Pioneering Montford Point Marines are honored in Florida

Pioneering Montford Point Marines are honored in Florida
By Matt Soergel
The Florida Times-Union, Jacksonville
Published: May 3, 2013

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Growing up, Leroy Jones Jr.’s five children couldn’t ever forget their father had been a Marine. There was his strictness, his preaching about the work ethic, about staying in shape, about putting your family first.

Then there was his insistence on getting up early — really early — in the morning. “Don’t let the sun bore a hole in you,” he’d say, dragging them out of bed.

“You could always tell he was a Marine,” said his son Oscar, 56.

“Everything a Marine’s got, he’s got,” said his oldest son, Carl, 58.

On Thursday afternoon, Leroy Jones Jr. got the highest civilian honor that the country gives, as he and fellow Marine Vincent Calhoun, 87, were awarded Congressional Gold Medals in a ceremony at Jacksonville City Hall.
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Last year I was able to interview one of these veterans. Charles O. Foreman.

Boston Marathon wounds raise anxiety for war veterans

It is not just the Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, but all veterans. Bombs have been planted in the earth for generations. For the OEF and OIF veterans, it is pretty raw emotionally. WWII, Korea, Vietnam and Gulf War veterans have been thru September 11th so they saw their anxiety level rise back then. This is yet one more reminder of lives on the line doing what this country asked of them. All of them need help right now.

Boston Marathon wounds raise anxiety for Iraq, Afghanistan war veterans
Long Island Newsday
April 21, 2013
By MARTIN C. EVANS

The horrific wounds on the legs of some Boston Marathon spectators were all too similar to those witnessed and experienced by U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Timothy Strobel of Shirley, a former Army medic, who rushed to aid the wounded when a Baghdad suicide bomber injured 38 Iraqi civilians at a crowded gas station in 2007, had to turn away from television images streaming out of Boston.

Christopher Levi of Holbrook, a former soldier with the 10th Mountain Division, who during a 2008 roadside bombing in Iraq lost both legs, felt vulnerable as he heard accounts of amputations in Boston.

They are among veterans who said the images from the Boston bombings, which killed three and wounded more than 170, inflamed their own anxieties about their experiences in war.

"It brought me right back there," said Strobel, 30, who served during one of the bloodiest periods of the Iraq War, and who now counsels veterans coping with war-related anxieties. "I had to turn the television off."

Strobel is a program coordinator for the Suffolk County-based PFC Joseph Dwyer Veterans PTSD Peer-to-Peer Program, which works with veterans who have post-traumatic stress disorder. After the group's Facebook page urged veterans who were experiencing anxieties related to the Boston bombings to contact the program, more than a half dozen replied.
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Generations of war veterans show what team work really is

Veterans from WWII to Afghanistan swap war stories, share bonds in Henderson courtroom
Las Vegas Sun
By Jackie Valley
Friday, March 8, 2013
WWII Veterans Honored in Henderson

Ninety-year-old Richard Zimpfer considers himself the lucky one.

The World War II veteran — part of a small team charged with maintaining anti-aircraft systems during the war — once drove a Jeep to retrieve an explosive that didn’t detonate. He returned unharmed.

Now he chuckles at the memory, but don’t call him a hero. He says he’s just one of many who served.

“I just feel I am lucky,” said Zimpfer, choking back tears as he spoke during a ceremony Thursday in Henderson’s Veterans Treatment Court. “I had a good time, and I have never regretted having served.”

Zimpfer and two female World War II veterans, Evie Hallas and Billie D’Entremont, received handmade quilts thanking them for their service and, perhaps more important, a round of applause from the people sitting in the courtroom, including a few younger veterans.

Veterans Treatment Court, a specialty court launched in June 2011, aims to help veterans who face issues — whether it be post-traumatic stress disorder or drug and alcohol addiction — after they return home from service. It enrolls veterans charged with certain misdemeanor crimes, such as drunken driving, petty larceny and possessing marijuana, and attempts to rehabilitate them through a team approach.
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Dale Robertson, soldier-turned-onscreen cowboy, dies at 89

Dale Robertson, soldier-turned-onscreen cowboy, dies at 89
By Randee Dawn
TODAY contributor

Dale Robertson, who used his Okie background and love of the American range to craft a long career in TV and film westerns, died at 89 on Wednesday near his home in San Diego, Calif. according to the New York Times.

He died of complications from lung cancer and pneumonia, his wife told the newspaper.

