans worst enemy is another Veteran." When we are sidetracked from the larger issues this comes into play. When egos are involved, this comes into play. When partisanship is involved, this comes into play. All Veterans should be focused on the issues, not the parties or even the individual shortcomings of those in office or, especially, those who are out of office.

Don't spit on the door step before you enter or you won't be welcomed.

Finally, a comment about general partisanship: partisan invective may not be intended to destroy a political party, but a consequence could be just that. Then guess what? The result is one party rule. Like German National Socialism in the 1930s to 1945. Like Soviet Communism almost all of the 20th Century, like we see now in Venezuela, Bolivia, Cuba, North Korea, and China. That is one party rule. The destroyed party becomes simply, "the opposition," never getting voice in the government, or the press, never having a say in how the nation is governed. Are we really trying to change the President’s title to “Dear One”?

Anyone who favors that is not a Patriotic American. Any Veteran who desires that end shames not only his own service, but the service of all others who have gone before him.

There is no good reason for radical extremism in politics. Zealotry, and that is what it is, is self destructive to its own end. It is long past time to put away the invective and rhetoric and restore a semblance of decency to our national discourse. Let’s start with restoring civil discourse to Veterans affairs and issues. We can accomplish much more that way that is positive for Veterans, and therefore, for the nation.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations."--President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Where have you gone Willie and Joe?

When Willie and Joe came home from WW II and later from Korea, they came home to ticker tape parades and a hero’s welcome. They joined their local American Legion and VFW posts, went about enjoying the best GI Bill ever in the process of returning to civilian life.

For the past few decades, Willie and Joe rose in the ranks of their posts, then the state organizations, and finally into the national leadership of those two giant Veterans organizations. Willie and Joe are still there. Once in a while a Vietnam Veteran sneaks in.

Willie and Joe marched and crawled across North Africa and Europe, landed on island after island in the western Pacific, flew missions in daylight over German occupied territory, and sailed ships into harm's way on and under oceans around the world. Six years later they were called to arms again to fight communism in Korea. From the Frozen Chosin Reservoir, to the Pusan Peninsula, and back to Inchon, they fought with the same valor and selfless courage they showed in WW II.

We'll call them Eddie and Josh, the new war Veterans from Gulf War I and Iraq and Afghanistan. Eddie and Josh came home and found the Legion and the VFW, sitting at the bars in their posts. Old guys more like parents and grandparents than fellow Veterans. So they decided to start their own organization: The Veterans of Modern Warfare. And rightfully so.

Eddie and Josh won the first Gulf War in a little over a month, and did so with minimal casualties, while inflicting major losses on the Iraqis. They freed Kuwait and stopped. Eleven years later, many of the same soldiers went to war again in the Global War on Terror, now separated into the Iraq War and the Afghanistan War. Iraq now has some semblance of a Democratic Government, as does Afghanistan. Both have been mostly freed from despotic dictators or subversive forces. Residual combat is still going on.

Somewhere in between Willie and Joe and their modern counterparts, Eddie and Josh, are the nameless, faceless Vietnam Veterans. They fought for nine years, more or less, in hostile jungle, in aerial action in skies filled with SAM missiles, and on the waters in and around Vietnam. They fought in Thailand, Laos and Cambodia. And they have since found that they also faced another enemy, unknown at the time, an enemy inflicted upon them by their own government. The 20 million gallons of dioxin laced herbicides sprayed in and around Vietnam were quite unlike the "bullet with your name on it." It all had all their names on it. For some reason or other, many managed to dodge it. At least for now. But far too many were unable to do so.

3.4 million served in Vietnam, including 512,000 in the waters off shore. The 2000 Census estimated there were only 1.012 million left alive in that year. At that rate, there are likely somewhere between 200,000 to 400,000 still living nine years later, likely nearer the lower amount. At the rate they are dying, they will be gone long before the last of the "Greatest Generation" and the Korean War Veterans.

One suspects the principle reason for this accelerated death rate among Vietnam Veterans to be the exposure to dioxins from the sprayed herbicides like Agent Orange.

This may be one reason why there are and have been so few Vietnam Veterans in the upper hierarchies of the American Legion and the VFW.

It also may be one reason the American Legion and the VFW have essentially given no more than lip service to the Vietnam Veterans.

It should have raised alarm bells instead.

In 1991, Congress passed the Agent Orange Act. It was to provide benefits and compensation for anyone who received the Vietnam Service Medal, or the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal for Service in Vietnam, who also had a specific disease listed by the Department of Veterans Affairs to be a result of exposure to the dioxin in herbicides that were sprayed in Vietnam.

From the start, the DVA denied those otherwise eligible Veterans who served in Thailand, Laos and Cambodia [TLC]. In 1993 the DVA changed their policy to remove the Air Force. In 2002 they changed their policy again, this time removing the Blue Water Navy from eligibility.

They did this without a shred of documentary, or scientific evidence to prove those Veterans were not exposed. They did this in violation of Federal Law that requires them to publish their proposed changes for public comment, by not bothering to do so. Their changes, therefore, were all illegal.

Where were Willie and Joe while this was going on? They were in their post bars, they were selling insurance to each other, they were recruiting new members, and conducting conventions. And at those conventions they were passing resolutions asking Congress to fix the Agent Orange Act of 1991 as it was intended. But worst of all, they were training their Veteran Service Officers, the folks you go to for help with your VA claim, to simply accept each change the DVA made and tell the Veterans not to bother filing a claim for Agent Orange exposure if they belonged to one of the three groups listed above.

The Legion and the VFW are the "biggies" in Veterans Organizations. They are the ones who supposedly carry the weight in Washington.

At the first sign of trouble with the 1991 Agent Orange Act, these two organizations should have demanded Congress conduct investigative hearings into the action of the DVA. They should have pressured Congress -- and they have the weight to do just that! -- to take whatever action required to stop the DVA's illegal actions and right the wrong they committed, and stop the DVA from doing other similar actions.

They should have taken drastic action in 1991, certainly no later than 1993! But instead, they continued to sell each other insurance, conduct annual conventions, issue statements usually backing conservative candidates, and recruiting new members.

