Thread: Vietnam Vets, sign in please.

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Welcome back to the "World" !

Do you miss the taste of "33 BA Muoi BA "?, Ham and Lima Beans?, how about "wait a minute vines" ? ,..... To the men of the 3rd Mar. Div. 3rd Force Recon Co. Quang Tri / Phu Bia, 69-71, You are thought of often.

You are more than welcome Jack, and thanx to ur father, grandfather and condolences on your late brother, may he rest in eternal piece...when next u speak to him as im sure u often do, tell him THANKS from a fellow VN vet

I am a VietNam vet also. In country from July 70-July 71. B-Btry (battling bastards) 5/42 FA. 2nd Field Forces.

I am also a GWVet, and I want to thank all the Vietnam Vets for their service and say welcome home. My dad (passed away in 2006-Agent Orange) was there twice and I remember when he came home the last time. I think all of the GWVets should give honor to those before use, they fought real wars and paid a much different price than we did.

WELCOME HOME BOYS

There's some sweet coincidence in this thread resurfacing after being asleep for a few years. Early last August four of my buds from the 553rd and I met in Las Vegas after not seeing each other in over 40 years. We had a ball, and it seemed like we'd only been apart a couple weeks. Grown, old men acting like kids again. We made it a mission to try to locate as many of the ol' guys as we could and see what happens. We thought it would be great to have a reunion later this year. Well, I just got back from having a planning meeting in LV with 17 of them and we're on for October. Same thing happened again with the dozen "new" members of the group.......war stories, and good fun. We've located 142 so far, 29 of which are in the big hangar in the sky. Each of them has stories about the other, some of which long forgotten, some even have pictures to back them up.................I would guess some folks wish there weren't that much evidence! Anyway, it's just been great seeing those guys again.

PS; are you still out there John?

I served,my brother and five cousins Vietnam ranging from 1966 to 1973 all in country one in Korea. Father and 6 uncles served in WWII. My youngest son now serving in the US Marines. All that have or are serving deserve all the respect that should be given them in country or out. With out each and everyone of them and you that served we would not have the freedoms we now have. thats all I got to say, I find most vets don't talk about it much.

Bob,

Do you think the coincidence has anything to do with this numerology thing.

Jack.