Robertson's career spanned the decades following WWII; he appeared in early television series including "The Iron Horse" and "Death Valley Days," and by the 1980s he had regular recurring roles on later shows like "Dallas" and Dynasty." He created and starred in the "Wells Fargo" series and served as the titular star in the 1987-88 series "J.J. Starbuck." Over the years, he racked up credits in over 60 films and 430 TV episodes.
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Troy veteran upset after GI Bill not offered

This is what happens when one generation of veterans is treated differently from all veterans.

Troy veteran upset after GI Bill not offered
Oakland Press
Published: Monday, February 18, 2013
By JERRY WOLFFE

A retired Army veteran says he and thousands of others in the military in the late 1950s and early ’60s were cheated out of veterans benefits.

Cicero Acton, now 73 and a retired veteran who spent his career as a Troy history teacher and coach, said communication with veterans was lacking.

During the administration of Republican President Dwight Eisenhower, the GI Bill was terminated.

The 1959 repeal provided that persons entering the military after Jan. 31, 1955, would not be entitled to any benefits at all, and those in the service prior to that date who had not signed up for its benefits by July 25, 1956, would receive nothing.

The U.S. Department of Veteran’s Affairs failed to inform them the GI Bill was reinstated in 1966 by President Lyndon Baines Johnson and made retroactive to those who served in the military from 1955.

“Those of us that graduated in the late 1950s (and were in the Armed Services) didn’t get the GI Bill,” Acton said.

“I am really bitter about it, not so much for myself but for others who could not afford to go to college. But I’m not the story, the story is the military didn’t inform those like me that they were entitled to educational benefits,” he said.

Veterans officials in Oakland County said Acton was mistaken about the GI Bill. The benefits were reinstated on March 3, 1966, by Johnson.
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WWII veteran proves PTSD is not new even tough it is news to some

WWII veteran proves PTSD is not new even tough it is news to some
by Kathie Costos
Wounded Times Blog
February 12, 2013

Before the cable news stations started running 24-7 news cycles, before the PCs and Macs started showing up in every home providing the public with a way of reading news from around the world, veterans were coming back home from war with what has been termed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

For some reason the younger generation of reporters have come to the conclusion that this is some kind of new illness no one ever heard of before. They believe they can get a scoop so they go to great lengths to get military brass to sit down for an interview. Unfortunately, they don't seem too interested in doing research on their own to even know what kind of questions to ask or follow up with what they were told with facts. This is why there is so much disinformation out there topped off with thousands of Facebook users mucking up what researchers discovered over the last 40 years.

Combat PTSD is not new. It is not the same as what civilians get from a one time event. It is not even the same as what survivors of abuse get after a lifetime of having their lives threatened. It isn't the same as emergency responders and firefighters get after many times of putting their lives on the line taking care of the citizens in their communities. It is close to the type of PTSD law enforcement officers get for the simple reason of being part of the traumatic event itself. They are not just responding after it happened. They are taking an active role in it, often meeting it with deadly force.

Still even that type of PTSD is not the same as Combat PTSD. For the men and women in the military, they are not just responding with deadly force, they live with the threat of dying on a daily basis for as long as they are deployed. They do not get to go home at the end of the day, back to where it is safe. They can't take a shower and wash the stench of war from their bodies or chill out in their favorite chair watching their favorite mindless TV show. They can't drive down the road to the next position they were ordered to without having to fear an IED blowing them up.

No, none of this is new. It has been called many things. During WWII it was called "shell shock" but the results are the same no matter what it is called by experts. It is a term that went back to WWI. To them it is simply hell.

Shell shocked During World War I, some people saw shell shock as cowardice or malingering, but Charles S. Myers convinced the British military to take it seriously and developed approaches that still guide treatment today.

By Dr. Edgar Jones
June 2012, Vol 43, No. 6
Print version: page 18

By the winter of 1914–15, "shell shock" had become a pressing medical and military problem. Not only did it affect increasing numbers of frontline troops serving in World War I, British Army doctors were struggling to understand and treat the disorder.

The term "shell shock" was coined by the soldiers themselves. Symptoms included fatigue, tremor, confusion, nightmares and impaired sight and hearing. It was often diagnosed when a soldier was unable to function and no obvious cause could be identified. Because many of the symptoms were physical, it bore little overt resemblance to the modern diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Shell shock took the British Army by surprise. In an effort to better understand and treat the condition, the Army appointed Charles S. Myers, a medically trained psychologist, as consulting psychologist to the British Expeditionary Force to offer opinions on cases of shell shock and gather data for a policy to address the burgeoning issue of psychiatric battle casualties.