This moral and ethical lapse by the American Legion and the VFW has lead to the early deaths of untold thousands of Veterans from the Vietnam War, the privations of their survivors, and the privations of still living Veterans in need of services but unable to afford them, and others unable to work, now without income, now losing their homes, their retirements, and their families in many cases. That is to say nothing of their dignity.

Occasionally one or both organizations would throw some money into the pot to fund a law suit, like the Haas case. On the whole however, the American Legion and the VFW have silently abdicated their responsibility, and their ethical and moral obligations to their own members, and constituencies.

Now, when given an opportunity to redeem their 18 years of moral turpitude, neither organization has lifted a finger to pressure Congress to pass HR 2254, the Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009, which sits in the Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs. It lacks co-sponsors. It lacks a voice in the Senate to introduce it. It lacks a voice in the Capitol to fight the misinformation program being conducted by the Department of Veterans Affairs, which is spreading the lie that the bill will cost $27 Billion. In fact, the cost of the bill is less than $3 billion. The DVA inflates the numbers whenever it is convenient.

Willie and Joe fought two wars against injustice, inhumanity, and racism, fighting for the rights of free world peoples who sought their freedom from oppression and tyranny.

Where have you gone, Willie and Joe? You’re needed here at home.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Dioxin Follow on: Strategies for VA Claims

Recently we posted an article written by Chuck Graham and Susie Belanger titled Dioxin: What the U.S. Navy knew and didn’t [or wouldn’t!] tell us.

This is a follow on to that post with a suggested strategy on how Veterans can use the documents in the article to support their claims in the DVA's claims processing system.

Readers with VA Claims in various stages of denial by the VA are welcome to use all of this as additional evidence in the development of their claims. It is of limited use to those who's ships did not get close inshore, but for those who anchored in bays, harbors and estuaries and those who's ships worked in close on Market Time, Naval Gun Fire Support [NGFS], and associated duties should be able to present this, along with other evidence to advance their claims.

That said, this will likely not have an effect on claims at the Veterans Affairs Regional Office level [VARO, or simply RO], but the chances of using this evidence to support a claim as described above successfully increase the farther up the Department of Veterans Affairs [DVA] food chain one goes: Board of Veterans Appeals [BVA], and the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims [CAVC]. It may take a while, but sooner or later, all this documentary and "scientific" evidence in support of granting presumptive exposure will overwhelm the scientific evidence that claims we could not have been exposed because we only served at sea -- of which there is absolutely none. The CAVC recently remanded the Haas claim back to the BVA with the warning that if they are going to deny a claim, they MUST have overwhelming evidence to do so, otherwise they must approve the claim. Simply repeating a line of policy [based on no scientific evidence] will not suffice.

The DVA has recently backed off the ports and harbors exclusion and is now granting claims if a ship tied up to a pier -- or at least they have SAID they would make that change.

With this evidence that the Navy, the Army, the Department of Defense [DoD], and the DVA knew as far back as 1969 of the dangers of dioxin in water supplies, there should be no problem getting a claim approved.

Warning, do not rely completely on the evidence from the documents listed as proof of exposure. Veterans must provide much more evidence, such as deck logs, charts showing ship's locations, letters, buddy statements, and/or official records of incidents leading to exposure.

What this evidence does is provide a high mountain of evidence that exposure MORE THAN LIKELY occurred, which, according to the recent Haas remand, requires the DVA to prove overwhelmingly that exposure did not occur. They cannot.

And suddenly, at least at the CAVC, the WORD of the DVA is no long good enough on its own.

Veterans with claims should also know that their true salvation concerning Agent Orange exposure is the timely enactment of HR 2254, and should therefore put all the pressure they can bring to bear on their Congressional Representatives and both their Senators to fully SUPPORT and FUND HR 2254. This MUST be accomplished soon. We find it impossible to believe that of all our readers and associates, none have any political connection, none worked on campaigns, none feel the power to tell an incumbent, "If you don't fully support this bill and its funding, and don't work to get it enacted, I will ensure that you have far fewer votes, especially among Veterans the next time you run."

Do not write letters unless you intend to fax them. If you get the canned response, telling you all about the bill and how the Congressman works hard on behalf of Veterans, and how he will keep your thoughts in mind should the bill reach the floor...," send back this response:

Thank you for your kind response to my request that you actively support and co-sponsor HR 2254. You response assures that I will keep your interest in mind when I next enter a polling booth with you on the ballot.

Then move on to your Senators.

We also now have resolutions under way in the Pennsylvania and Massachusetts General Assemblies, and perhaps the Illinois legislature as well. These resolutions call for their respective state Secretary of State to forward a request to the President of the United States, the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House, and each member of that state's Congressional Delegation to fully fund and support HR 2254, the Agent Orange Act of 2009.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Dioxin

What the U.S. Navy knew and didn’t [or wouldn’t!] tell us.
An OP-ED Paper by Chuck Graham, with Susie Belanger

I’m a U.S. Navy Vietnam Veteran and I have had a claim in place with the Department of Veterans Affairs [DVA] since 2003. Like so many of you I’ve been on the hamster wheel and suffered through the Haas appeal all to no avail. Over the years I’ve researched any available material that might help prove that the U.S. Navy had knowledge to support the findings of the Australian study, ENTOX, also called NRCET from 2002. This study involved the co-distillation of Dioxin through the fresh water evaporator systems commonly used aboard Royal Australian Naval Ships that were present in Vietnam. The same evaporator systems were commonly used by U.S. Navy Ships that were present in Vietnam, as the majority of the Australian Naval Ships were built at U.S. Naval Shipyards. It is my hope that the following information will shed some knowledge of what the U.S. Navy knew and had in their possession and if they knew then the Department of Defense [DOD] and more than likely the Veterans Administration [VA], now the Department of Veterans Affairs [DVA], also knew.

Click here to read the Australian Study

As far back as 1946 the U.S. Navy had knowledge of the dangers of distilling water for shipboard uses while in littoral waters or certain other locations. This was evidenced by the fact that while conducting atomic radiation testing at Bikini Atoll, they were warned not to utilize any seawater aboard ships in the area, for fear of contamination by the radiation which had contaminated the coastal waters. This was “Operation Crossroads” and 79 ships that were present during these tests, were salvaged and sent to Hunters Point Naval Shipyard in San Francisco for decontamination. An acid wash had to be used to decontaminate the evaporators and water purification systems.