I too am a Viet-Nam Vet who suffers from the effects of herbicide exposure(Agent Orange). I however am more fortunate than most who suffer and have suffered and died from this. After 31 years of fighting with the VA, in and out of hospitals sick as a dog I was able to win 100 per cent compensation for my suffering, tho they WOULD NOT pay me for the Agent Orange contamination. What they did was to cover themselves by giving me 100 per cent and labeled it as POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER, in spite of the fact that i have NEVER been institutionalized or even recommended for so much as an in-house evaluation, nor have i ever been treated for same by AMY VA Dr. or therapist.
This indicates the lenth to which the VA will go to avoid responsibility for this poisoning of SO MANY Viet-Nam Vets, all my meds, some 600+ per month issued are just that MEDS to control the physical symptoms of the poisoning which was affecting me and causeing illness even before i left Nam.
Its said that only the AIR FORCE applied the chemical, this is a blatant lie. so did the Army, the marines and the navy. Let me run down to u how this worked, After the 1968 TET OFFENSIVE it was decided that there was an imminent need to get rid of the dense foilage around base camps, as well as to clear same in order to set up base camps. The proposed areas for NEW camps would b sprayed dailey for 2 weeks. once the vegatation was dead, the area would b cleaned off of the dead vegatation and the cleared grounds would b then sprayed to prevent the vegatation growing back, THEN the perimeter for the next 500 yards would b sprayed so as to prevent cover close to the camp where the enemy could approach unseen. In addition, not knowing the effects on them by the chemical, there was abundant misuse and misapplication of the chemical. In one company in which i served, it was used inside the compound to keep vegatation from growing in the boundaries between the nato units stationed there, Not only were there American combat troops but also French, Phillipino and Australian. as a Helicopter flight engineer i was one of those who actually transported the chemical, in fact aviation personel such as myself actually gave the name AGENT ORANGE since it was delivered in either Olive drab or navy gray 55 gallon drum with a BIG ORANGE Stripe around them. The Popularity of the GET SMART TV series at the time led to the moniker AGENT ORANGE since the mil spec name on the barrels read defoiliation agent. Essentually after the TET Offensive in 68 there was NO CAPACITY in which a soldier could serve in Nam without being exposed in some manner. With so many surviveing vets yet living its easy to understand why the VA and the goverment would want to cover up and deny this. Its a can of worms that could cost BILLIONS in compensation.
AS Viet-Nam Veterans we filed a class action law suit against the manufacturers and marketers of the chemical, Dow, Monsanto, Allied and Union Carbide Chemical companies, DOW was the original contractor who sub contracted production to the other companies, while Georgia Pacific Forestry were the testers. Since these were goverment contracts, there was obstensively NO way for us to win, the hope was that they would put enough pressure on the gov such that THEY would b forthcoming. They weren't, and to avoid and end the publicity that was hurting their business, especially after the BO-Paul incident that the 5 companies set up a trust fund for the contaminees and based on their evaluation of how much responsibility rested with each company each contributed amounts that totaled 10 million and placed same in a National bank in Smithtown, NY where it sat for over a decade collecting interest since the VA was left to decide who could get funds from the fund. The requirement that any complainee would have to submit to a 5 part biopsy which they would have to pay for out of pocket, and the results of the biopsies were required to show " the significant presence of Dioxin(the active ingrediant in Agent Orange) in at least 3 of the biopsy results, Stomach, liver, spleen, heart, and lungs. To top this all off, results from but 3 sources were acceptable, Stanford University Hospital in California, Humana Medical Center in KY and Bathesda Naval Hospital. The closest acceptable testing site for me living in Michigan was Humana. i researched the cost, best i could hope for with discounts was 17k, JUST for the surgeries plus the cost of hospitalization, travel etc. In short, unless u were of a wealth where u didn't actually NEED compensation u would b unable to afford this, besides an extensive biopsy such as this was best done POST MORTEM, since it involved surgeries whereby tissue samples were taken from the 5 parts thru open surgery. Besides, unless u met the 3 with " significant dioxin pressence rule" u would have spent a chitload of loot and did a whole lot of suffering for NOTHING.
After another decade of pressure by the VFW, Viet-Nam Vets of America, DAV and other vets and vet organizations, the VA decided to disperse the trust fund among ONLY those Viet-Nam veterans already recievin compensation from either the VA or SS who had complaints of Agent Orange poisoning within their VA File. Not having recieved a disability rating from either at the time, i was not allowed to collect any money from the fund.
From what i can tell, the gov is engaged in much the same sweep under the rug tactics with the current Gulf War syndrome sufferers, so let us not forget to honor and praise those brave young soldiers who may well go thru as many years of fighting and suffering and death from this as i and so many Nam vets did.
As has been noted by some of u, Viet-Nam vets are in general not prone to talk much about their experience but to other Viet-Nam vets since few if any others can begin to comprehend what a tour in Nam did to one. After 10 years of treatment and counsoling at my and my families own expense I learned that the experience is NOT something one can get over, but one that u must learn to get past, the best way to do that is to talk about it, get it off your chest.
Thanx fellow vets of ALL our wars, and thanx to the families of same who suffered right along with the returning veterans. You can't imagine how many families that have been broken up and devastated by what war veterans suffered AFTER they returned home, and until very recently, after the 911 incident, the VA Hospital system was among the last places u wanted to go for treatment of Agent Orange poisoning. Your only hope of compensation was to so suffer from post traumatic strees in addition to ur physical ailments fom exposure such that they could write u off in compensation for THAT, not the poisoning, JUST LIKE they finally did me, after 31 years. As I expect would so many vets say, in spite of all this, i would gladly go to serve all over again were i called upon, and just as i did, do so honorably. Let the fact that i dislike many of the things that i went thru not give u the impression that i do not yet LOVE AMERICA and still think its the greatest country on Earth. BTW I am Black, born in 1949 u may well have clue what all ELSE i have suffered in this country during the racially turbulent 50's and 60's. Still this is MY country as much as anyone else's and thus it is my obligation to serve when called upon.

Originally Posted by Jack F

Bob,

Do you think the coincidence has anything to do with this numerology thing.

Jack.

You've STILL got that Twilight Zone theme playing in your head don't you Jack?

Ok lets see some of those young guns Here's mine, that's me on the right. 1965
Ken

I was lucky - I'm a Viet Nam era vet that never made it there though my battalion deployed several months after I got out - and if you were army then you know what happens to combat engineers in war zones.

I too am a Viet Nam era vet that didn't serve in country. The closest made it was Utapao, Thailand. Just a young P3 ground pounding sailor deployed to an Air Force base.

Originally Posted by Ken Thurm

Ok lets see some of those young guns Here's mine, that's me on the right. 1965
Ken

So, THAT'S what you look like without a beard! Otherwise, nothing else has changed!

Well okay, since you started it, here's a crew pic from some time in '68, I'm standing to the (your) right of the nose gear.

yes i do know what happens to combat engineers deployed in war zone for the US Army, even so, tho u didn't actually serve in country u served in suport of those of us who DID serve in country and i for one would like to thank u for THAT....Thanx...

I was never in country, but was in the Navy from '68 to '72 at the pilot training base in Corpus Christi working on radial recip engines. There was a big civilian ARADMAC operaton on post where they rebuilt Huey's and Cobras, and things became more focused for me in '71 when I saw a Huey go by on a truck, just the burned out shell, and a 'What? Me Worry' Wiley Coyote nose art. I had seen that Huey in a magazine a just few months earlier with the crew posing beside their plane.