Myers had been educated at Caius College Cambridge and trained in medicine at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, London. Shortly after qualifying as a physician, he took an academic post at Cambridge, running an experimental psychology laboratory. However, at the outbreak of the war, Myers felt compelled to return to clinical practice to assist the war effort. The War Office had turned him down for overseas service because of his age (he was 42), but undeterred, he crossed to France on his own initiative and secured a post at a hospital opened by the Duchess of Westminster in the casino at Le Touquet. Once Myers was there, his research credentials made him a natural choice to study the mysteries of shell shock in France.

The first cases Myers described exhibited a range of perceptual abnormalities, such as loss of or impaired hearing, sight and sensation, along with other common physical symptoms, such as tremor, loss of balance, headache and fatigue. He concluded that these were psychological rather than physical casualties, and believed that the symptoms were overt manifestations of repressed trauma.

Along with William McDougall, another psychologist with a medical background, Myers argued that shell shock could be cured through cognitive and affective reintegration. The shell-shocked soldier, they thought, had attempted to manage a traumatic experience by repressing or splitting off any memory of a traumatic event. Symptoms, such as tremor or contracture, were the product of an unconscious process designed to maintain the dissociation. Myers and McDougall believed a patient could only be cured if his memory were revived and integrated within his consciousness, a process that might require a number of sessions.

While Myers believed that he could treat individual patients, the greater problem was how to manage the mass psychiatric casualties that followed major offensives. Drawing on ideas developed by French military neuropsychiatrists, Myers identified three essentials in the treatment of shell shock: "promptness of action, suitable environment and psychotherapeutic measures," though those measures were often limited to encouragement and reassurance. Myers argued that the military should set up specialist units "as remote from the sounds of warfare as is compatible with the preservation of the ‘atmosphere' of the front." The army took his advice and allowed him to set up four specialist units in December 1916. They were designed to manage acute or mild cases, while chronic and severe cases were referred to base hospitals for more intensive therapy. During 1917, the battles of Arras, Messines and Passchendaele produced a flood of shell-shock cases, overwhelming the four units.

The bulk of the reporting done has been about OEF OIF servicemen and women suffering from PTSD and far too many taking their own lives however none of this is new. Good reporters manage to point that out so that new newer generation of war fighters take comfort in the simple fact while they are unique among the general population, what they are going thru is far from "new" to veterans that fought our battles long ago.

At the age of 87, WWII veteran Glenn Chaney finally received his PTSD claim of service connected disability from the VA. "Nearly 70 years later, Chaney is among the dwindling number of South Carolinians who fought in World War II. And at 87, he may be among the oldest to receive post-traumatic stress disorder benefits for it."

The truth is they were coming back home with the same enemy inside of them as this generation is. The difference is they came home, suffering in silence and isolated from others with the same list of symptoms. They did the same things this generation is. They just didn't get the attention from the press. No one cared. Long after the parades and cheering ended, their battles went on but no one noticed.

It happened to Korean War veterans. It happened to Vietnam veterans and Gulf War veterans and every other combat operation. The information was all out there but few knew about it.

This is why advocates are so frustrated. The research has been done for generations but instead of moving forward from what has already been learned, they repeat the studies and doom generations to suffer the same outcomes.

Troops help clean up WWII vet’s vandalized home

Troops help clean up WWII vet’s vandalized home
Army Times
By Gina Harkins
Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Feb 6, 2013 7:05:09 EST

Marines are stepping up to assist a 93-year-old World War II veteran after learning he returned from a doctor’s appointment to find his home destroyed by vandals.

Elbert Wood served as a Marine rifleman for four years before being medically discharged as a corporal for wounds sustained on Guam. He received two Purple Hearts during his time in the Corps. When he returned to his home in Houston on Jan. 21 — 19 days after losing his wife — he found the walls, furniture, appliances and carpet covered in spray paint.

“When I opened the door, I was just amazed to see spray paint on the walls,” he said. “I’m 93, so I have to walk with a walker, and I just went through the house and hollered around to ask if anyone was still there.”

Two juveniles were later arrested. His was the second home they allegedly hit that day, he said, and he would’ve shot them had he been home when it happened. But one of the fathers came to apologize later, and Wood said he felt bad that the father has such troubled kids, so maybe he wouldn’t have been so hard on them.