In the U.S. Army Technical Manual TM 5-813-8 from September 1986 on water Desalination chapter 5-1 paragraph C, states "Some organic materials will carry across a distillation/condensation process with the water. Pesticides and industrial organic chemicals may be difficult to remove by distillation/condensation."

Click here to read the U.S. Army Technical Manual TM 5-813-8, SEP 1986

Ok folks, let’s look at and re-read that statement!! Someone in the Army had to have done some tests to make that statement. How else would they have known, without testing the condensate, that this was so? That proves that the Military knew that dioxin/herbicides/pesticides would remain in distilled water.

The manual of Naval Preventive Medicine NAVMED P -5010-6 rev 1990, chapter 6: Water Supply Afloat, sec 6-3 states, "Distillation of water from harbors or from polluted sea water is to be avoided except in emergencies. Sea water must be assumed polluted when ships are operated in close formation."

Click here to read NAVMED P-5010-6 rev 1990

In the U.S. Navy’s Risk Analysis of Shipboard Drinking Water Chemical Contaminants, August 18, 2000, author Lieutenant Michael D. Cassady, Medical Service Corps, U.S. Navy states, "An important aspect of the drinking water produced onboard ships and submarines is, its source. Ships and submarines routinely do not produce water unless they are at least twelve miles from the shoreline...However, the operational environment for ships and submarines is changing and more missions are requiring operations in littoral waters for extended lengths of time. Littoral waters are more likely to be at risk for primary and secondary contaminates."

Click here to read Risk Analysis of Shipboard Drinking Water Chemical Contaminants, August 18, 2000

Now while on the gun-line conducting Naval Gun Fire Support [NGFS] firing missions off the coast of Vietnam, we did not have time to pull off and run out 12 miles and make fresh water. We made water where we were -- 24/7.

Now to get to the heart of the matter and the reason for this paper: We have discovered several Naval Documents that we feel should shed some light on the knowledge that the U.S. Navy had over the years starting in 1963 with BUMED INSTRUCTION 6240.3B, 30 SEP 1963. Pay special attention to page 3 where it lists Chemical Characteristics Limits. No where do you see the word Herbicides mentioned.

Click here to read BUMED INSTRUCTION 6240.3B 30 SEP 1963

Then in 1972 we see BUMED INSTRUCTION 6240.3C DEC 1972, Pay special attention to page 6 on Chemical Concentrations, where it now includes Pesticides, Herbicides, and Fungicides; and see footnote [2]. This is just a short period of 9 years from 1963 through 1972 that something brought to their attention that it would be desirable to remove Pesticides and Herbicides from our drinking water! In my humble opinion, scientific tests of some sort had to be conducted to verify this concern over Herbicides.

Click here to read BUMED INSTRUCTION 6240.3C, DEC 1972

Then in February 1987 we have this document from Naval Facilities Engineering Command: Guide Performance Work Statement [GPWS] For Water Plants and System Operation and Maintenance. Prepared by Southern Division Naval Facilities Engineering Command in Charleston, South Carolina, it states, "The contractor shall produce and store treated water free of taste and or odor and that meets the minimum water quality standards described below:" see page 44 of he GWPS PDF Document where we see Herbicides are a concern again.

Click here to read NAVFAC GUIDE FOR WATER PLANTS & SYSTEMS - FEB 1987

Finally, see the following study where Researchers in Vietnam in 1970 tested fish and crustaceans For the presence of TCDD {Dioxin}. These are the same researchers that were mentioned in the Australian ENTOX study and the fish tested were caught by local fishermen in Vietnam, both in fresh water as well as saltwater. This shows that dioxin’s were present in local fish in 1970 and If dioxin stopped at lands-end, as the DVA would have us believe, how did it pollute saltwater fish and crustaceans?

Click here to read An Analytical Method for Detecting TCDD [Dioxin]: Levels of TCDD in Samples from Vietnam - SEP 1973

Thanks Chuck and thanks Susie! Outstanding research work here.

We will add the folowing to wrap this up:

Clearly, then, not only did the Army and Navy, and their respective offices overseeing potable water handling, the Department of Defense, and the Veterans Administration, all know of the presence of dioxin in the drinking water and the difficulties of getting rid of it [which was not solved until the introduction of reverse osmosis filtration, but the lengths to which they went to caution about its presence show the awareness of the danger of it in the potable water. There can be no doubt that thousands of sailors and embarked Marines were exposed to dioxins from their ship's potable water system: they drank, cooked, and showered with water contaminated by high concentrations of deadly toxic dioxins.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Everyday Heroes

The great American humorist Will Rogers once said, "We can't all be heroes, because somebody has to sit on the curb and applaud when they go by.”

Defining heroes is not as simple as it seems. One way to look at it is to say that everyday heroes are the folks who silently pick up the slack. They are ultimate team players, and in the end, team leaders. The guy who jumps on a grenade in combat to save the lives of the rest of his team is a hero. In the words of Jesus Christ, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." [John, 15:13, KJV]. This is the ultimate, the paragon, the epitome of heroism. This is the measure upon which all heroes are judged. And such are truly heroes.

But so is the guy who, on a long march, shoulders the pack of a guy who is struggling to keep up; and the guy in your berthing compartment who sees you've been on watch all night so he takes care of his morning job, and yours too: the morning sweepdown of the compartment. He doesn't ask, he doesn't tell you about it afterwards, he just takes up the slack.

So, we can have two types of heroes, the courageous ones who do heroic deeds -- and these are the ones we recognize with medals, and ceremonies, and we can have the everyday heroes, those who quietly go about taking up the slack, unobtrusively, seeking neither favor nor recognition. These are the people who Ronald Reagan was referring to in his first Inaugural address when he said, “We have every right to dream heroic dreams. Those who say that we're in a time when there are no heroes, they just don't know where to look."

At the Veterans Association of Sailors of the Vietnam War, we have looked in the right place.

Steve Burns is a Yahoo specialist, owner of websites and Veterans support groups, who generously lends his expertise and support where and when it is needed. He joined VASVW several months ago, and has become a staple of the group, and recently was named VASVW Chaplain. For his efforts, he rates everyday hero status.

