Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day

Vietnam veterans finally get their due

Monday ceremony part of day of honor
March 18, 2010 11:35:00 PM
By Howard Yune/Appeal-Democrat


For Vietnam War veterans, the first annual observance expressly in their honor is a chance to receive thank-yous deferred for decades.

Though belated, the ceremonies this month could undo some of the bitterness vented on U.S. soldiers in the late 1960s and give them the same appreciation given the veterans of other wars, predicted one of the observance's chief backers in the state.

"They were shocked. They didn't expect a heroes welcome, but they did expect to be treated like normal Americans," said Assemblyman Paul Cook, R-Yucca Valley, a 26-year Marine Corps veteran who served 13 months in Vietnam and co-wrote the Assembly bill to designate the day.

"It was a really bad time, and I think a lot of anger was directed toward veterans or anyone in the military — quite different from the attitude toward men and women serving today."

A Vietnam veteran in suburban Los Angeles, José Ramos, began petitioning cities and states a decade ago to give fellow veterans an observance distinct from Memorial Day and Veterans Day.

In September 2009, the Legislature passed a bill to recognize the day, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed it into law. According to the Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day Organization, 11 other states have created observances for March 30 — the day in 1973 when the U.S. withdrew its last troops from the country, two years before communist North Vietnam's conquest of the south, which American forces had backed for more than a decade.
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Vietnam veterans finally get their due