Veterans with GruntLife, an organization for combat vets started by former infantryman Derek Cloutier, turned to Facebook to gather donations. Their goal: to send Wood to Washington to visit the World War II Memorial and National Museum of the Marine Corps.

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Combat survivors spouse surviving guilt

Combat survivors spouse surviving guilt
by Kathie Costos
Wounded Times Blog
January 19, 2013

The subject of "survivor guilt" has made the news lately and rightfully so because it is a huge part of Combat PTSD. What does not get talked about is when the spouse ends up with it because the veteran has committed suicide or they had to end their marriage. Most of the time they had no knowledge of what PTSD was, what it was doing to their veteran and family other than it was being destroyed by the veteran. The more I learned, the easier it was to stay with mine.

Like many my husband enlisted in the Army, left for Fort Jackson and ended up with the 101st in Vietnam. He left as a civilian even though he came from a military family. His Dad served in the Army in WWII along with three uncles. The uncle he's named after was a Marine, killed in Saipan My husband did not come home as a civilian. He came home as a combat veteran with a year of memories from Phu Bai. By the time we met, he had been home for 10 years. He was also getting divorced from his first wife.

For me, my uncles served in WWII and my Dad was a 100% disabled Korean War veteran, so when he met Jack, he spotted what came home with him. My Dad called it "shell shock" so I did my research and understood what it was. No amount of research told me that mild PTSD would get worse untreated. He didn't want to go to the VA no matter how much my Dad told him he needed to. He wouldn't listen to me. He was listening to his Dad. His Dad said the "VA is for guys that can't work" not for him. Back then, he could work. He was doing ok with the nightmares and flashbacks, the twitches and mood swings. Then the secondary stressor hit pushing his mild PTSD into full blown.

Back then, families like mine suffered in silence. It was something no one talked about. It was something even less understood. What wives like me were told was just get a divorce. Veterans like my husband were thought of as just being "jerks" "druggies" and "alcoholics" destroying their families. My Mom knew that part well since my Dad was also a violent alcoholic until I was 13.

You need to remember that no one knew what was going on from state to state because no one had computers to read any news reports. Isolation was easy because Vietnam was not like WWII when everyone knew at least one veteran. Few knew a Vietnam veteran and what they ended up reading in the newspapers was usually bad. After all, reporters had no clue what life was like for them so when they were arrested, committed suicide or got divorced, they got blamed and no one blamed Vietnam. Extended families blamed them for marriages falling apart and many wives had no support to understand what was going on, so they blamed them too.

Even today with all the reports and research done on combat and PTSD, too many are left with little understanding. They still don't have what they need to get through all of this. I get emails and phone calls from spouses and parents. They tell me they just didn't know about any of this and then they feel guilty they didn't do things differently. They had no choice. No one gave them the information to have options and tools to cope. They made things worse because they didn't know any better. The mistakes I made with my own husband are too many to count but the more I knew, the more I understood and the more I was able to help him and in turn, myself. Everyday I do this work because I remember what it was like when I had no one to talk to, no place to get support to do it and above all, felt totally alone. For every veteran I help, I'm helping my husband when no one else would. When I help a family I am helping my own when no one else would.

This report from Mother Jones goes a long way toward bringing understanding for the forgotten warriors in all of this. The families on the front lines of the home front.

Is PTSD Contagious?
It's rampant among returning vets—and now their spouses and kids are starting to show the same symptoms.
Mother Jones
By Mac McClelland
January/February 2013 Issue

BRANNAN VINES HAS NEVER BEEN to war. But she's got a warrior's skills: hyperawareness, hypervigilance, adrenaline-sharp quick-scanning for danger, for triggers. Super stimuli-sensitive. Skills on the battlefield, crazy-person behavior in a drug store, where she was recently standing behind a sweet old lady counting out change when she suddenly became so furious her ears literally started ringing. Being too cognizant of every sound—every coin dropping an echo—she explodes inwardly, fury flash-incinerating any normal tolerance for a fellow patron with a couple of dollars in quarters and dimes. Her nose starts running she's so pissed, and there she is standing in a CVS, snotty and deaf with rage, like some kind of maniac, because a tiny elderly woman needs an extra minute to pay for her dish soap or whatever.

Brannan Vines has never been to war, but her husband, Caleb, was sent to Iraq twice, where he served in the infantry as a designated marksman. He's one of 103,200, or 228,875, or 336,000 Americans who served in Iraq or Afghanistan and came back with PTSD, depending on whom you ask, and one of 115,000 to 456,000 with traumatic brain injury. It's hard to say, with the lack of definitive tests for the former, undertesting for the latter, underreporting, under or over-misdiagnosing of both. And as slippery as all that is, even less understood is the collateral damage, to families, to schools, to society—emotional and fiscal costs borne long after the war is over.