Aletta has done the same. She has been a steady voice of focus when discussions start to go farther afield than is productive. She has the knack of simply restating the subject in a way that brings everyone back to the problem at hand. If someone needs a document, she can usually find it. She is quiet, and unassuming, steady and reliable. For her efforts she rates everyday hero status.

Dave Sanderson, the first President of VASVW, is a steady hand, knowledgeable of people, who very quietly, behind the scenes, picks up the slack for others. For his service and his quiet leadership, he rates everyday hero status.

Tom LaLiberte has quietly created a wonderful website for VASVW [click here to view it], maintaining the pages, expanding the capabilities of the site, and adding much to the general information now available to all who are involved with the Blue Water Navy fight for Agent Orange Veterans benefits. Additionally, he has prevailed upon numerous congressmen to support the HR 2254 legislation, not just his own, but many others. For his dedication and hard work, he rates hero status.

Phil Elliott works hard behind the scenes to see that things work in VASVW. Whether it be a perceived misunderstanding between two members that he helps clear up, or showing folks how to use the Yahoo site extras, to occasionally breaking the seriousness of the discussion with some well timed humor, Phil does it, and does it well. For his quiet service he rates hero status.

Dennis Myers very quietly goes about the work that needs doing, providing suggestions and ideas, and shouldering heavy workloads of contact work. Dennis is unique in doing this, as he does so much, not for himself, but for others, and he does so quietly, behind the scenes, seeking neither thanks nor recognition, just results. In this way he rates hero status.

There are so many more who should be recognized but these six go above and beyond, serving not just VASVW but all Veterans in what they do, everyday, in their own way, quietly, picking up the slack.

Bernard Malamud wrote, “Without heroes, we are all plain people, and don't know how far we can go”. These six show us all the path to how far we can go. They are the ultimate team leaders. Follow them and you will, at some point, meet with success.

Finally, to all of our shipmates in VASVW and the Blue Water fight, here is some wisdom from the great American jurist, Oliver Wendell Holmes:

“For I say unto you in all sadness of conviction that to think great thoughts you must be heroes as well as idealists. Only when you have worked alone -- when you have felt around you are a black gulf of solitude more isolating than that which surrounds the dying man, and in hope and despair have trusted to your own unshaken will -- then only can you gain the secret isolated joy of the thinker, who knows that a hundred years after he is dead and forgotten men who have never heard of him will be moving to the measure of his thought -- the subtle rapture of postponed power, which the world knows not because it has no external trappings, but which to his prophetic vision is more real than that which commands an army. And if this joy should not be yours, still it is only thus you can know that you have done what lay in you to do -- can say that you have lived, and be ready for the end."

Fortitudine vincimus.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

HR 2254: The Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009

Marcus Annaeus Seneca wrote:

The conditions of conquest are always easy. We have but to toil awhile, endure awhile, believe always, and never turn back.

HR 2254 is finally here. It promises to right many wrongs perpetrated against so many Veterans by the agency chartered to care for them.

There are things in it that perhaps belong in another bill, and there are some things that need correction, and one item that needs to be added, but overall, this bill restores benefits that were taken away by the Department of Veterans Abuse, from the Veterans who served gallantly in Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia [TLC], the Blue Sky Air Force Veterans, and the Blue Water Navy Veterans.

HR 2254 would establish once again the receipt of the Vietnam Service Medal as the qualifying criteria for presumptive exposure to herbicides while serving in and around Vietnam during the Vietnam War.

The bill contains a reference to Veterans who served on Johnston Island, a group that perhaps would be better served in what we hope will soon arrive: A toxins bill covering all other herbicide exposures during the Vietnam War era and toxin exposures to our Veterans who served in Gulf War I.

We believe the language citing the Vietnam Service Medal or the Vietnam Campaign Medal as the qualifying criteria for presuptive exposure to be an error. The Vietnam Campaign Medal was awarded to those who served in the combat zone for six months or more, AND who received either the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal for service in Vietnam, or the Vietnam Service Medal. One had to have one of the latter two in order to be awarded the Campaign Medal. Instead, we believe the language should read to include the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal for Service in Vietnam, not the Vietnam Campaign Medal.

Finally, we believe it is important that retroactivity be covered properly in this bill. While the effective date goes all the way back to 1985, it does not address those who accepted the DVA at their word after a denial and did not file an appeal. All the policy changes to the DVA's M21-1 Manual that resulted in the removal of groups of eligible Veterans from benefits under the Agent Orange Act of 1991 were done without putting the changes out for public comment, and without making appropriate changes to 38 CFR without public comment, thus depriving the public, including the Veterans of due process, and their Constitutional right to address the government. Ergo, all claims denied after those changes were made were incorrect, extralegal, and should be automatically reviewed for reversal. If language is not included in this bill, all those Veterans will be forced to file separate appeals, and litigations up to and including the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims in order to seek the justice required to reverse those decisions. A simple statement to this effect in the legislation would eliminate this problem.

We noted elsewhere today that:

Right and justice have little to do with it. And if you think we and our cause are not part of a larger picture, think again. Our bill [HR 2254] would be an enormous smackdown of the DVA. Our bill would restore faith in the Veterans of the future that their benefits will be there when they need them. Our bill starts the ball rolling toward a complete makeover of the mindset locked in the brains of all those DVA employees. Oh yes, and our bill rights a terrible wrong done to far too many, and does so many years too late for far too many more.

Writing letters to Akaka and Filner at this time are pointless. Akaka is well aware of HR 2254. And he is content to wait until it comes to him passed by the House.

I cannot emphasize this enough. We must focus ALL, repeat ALL of our efforts at getting co-sponsors in the House for HR 2254 and a Sponsor to introduce, and co sponsors for the bill in the Senate. And we are failing miserably at the moment.

Letters do little and take too long. I keep pointing that out. Personal contact. Face to face with your elected Congressional Reps and Sens. Phone calls, get to know their staff, and nicely ask for their assistance in getting your message to the Senator or the Congressman. Go to their offices. This is not yet the time for a March on DC, but it IS the time to march on your elected Congressional delegation.

And do not forget the state representatives. Contact them and ask for their help by getting them to float a resolution calling for the entire state Congressional Delegation to support HR 2254 and the funding for it.

