by Joseph L. Galloway

It is autumn, and the air is crisp and cool at night at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.

It gets very quiet at The Wall around midnight. The tourists have gone home, and are all tucked into bed.

A homeless Vietnam veteran patrols the black granite panels. He tells us that he has cancer and is having a hard time getting any benefits from the Veterans Administration. He lives in a mission that houses those who have nowhere else to go, but the doors don't open until 11 p.m.

He sees my interest in Panel 3-East, the third panel to the east of the apex of the memorial, and he asks if I was there at the Ia Drang Valley battles that contributed 305 of the names that are on that panel. I nod, and he grows animated. "Oh, I know these guys well. Or at least I know their names." He begins calling the roll to prove it: "Henry T. Herrick, John Geoghegan, Willie Godboldt, Travis Poss, Carl Palmer, Wilbur Curry, Thomas C. Metsker . . . ."

Twenty, then 30 of the names trip off his lips. "I tell people about them when they ask."

So do I.

We slip a few bucks into his hand for something to eat and he wanders off into the night, heading for the mission and a cot where he can rest his head until 7 a.m., when he and the other homeless are shooed out to begin another day of waiting for something good, finally, to happen to them.

I hope that he lives long enough to collect some benefits and get some medical help from the VA, although given the 6- 8-month backlog in processing veterans' claims, there's no guarantee that he will.

I stand before Panel 3-East and slowly scan those names, remembering their stories, their hometowns, their wives and children, remembering, too, how and where they died and what it all means.

Did they die so that a brother veteran can die waiting in line for a little help from the nation that sent them all off to war in the prime of their youth?

Did they die so that four decades later, an American president and his cronies could start another needless war in a far-off land, a war that to date has dragged on almost as long as the one they fought in Southeast Asia?

Did they die so that wounded veterans of that war could come home to a lot of "Welcome Home" greetings and a lot of "Support Our Troops" bumper stickers, but facing the same fight that America's veterans have always faced when they try to get treatment and benefits from our Army and our Veterans Administration?

Did they die so that an administration full of draft dodgers and draft avoiders and almost bereft of anyone who ever wore a uniform or heard a shot fired in anger could prance around presenting themselves as wartime leaders?

Did they die so that 10,000 craven politicians could stand on bandstands and make speeches full of empty praise for those who protect and defend this country and make empty promises of how they guarantee that our wounded, our new veterans, will be treated better than their fathers and grandfathers were when they came home from their wars?

The men and women who wear the uniform today are, many of them, on their fourth or fifth combat tours in Afghanistan or Iraq. They and their families do all the suffering and sacrificing for the rest of us.

Meanwhile over in the Pentagon, the bean counters run their computers and come up with the good news: The economic meltdown in America, the growing ranks of the unemployed, the complete lack of work or prospect of a decent future in the rural and urban backwaters of a great nation make for a boom in enlistments in our voluntary military.

If you sign on the bottom line because you have no other alternative, no other way out of nowhereville, are you really a volunteer?

The bands will play, and the old veterans will march proudly and the politicians will run their mouths this Veterans Day, just as they do every Veterans Day.

And the 400,000 dead of World War II and the 40,000 dead of Korea and the 58,260 dead of Vietnam and the 4,500 dead of Iraq and Afghanistan will rest silent and uneasy under the modest white marble tombstones that a grateful nation has provided them free of charge.

Across town, an old and ailing veteran of one of those wars will line up tonight for a cot in a mission and wonder whether he can live long enough to collect from the bureaucrats what we owe him.

On Army posts around the nation, the battalions and brigades and divisions are either just coming home after a year or more at war while other battalions and brigades are just saying their goodbyes and heading back out on their third or fourth or fifth deployments.

"Where have all the flowers gone?
Gone for soldiers, every one.
When will they ever learn?"
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/galloway/story/55633.html

how much more blood will spill,..

how many more will die,...

before all this insanity ends

More vietnam crapola is the only waste of time there is. Because of people who hide their heads in the sand is why they died in vain. That's the only vain thing about all this.


