Research - Rehabilitation - Re-Employment

Sgt. Shaft 11/29/99

Dear Sgt. Shaft:
I am the President of a group called the Vietnam War In Memory Memorial, Inc. Our goal is an approximately 3-foot by 3-foot plaque to be placed somewhere near the Wall to honor those who have died since the war because of their Vietnam War experience. These deaths include cancers. Both my brother and Elmo Zumwalt III died of non-Hodgkins lymphoma as have thousands of others. Other deaths, such as the suicide of Lewis Puller, Jr., have been caused by Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. We would appreciate any help you can give us. Our web site is http://members.aol.com/vietwarmem/plaque.htm. 

Thanking you in advance for your assistance, 
Ruth Coder Fitzgerald
Fredericksburg, VA

Dear Ruth:
Another special Vietnam veteran who lost his fight with service-connected cancer was good friend Dean Phillips. Like buddy Lew Puller, he not only fought for his life, but also fought courageously for his fellow Vietnam veterans. I agree that they and others deserve a memorial plaque at the Wall.

Dear Sarge:
I received the following from a long and dear friend, a former USAF C-103D (ski equipped) driver who spent his active duty time hauling "trash" to a remote site on the DEW Line during the Cold War. Not very glamorous duty to say the least. I spent 11 years in the USAF as an enlisted type, in GCI and ATC radar, a year of which was assigned to the Da Nang Approach Control (3rd NAW, USMC) during 1966/67. Important, but not your down in the bushes grunt work.

Anyway, the enclosed says an awful lot about what a vet is and I thought I would forward it for your info.

Mike O.
Herndon, VA

What is a Vet?
Some veterans bear visible signs of their service: a missing limb, a jagged scar, a certain look in the eye. Others may carry the evidence inside them: a pin holding a bone together, a piece of shrapnel in the leg -- or perhaps another sort of inner steel; the soul's ally forged in the refinery of adversity.

Except in parades, however, the men and women who have kept America safe wear no badge or emblem. You can't tell a vet just by looking.

What is a vet? He is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia sweating two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel carriers didn't run out of fuel.

He is the barroom loudmouth, dumber than five wooden planks, whose overgrown frat boy behavior is outweighed a hundred times in the cosmic scales by four hours of exquisite bravery near the 38th parallel.

She -- or he -- is the nurse who fought against futility and went to sleep sobbing every night for two solid years in Da Nang.

He is the POW who went away one person and came back another -- or didn't come back at all.

He is the Quantico drill instructor who has never seen combat but has saved countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account rednecks and gang members into Marines, and teaching them to watch each other's back.

He is the parade-riding Legionnaire who pins the ribbons and medals with a prosthetic hand.

He is the career quartermaster who watches the ribbons and medals pass him by.

He is the three anonymous heroes in The Tomb of the Unknowns, whose presence at the Arlington National Cemetery must forever preserve the memory of all the anonymous heroes whose valor died unrecognized with them on the battlefield or in the ocean's sunken deep.

He is the old guy bagging groceries at the supermarket -- palsied now and aggravatingly slow -- who helped liberate a Nazi death camp and who wishes all day long that his wife were still alive to hold him when the nightmares come.

He is an ordinary and yet an extraordinary human being -- a person who offered some of his life's most vital years in the service of his country, and who sacrificed his ambitions so others would not have to sacrifice theirs.

He is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness, and he is nothing more than the finest, greatest testimony on behalf of the finest, greatest nation ever known. So remember, each time you see someone who has served our country, just lean over and say "thank you." That's all most people need, and in most cases it will mean more than any medals they could have been awarded or were awarded. Two little words that mean a lot, "Thank you."

It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who has given us the freedom to demonstrate. It is the soldier, who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protestor to burn the flag.

Authored by Denis Edward O'Brien, USMC

Dear Mike:
Thanks for sharing Denis O'Brien's thoughtful prose. The meaningful words remind us that every day should be Veterans Day.

Shaft Kudo

The Sarge is looking forward to addressing the VA Alumni Association at its annual Holiday Luncheon on December 9 at the Pier 7 restaurant in Washington, D.C. Happy hour begins at 11:30 a.m., followed by lunch at noon. Association President Jim Fischl is asking all members to bring a nonperishable food item for distribution to needy families during the holiday season. The meeting will feature a host of door prizes and good fellowship. For more information on the luncheon, or on joining the Association, call Leon Sanchez at 703-451-7529.

Send letters to Sgt. Shaft, c/o John Fales, P.O. Box 65900, Washington, D.C. 20035-5900; fax to 301-622-3330; call 202-462-4430 or email sgtshaft@bavf.org.

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