Folks, our bill will sit in the Subcommittee where it now resides until such time as Filner thinks he had enough Co-sponsors to give the bill a chance. The bill will not see hearings until that time. And we are very far below what he needs.

Indeed, the numbers recorded on the polls on the right side of theis page are woefully inadequate to acheive any measure of success in getting HR 2254 enacted.

Here is what we need:

We need more cosponsors in the House & Senate.

We need full support for HR 2254 AND for its funding, from as many Members of the House and Senate as possible.

We URGENTLY need a Senator to Introduce the Bill in the Senate!!!!!

We need all 50 state legislatures to pass a resolution calling on their respective state Congressional Delegations to support HR 2254 and its funding --ASAP!

We need public awareness of this issue in the print and electronic media.

Ladies and genetlemen, fellow Veterans, this is it. Our last shot at obtaining justice, at restoring our historical legacy, at securing our financial legacy for our survivors, and obtaining the medical treatment we require.

Our enemy is the DVA. They have already struck a blow against us by using scare tactics in their estimates of the cost of HR 2254. We have countered them with Chairman Filner and staff, but every Congressman and Senator you approach needs to be made aware that the bill should cost less than $3 billion the first year [to cover retroactive benefits as well as on going], and a budget bump of less than $1 billion after that, diminishing as time goes on and Veterans and their surviviors pass on.

Compared to TARP and all the other bailouts, this is a drop in the bucket.

When you contact your elected officials to get their support make sure you mention this estimate. It is far more valid than the $27 billion the DVA or the DVA inspired Congressional Budget Office "estimated".

There's not much else to say except this is it. We need to pass this, and hopefully the Toxins Bill when it comes out, along with several other bills you can read about on the trackers at the top of the right sidebar. After that, we'll take stock and see what is next. We have a list of fixes for the DVA, but these are the important first steps.

Think BIG, folks!

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

At War with the DVA: Right and Wrong

My friend says, "With the DVA, it's about right and wrong, and they are just wrong...on so many things they do, and don't do." She is absolutely correct.

We would add that Congress is frequently in the same boat. At least their intent is good...sometimes.

Representative Linda Sanchez [CA-39] has introduced a resolution on the floor of the House to create a Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day. The intent, of course, is to honor all Vietnam Veterans. And there is where we come to the sticking point.

It used to be that if you received the Vietnam Service Medal, then you were a "Vietnam Veteran." Now, however, we who served on ships afloat in the South China Sea and Tonkin Gulf, along with Air Force personnel who overflew the Republic of South Vietnam on many different types of missions, nearly all combat, or combat support, and those who served in Thailand, Laos and Cambodia, despite our Medal awards, have essentially been reclassifed by the Department of Veterans Affairs as "Vietnam Era Veterans."

If Vietnam Veterans allow this day to go into effect, tens of thousands of us who have been told our fight in the Vietnam War doesn't count will not be so honored because the DVA says we are NOT "Vietnam Veterans", but rather "Vietnam Era Veterans." Representative Sanchez and the 63 members of Congress who have co-sponsored her resolution [HRes 234] intend that we all be included. But Congress is too complicit in allowing 18 years to pass with the DVA hijacking the Agent Orange Act of 1991 without lifting a finger to stop them. So much for Congressional oversight.

We who are in limbo, however, feel differently. We have yet to be welcomed home. Our treatment at the hands of the DVA has been maliciously reprehensible, and probably criminally malfeasant and negligent. An oblivious Congress has allowed the DVA to hijack the Agent Orange Act of 1991 right from the start, 18 years ago. They have hijacked it, not with science, for there is no science to back what they have done, but with legalese. They have used legal mumbo-jumbo to disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of Vietnam Veterans from the benefits that Congress intended for them, and in so doing, moved them from the category of "Vietnam Veterans," to the category of "Vietnam Era Veterans".

Consider, Blue Water Sailors have been denied their Agent Orange Benefits with the words, "You did not serve in Vietnam." That phrase means we are not "Vietnam Veterans". It means we are Vietnam Era Veterans, just the same as any Army guy who spent the war years in Germany, or Air Force guy who spent the war years in Spain, or the Navy guys who were on Atlantic Fleet ships that were never deployed to Vietnam.

We were there. Many of us were on ships that provide the Army, Marines, Air Force, and our allies in the South Vietnamese military with gunfire support from just off the beaches of Vietnam. Others served on ships that launched sortie after sortie of bombing and strafing missions over both North and South Vietnam.

But despite evidence to the contrary, the Department of Veterans Affairs ASSERTS that Agent Orange stopped at the beach, and never went any farther, and never drifted through the skies, or if it did, it never crossed the coastline. Such "science" boggles the mind.

The members of VASVW have agreed to submit to their respective Congressional Representatives, the following resolution:

Whereas the government of the United States has declared through the Department of Veterans Affairs, that Veterans who served only in the waters off shore, the airspace above, and in Thailand, Laos and Cambodia during the Vietnam War are NOT Vietnam Veterans, but Vietnam Era Veterans, and

Wheras such discrimination includes true heroes such as Senator John S. McCain, and the hundreds of thousands of Veterans who volunteered for Vietnam Service, and

Wheras such discrimination is done in the face of the fact that all three of the groups involved were involved in combat operations, and were awarded the Vietnam Service Medal, not the Vietnam Era Service Medal, and

Whereas such Veterans are accorded less than War Veteran status by dint of these discriminatory actions, and

Whereas such Veterans then have been determined not worthy of the Welcome Home for Vietnam Veterans, and

Whereas such shameful treatment by the Government of the United States is contrary to all the historical records and true facts, and

Whereas the United States Congress has offered a resolution establishing a Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day,

Be it resolved that we Veterans and members of the Veterans Association of Sailors of the Vietnam War refuse to be so honored, and ask that all Vietnam Veterans refuse such honors, and that no welcome home is acceptable until such time as ALL true Vietnam Veterans are fully restored with their honor and their legacy, and their Veterans Rights and Benefits.

Congress wants us to feel welcome? Sorry, no can do.

We ask that all of you reach out to your Representative, especially if they are on the co-sponsor list below and get a copy of our resolution above into their hands.

Here is the list of current co-sponsors of Representive Sanchez's HRes234.