I have a suggestion..you all go to the mid east & wave the white flag to those terrorists you sympathize with & watch what happens. They will probly line you up & torture you till you're dead. Then they'll rape your women before they put the burkas on them.

Give peace a chance you say? LOL

Yes.

I dream of the day we, as a world, raise an entire generation that does NOT KNOW WAR...

What a wonderous place the earth could be.

they died for the imperialist hunger of the damn government.
that is why every single american soldier has died, to feed the tiger.
the tiger which wants more power over all the world.
But remember even Rome fell, and when it did, it did it hard.

We are not Rome.

We are the United States of America...

the PEOPLE.

Would Rome have even allowed Obama to run for president?

they allowed sick individuals like nero or vespasian to be emperors.
meaning that given the time and the culture of those days I may say that yes. they would.
they had several emperors who had not so good backgrounds, such they were born as slaves, but due to their military skills they went up in power til becoming into emperors.
If we are to extrapolate such situation into our days, I'd say yes, Rome would have elected Obama as president.

Somebody believes what she sees on TV and is told at the pulpit. That's so cute.

Madosonman, that was absolutley beautiful. Absolutley.

You are such a nice christian woman.

Yea looking back what did the Vietnam war do to really secure America?

Would over 50K be dead now if we had not gone in?

Now more have died in Iraq and Afghanistan then died in the 9-11 attacks . . . .

Think what ever you will, but we should learn from our mistakes.

It seems like "Learning" is not happening

But "Mistakes" keep happening

im glad that nobody on this thread...in mingle...or in society...has never felt a taste of what oppression is like.

Im glad nobody has ever had the oppurtunity to meet a terrorist (or any sort of just a basically evil person) and SHAKE their hand.

im glad that in America we dont see the effects of racisim and hate.... that every citizen of this great country raises our children better than that!! i mean shoot we dont hate anything. we even love the government.

now lets alllll hug!!!!
((((((everyone))))))))

I meet with murderers, rapists, drug dealers, etc. on a regular basis. I shake their hands sometimes. I smile even, and say nice to meet you. Good luck to you.

do you look in their eyes and see the evil that lurks within them??

A homeless Vietnam veteran patrols the black granite panels. He tells us that he has cancer and is having a hard time getting any benefits from the Veterans Administration. He lives in a mission that houses those who have nowhere else to go, but the doors don't open until 11 p.m.


I hope that he lives long enough to collect some benefits and get some medical help from the VA, although given the 6- 8-month backlog in processing veterans' claims, there's no guarantee that he will.


I am a veteran and I get Veteran benefits.

The 2 statements from the writer of the article are mostly false.


1... The VA hospital where I go does have a waiting list for some medical cases.

They do not let veterans suffer if they are in need.

If they have a backlog with canser and he needs treatment they will contract with another hospital to take care of him.


They also have thier own VA apartment house that is managed that no one can get into with out the proper code to open the door.

They take these homeless veterans and help them and get them a job and they stay their until they can secure a place of their own.

I personally know this is true. My Dr. decided he wanted me to have a sleep test but they were 18 months behind.


In a few months I get a letter for an appointment that was fully paid for at another hospital.

I know another veteran who needed a L5 disk replacement. They sent him to the best Specialist in town and he got his operation at another hosp. They did not do that thier. Niether did they send him hundreds of miles away to another VA hosp.

I have asked the question to the people who decide about these things about . What if I get into a accident 200 miles away and I I am unconscious and taken to a local hosp.

They told me the Hosp if you have a wallet should look to see if you have a VA card 1st. Then they should call us and like any insurance company we will talk about your condition and decide if you are stable enough to be transported here or if it would be best if they took over your medical needs for the accident until discharge.

If they do not call you need to call when you realize where you are at and the same thing will happen then.


So this writer I Know has a bias an personally is lieing about this Homeless veteran because. It is the best benefit I have recieved from the USAF. It is one of the few things that our govt. does not tick me off

I met people like that when i was younger

Before i came over here (US)

I still meet those kind of people

But the only difference is

They disguise here much better