Our names are on that great wall

There are times when I just take in all I read, feeling adding something is not necessary or I am just feeling too hopeless to post my two cents. This is not one of those times. When you read the following, know this was like a conversation I had today with a Vietnam veteran talking about coming home and being treated like a criminal. Actually it was worse than being treated like a criminal because they had an easier time finding work out of jail than a soldier did out of the military. It is also true the VFW wanted nothing to do with them, but none of the other groups wanted them on top of that. Families and friends didn't want to hear anything other than some morbid curiosity questions. We know how bad they had it but we dismiss how bad they still have it after all these years.

Words hurt but actions can help remove the pain careless words create. We had the chance when in the late 80's and 90's monuments went up and the Vietnam veterans were invited to participate in parades. We had the chance but when they had to fight tooth and nail for everything the VA granted them, it seemed society was still trying to take away from them. This happened after the Gulf War when they were greeted with cheers, yellow ribbons on the doors of businesses and ceremonies from coast to coast. We realized more than ever how we mistreated the Vietnam veterans. We were not about to repeat the same mistakes but as for making things up to them, well, let's just say it was not the top priority of this country.

Now we are repeating the same mistakes all over again. We want to do the right things for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans but we seem to be pushing them to the front of the line while Vietnam veterans are pushed back. Why can't we ever manage to get it right once and for all for all our veterans at the same time?

“The real shame isn’t on the VFW wall,” he said. “The real shame is that a veteran has to fight to get medical care that he was rightfully promised.”

‘Our names are on that great wall.’
Kelsey Palmer
Jacksonville Progress

JACKSONVILLE — After 40 years of silence, two Vietnam veterans decided to come clean about their experiences as servicemen both on and off duty and the many struggles they faced after returning home.

Brothers and native Jacksonville citizens Dale and Larry Walker first approached the Progress staff with their story after seeing a letter to the editor in the Sunday, Feb. 14 issue of the newspaper titled “VFW Wall of Shame?”

“This letter suggests that some of the names of soldiers listed on the map of Vietnam in the VFW entrance didn’t fight in the Vietnam War,” Larry said. “I have no way of knowing of names on that wall that didn’t serve, but I know that all of us (Dale, my three other brothers, and I) honorably served the United States in that war, and I’m proud to say our names are all on that great wall.”

Larry, who served in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War, said the general mistrust of the military during the time the Vietnam War was fought caused a great deal of shame for both him and Dale.
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Our names are on that great wall