Rep. Ciro Rodriguez [D-TX]
Rep. Gwen Moore [D-WI]
Del. Madeleine Bordallo [D-GU]
Rep. Bob Filner [D-CA]
Rep. Timothy Bishop [D-NY]
Rep. David Loebsack [D-IA]
Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers [R-WA]
Rep. Ben Chandler [D-KY]
Rep. Joe Courtney [D-CT]
Rep. Joe Donnelly [D-IN]
Rep. Melissa Bean [D-IL]
Rep. Dana Rohrabacher [R-CA]
Rep. Donna Edwards [D-MD]
Rep. Barton Gordon [D-TN]
Rep. James McGovern [D-MA]
Rep. Betty McCollum [D-MN]
Rep. Raul Grijalva [D-AZ]
Rep. Barney Frank [D-MA]
Rep. Yvette Clarke [D-NY]
Rep. Tammy Baldwin [D-WI]
Rep. Tim Holden [D-PA]
Rep. Phil Hare [D-IL]
Rep. Dennis Moore [D-KS]
Rep. Michael Arcuri [D-NY]
Rep. Christopher Carney [D-PA]
Rep. Maurice Hinchey [D-NY]
Rep. Heath Shuler [D-NC]
Rep. Lincoln Davis [D-TN]
Rep. Marcy Kaptur [D-OH]
Rep. Russ Carnahan [D-MO]
Rep. Mazie Hirono [D-HI]
Rep. Dennis Cardoza [D-CA]
Rep. Jerry Moran [R-KS]
Rep. Jay Inslee [D-WA]
Del. Gregorio Sablan [I-MP]
Rep. Michael Capuano [D-MA]
Rep. Joe Baca [D-CA]
Rep. Candice Miller [R-MI]
Rep. Adam Schiff [D-CA]
Rep. Donald Young [R-AK]
Rep. Betty Sutton [D-OH]
Rep. John Sarbanes [D-MD]
Rep. Harry Teague [D-NM]
Rep. Martin Heinrich [D-NM]
Rep. Bart Stupak [D-MI]
Rep. Diane Watson [D-CA]
Rep. John Adler [D-NJ]
Rep. Brian Higgins [D-NY]
Rep. Robert Brady [D-PA]
Rep. James Moran [D-VA]
Rep. Eddie Johnson [D-TX]
Rep. Elijah Cummings [D-MD]
Rep. Leonard Boswell [D-IA]
Rep. Ben Luján [D-NM]
Rep. Timothy Walz [D-MN]
Rep. Charles Gonzalez [D-TX]
Rep. Steve Scalise [R-LA]
Rep. Bruce Braley [D-IA]
Rep. Mike Ross [D-AR]
Rep. James McDermott [D-WA]
Rep. Luis Gutiérrez [D-IL]
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords [D-AZ]
Rep. Frank Wolf [R-VA]

If Congress wants to welcome us home, let them restore our benefits and take steps to keep the DVA from doing the same to our latest Veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Leave no one behind.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Time for an Unconventional Fight

Although they will never admit it, last spring's campaign to send our Vietnam Service Medals back to the White House, the Senate and the House was a success. It was what prompted Filner to introduce the Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009. We all know that it subsequently got loaded down by other Veterans groups and failed to move out of committee last session. The bill died under its own weight.

Now we are three months late in the new bill that was promised.

We now ask ourselves, who has been missing from this fight? Not the FRA, which has been actively with us every step of the way, and not the V.V.A., which has also been directly involved with the legislative process to restore our benefits.

But outside of financial support for the Haas case, and a few resolutions on our behalf at their annual conventions, the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars have been noticeably absent.

That said, we need to hammer the VFW and the American Legion for never applying enough pressure by their legislative staff, and their Sr. Officers to get Filner and Akaka to pass the legislation.

Beyond funding the Haas Case, which I question would EVER have been a precedent since Haas was claiming direct exposure, the VFW and the Legion have done nothing, zilch, zero.

Why would you remain with a Veterans Organization that doesn't support you?

I'm sorry, I love the VFW. It is the first VSO I ever joined. A BT Chief came around the ship within hours of our first crossing into the Combat Zone and signed us up for $5 a pop in the Fall River, Mass. VFW Post. When I moved to my present location I went into the local VFW Post and fell in love with it. The people made me feel welcome without knowing a thing about me. I still feel that way even though they know me now. :)

I joined the American Legion when I got home, my father's post, and was elected as the youngest Jr. Vice Commander ever in my state. It didn't last, as I attended the meetings long enough to see they spent 10 minutes with the bar closed, raced through the meeting, and then opened the bar again, all without leaving their seats at the bar and the poker tables.

Great guys, lots of fun, but...

Now here we are 43 years later and what has either done for me? That may be short sighted, but as far as I can tell, they've concentrated on the WW I, WW II, and Korean war Vets, and skipped us entirely. I don't begrudge those Vets their organizational services, but would have liked to have been under that same umbrella. I never felt it was there for us.

Face it. we fought a war during which a minority of folks poisoned our legacy at home while the Government poisoned us in theater.

Two Vietnam Vets who served in the Navy have run for President, one a phony hero, the other legitimately a hero, and both were soundly defeated. There is a message in that. The people have never forgotten or forgiven us for the sins that were falsely charged to our accounts.

If we want that legacy, if we want those benefits, we must engage in unconventional warfare.

I am sending my VFW and American Legion Life Membership Cards back to their respective national HQ and renouncing my membership in both organizations. I am sending this statement with it:

Dear National Commander of the American Legion,

I am returning and renouncing my life membership in the American Legion to protest the extremely dissatisfying lack of public and lobbying pressure on Congress to restore presumptive Agent Orange benefits to Blue Water Navy, Blue Sky Air Force, and Thailand, Laos and Cambodia Veterans of the Vietnam War. Legislation a decade or more ago should have been enacted and would have corrected the path on which the DVA was embarked to deprive more and more Vietnam Veterans of their legacy and their rightful benefits. This inaction is disgraceful in a national Veterans Service Organization of the stature of the American Legion.

Merely mouthing words at a table in front of the Congressional Committees on Veterans Affairs, and issuing a resolution at a national convention is tantamount to lip service toward the hundreds of thousands of remaining Vietnam Veterans. Instead, your inaction has led to a whole class of Veterans being reclassified as Vietnam Era Veterans, no longer Vietnam Veterans, and the deprivation of rightful benefits.

It is to the utter shame of the American Legion that your inaction has led to the early deaths of far too many Vietnam Veterans, and the deprivation of benefits for tens of thousands of widows and survivors who will now never see a penny from the DVA.

American Legion, you have left us behind.

Sincerely,

Life Member # xxxxxxxxxx

I will of course substitute Veterans of Foreign Wars for American Legion with my second letter.

I will also remain a member of the Home Association of both of my local posts. It is not their fault that the National Officers have failed us.

I will be mailing these out on Monday.

I'm tired of waiting around and doing nothing while Congress fiddles with Welcome Home Vietnam Veteran resolutions [HRes 234] that do not include us instead of passing the legislation we need now!

Anyone care to join me in this?

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Welcome VASVW.org

We would like to introduce our readers to the new VASVW.org website, located at http://www.vasvw.org/. The site was put up by our great webmaster, Tom, and the current membership of VASVW is highly pleased with his efforts. It is first rate: Bravo Zulu, Tom!

On the website, among other things, you will see current news about Veterans and Blue Water Veterans issues, memorials to our members killed by friendly fire, links to Blue Water Navy ship's sites, and to organizations that may be of assistance to Veterans filing claims for benefits from the DVA.

Also there is a page for joining VASVW.org.

We suggest that you take a look at the VASVW.org website. Look around, you'll like what you see.

We also would like to issue an invitation to you to join the VASVW. Here is our mission statement:

The Veterans Association of Sailors of the Vietnam War, Inc is founded on the principle of furthering the benefits for Veteran Sailors of the Vietnam War, their families and survivors, and other Veterans of the Vietnam War, and the Vietnam Era who have been damaged by exposure to Dioxins from herbicides used, stored, or transshipped during that war. We welcome those who agree with and support our causes and efforts.

We espouse the concept that no one shall be left behind. We equally espouse the concept of a broad based, grass roots, common-sense effort to support any legislation that will further that cause, and do so expeditiously, and at no delay to others. We espouse the concept of mutual support, and comradeship among our member shipmates and comrades.

We believe in fairness, openness, and the inclusion of all in decision-making. Each member shall have full say, and each member shall have available full knowledge of the issues at hand. Each member is eligible for positions in leadership. Widows, survivors, and Veterans Advocates are welcome as members.

Membership is free.

Membership is free. Membership will always be free. We are not about money. We don't even have a treasurer. We held elections early last fall and those folks will be up for reelection in about six months. We are about providing mutual support to one another, spreading accurate information, and keeping each other informed as to the best practices to use when pursuing a claim with the DVA.

From personal experience we can promise you that the VASVW members are among the finest folks in the world. Won't you join us?

Click on the large orange logo on the left sidebar and join our group on Yahoo.

The VASVW is now a 501.(c)(3) registered non-profit corporation.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Go Get that Congressional Support!

Congress is in its Easter Recess [no separation of Church and State there, eh?], so here is a two week window to get to your Representative and your Senators and get their agreement to cosponsor the Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009!

Hit them at their offices, go see them where they are scheduled to speak! Talk to their staffers and find out how to get to them, and get an appointment. It only takes about 5-10 minutes out of their schedule to get their support.

You have until April 21st when they return to work, though they are due back on the 20th. Imagine your Senator after returning to DC from a meeting with you. On the 20th he does catch-up work in his office, and schedules a few golf outings with lobbyists. But one of the first things he does is consult with his Chief of Staff and tell him to be on the lookout for the Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009, so he can cosponsor.

That is the kind of effective work we are looking for from all of you. That, and spreading the word as much as poossible, to family, and friends, so that they may do the same work you are on behalf of the Agent Orange Equity Act of 2009.

Turn to, Sailors!

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.

Logic and the DVA

Well, the title is both telling and misleading, as there seems to be something askew in the logic of almost every decision and policy issued by the DVA. Come along with us on a little ride into the past and we'll illustrate what we mean.

Back in the late 1980s, Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, or "Zum" as we called him when he was Chief of Naval Operations, wrote a detailed report about the use and effects of herbicides [Agent Orange, or AO for our purposes here]. Zum's report was was done for the Department of Veterans Affairs, and was used to help frame the Agent Orange Act of 1991. After that, the DVA classified it and locked it up for ten years until someone leaked it.

After reviewing the history of the herbicide issue, Zum made his recommendations on compensation for Veterans who were exposed. He offered these two options:

COMPENSATION FOR SERVICE RELATED ILLNESSES

Alternative 1:
Any Vietnam Veteran, or Vietnam Veteran’s child who has a birth defect, should be presumed to have a service—connected health effect if that person suffers from the type of health effects consistent with dioxin exposure and the Veteran’ s health or service record establishes 1) abnormally high TCDD in blood tests; or 2) the veteran’s presence within 20 kilometers and 30 days of a known sprayed area (as shown by HERBs tapes and corresponding company records); or 3) the Veteran’ s presence at fire base perimeters or brown water operations where there is reason believe Agent Orange have- occurred.

Under this alternative compensation would not be provided for those veterans whose exposure came from TCDD by way of the food chain; silt runoff from sprayed areas into unsprayed waterways; some unrecorded U.S. or allied Agent Orange sprayings; inaccurately recorded sprayings; or sprayings whose wind drift was greater than 20 kilometers. Predictably, problems generated by the foregoing oversights, the mass of data to be analyzed as claims were filed, and the known loss of many service records would invalidate many veterans’ legitimate claims

Alternative 2:
Any Vietnam Veteran or child of a Vietnam Veteran who experiences a TCDD—like health effect shall be presumed to have a service—connected disability. This alternative is admittedly broader than the first, and would provide benefits for some veterans who were not exposed to Agent Orange and whose disabilities are not presumably truly service—connected. Nevertheless, it is the only alternative that will not unfairly preclude receipt of benefits by a TCDD exposed Vietnam Veteran.

Furthermore, this alternative is consistent with the Secretary’s decision regarding the Service—connection of non— Hodgkin’s lymphoma, as well as legal precedent with respect to other diseases presumed by the Department of Veterans Affairs to be connected to one or more factors related to military service (i.e. veterans exposed to atomic radiation and POW’s with spastic colon).

This is crystal clear, and Congress opted for Alternative 2 when it enacted the Agent Orange Act of 1991.

Immediately, the DVA began shifting the policy from Alternative 2 to Alternative 1. It barred Veterans from Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia [TLC] from qualifying for Agent Orange benefits. Two years later they kicked the Blue Sky Air Force out of the Agent Orange Act. Ten years after the Air Force lost their benefits, the DVA issued a policy banning Blue Water Navy Veterans from receiving benefits.

Clearly, Zum's Alternative 2 would encompass all three Veterans groups. Clearly, the use of the Vietnam Service Medal as the establishing criteria, along with a qualifying disease, for presumptive exposure to herbicides, was how the AO Act of 1991 was administered from the start, and clearly that was the will and intent of Congress.

Zumwalt also talks in his report of how hard the DVA [and its predecessor, the VA] worked to fight off Herbicide benefits -- so hard that they falsified their own studies on contamination health issues, and did so to such a heinous extent that Congress ordered the CDC to take over the scientific studies.

Even then, the DVA interfered, just as they do today in quashing any attempt by the Institute of Medicine, the committee established to review fresh science with a view to expanding herbicide benefits, to do just that.

The motivation, we suspect, was money, and protection of both the chemical company manufacturers of the herbicides and the Federal Government from litigation for liability. Indeed, with the way Europe views the modern day USA, it could have conceivably brought charges in the World Court for Crimes Against Humanity. That possibility still exists [note the recent indictment of Bush Administration officials by a Spanish Court over post 9/11 policies overseas.]

The DVA and its respective successive Adminstrations is not alone in this conspiracy. Add Congress for knowingly ignoring the situation for almost 18 years. Add the Federal Court system that has rebuffed not only new Agent Orange civil cases, but benefit cases - repeatedly. When given an opportunity to set things right, they dodged the issue. The entire Federal Government has dirty hands on this.

But later, the Clinton and Bush administrations saw opportunities to use money appropriated for the Agent Orange benefits for the three disenfranchized groups, to embark on an enormous expansion of government. Thus the Rural Health Care Centers.

Consider, the DVA must locate a facility, or a property on which to construct a facility, supposedly situated in areas with Veterans needing health care from existing treatment facilities that are considered too far away to get to over a reasonable distance. Sounds like a great plan. They then construct or modify existing structures they acquire by rent or purchase. Then they equip them as medical clinics, and finally staff them with medical professionals. Imagine the costs.

Consider the alternative. The DVA issues the Veterans with a medical insurance card which is paid to any provider on the basis of the payment schedule for Medicare and Medicaid. No additional charges may be billed to the Veteran. The Veteran gets to be treated at any facility, no matter where it is. He can go to his family doctor for treatment. It would be covered. Levels of co-pays would vary according to disability rating and/or income levels or non-service-xonnected disabilities.

Which of those alternatives is less expensive?

So why the Rural Health Centers? We suspect there is a system of rewards and perhaps kickbacks with the contracts the DVA signs for property acquisition, and facilities modification or construction. And we think this also goes on at a grand scale, as is evidenced by the astonishing fleecing of the taxpayers to build the new VA hospital in Denver. It was set in place by Secretary Jim Nicholson, who resigned shortly afterwards to return to his "developer" career in the Denver area. The odor of that deal still reeks as far east as DC, where there must be other participants.

But this grew as more and more people needed to be "fed" as part of the system. So the DVA kicked out the Air Force, and later the Navy from AO benefits in order to hijack their appropriations to pay for more and more Rural Health Centers. And they used official intimidation to control employees, and others, such as the Institute of Medicine, to prevent having to give the benefits back to the Veterans.

When and if this alleged system is finally exposed, they can point to the fact that the money went to Veterans. But they will be hard pressed to justify the level of spending on an expensive expansion of government, that needlessly sidetracked funds that should have gone directly to Veterans who are sick and dying, and spent them on the expensive rural health centers. Developers, realtors, contractors and investors get very rich, and Veterans are dying all the while.

And the hands of many in Congress, the Executive Branch, and the Federal Court system will have dirt under their nails from this one.

That is a prediction.

The DVA requires proof to complete a successful claim for exposure to Agent Orange. Thankfully, their own court has now instructed them to provide evidence to deny. So, there are those in the Federal Government who have a clear understanding of what is right.

To date, the performance of the new administration and the new Secretary of Veterans Affairs shows the only difference from their predecessors is an even more virulent stand against the Vietnam Veterans. Two of the first memos issued by the Secretary changed the VA's policy on boots on the ground by putting a 24 hour minimum time limit on it where none existed before, and declare the South China Sea ports of Vietnam are not "Brown Water".

Never mind the question that comes up asking "how long must exposure last to contaminate and eventually kill a human being? Never mind the fact that while anchored in those coastal ports, bays, and harbors, US Navy ships were required to make fresh water out of the water in which they sat, which contained runoff loaded with dioxins.

We ask, then, "What science is behind these two memos?" The answer is: "NONE". Therefore, the motivation is further denial of benefits to the Blue Water Navy, Blue Sky Air Force, and TLC Veterans.

The motivation is money.

The motivation is greed, at the expense of hundreds of thousands of Veterans of the United States of America, Veterans who went to war, Veterans who almost entirely, were voluntary enlistments in the Navy, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, and Air Force.

We anxiously await the introduction of the Agent Orange Act of 2009 in great hopes that this cycle of greed might be broken and justice be served on those Veterans who are still alive, while the DVA has dallied away the lives of so many others by making a few people wealthy.

VNVets

”It is a stain on this nation's honor that the Department of Veterans Affairs has become a deadlier and more difficult adversary to the American veteran than any they have ever faced on a battlefield."-- VNVets

"The concept that Agent Orange, and its effects, stopped dead in its tracks at the shoreline is simply too illogical, and too ludicrous to accept. What does that say about the Bush Administration and his Department of Veterans Affairs?"--VNVets

"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." --President Abraham Lincoln

"It follows then as certain as that night succeeds the day, that without a decisive naval force we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious."--President George Washington

Copyright © 2005-2009: VNVets Blog -- Now in our Fifth Year of Service to Veterans; All Rights Reserved.