Like Brannan's symptoms. Hypervigilance sounds innocuous, but it is in fact exhaustingly distressing, a conditioned response to life-threatening situations. Imagine there's a murderer in your house. And it is dark outside, and the electricity is out. Imagine your nervous system spiking, readying you as you feel your way along the walls, the sensitivity of your hearing, the tautness in your muscles, the alertness shooting around inside your skull. And then imagine feeling like that all the time.

I don't usually leave comments on websites unless they write something that hits me hard. This is one of those times.

You did a great job on this but a couple of things need to be pointed out. Less than half of the veterans needing help for PTSD seek it and the reported numbers leave out thousands of veterans along with their families. I am glad you mentioned Vietnam Veterans because Point Man International Ministries focused on them back in 1984 when they established Home Fronts to help families along with the Out Post for the veterans. I wrote my book in 2002 because I saw what was coming for the veterans and their families because reporters like you were nowhere to be found. No one cared. It is happening to this generation of families just as it happened to ours. I am glad you care enough to to do something for us, the forgotten families of combat veterans.

The reason why I left this comment is this part on page two.

BY THIS POINT, YOU MIGHT BE wondering, and possibly feeling guilty about wondering, why Brannan doesn't just get divorced. And she would tell you openly that she's thought about it. "Everyone has thought about it," she says. And a lot of people do it. In the wake of Vietnam, 38 percent of marriages failed within the first six months of a veteran's return stateside; the divorce rate was twice as high for vets with PTSD as for those without. Vietnam vets with severe PTSD are 69 percent more likely to have their marriages fail than other vets. Army records also show that 65 percent of active-duty suicides, which now outpace combat deaths, are precipitated by broken relationships. And veterans, well, one of them dies by suicide every 80 minutes. But even ignoring that though vets make up 7 percent of the United States, they account for 20 percent of its suicides—or that children and teenagers of a parent who's committed suicide are three times more likely to kill themselves, too—or a whole bunch of equally grim statistics, Brannan's got her reasons for sticking it out with Caleb.

None of this is impossible. If you want to prevent suicides, then take care of the families on the front lines of all of this. If you want to prevent them from becoming homeless, then take care of the families. Give them the knowledge they need to know so they can help their families heal from the combat they face at home. Our veterans deserve so much more than they have received and their families need to be included in on all of it because while they did not go, it came home to them.

Mississippi Middle Schoolers send WWII veteran back to battleground

Hulan Roberts, WWII Veteran, Has Wish To Return To Battleground Granted By Mississippi Middle Schoolers (PHOTOS)
By Sarah Medina
Posted: 12/25/2012

A World War II veteran's dream of returning to the land he fought in is finally being granted, thanks to the generosity of middle school students in Mississippi.

According to the DeSoto Times-Tribune, Hulan Roberts, who was aboard a B-17 bomber during the Battle of the Bulge in 1944, wished to return to the Belgian countryside. He wanted to see the towns and villages from the ground rather than the air.

"I'm as interested as anyone to go back and see it," Roberts said in a ceremony at DeSoto Central Middle School. Now, he will get his wish.
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Charles Durning: war hero and character actor

Charles Durning: war hero and character actor
Celebrity deaths
posted by halboedeker
December, 25 2012

He was awarded the Silver Star and three Purple Hearts. He will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

The life and art of Charles Durning are inseparable. He drew on what he had seen to enrich his acting. He had seen a lot as a soldier who survived the D-Day invasion.

His death Monday, at age 89, brought back a flood of movie and TV memories. He played confusion beautifully as Jessica Lange’s father in “Tootsie.”

Durning racked up impressive credits: ”Dog Day Afternoon,” “The Sting,” “Dick Tracy,” “Starting Over,” “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?” and the remake of “To Be or Not to Be.”
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Veteran's Stolen WWII Medals Replaced by Fellow Marine

Veteran's Stolen WWII Medals Replaced by Fellow Marine
The war medals were stolen from a home in Vista sometime between Nov. 27 and Dec. 15
By Monica Garske, Tony Shin and Elena Gomez
Sunday, Dec 23, 2012

A Marine who learned several World War II medals were stolen from a fellow veteran's home brought the 88-year-old vet a surprise on Friday: a new set of medals to replace his originals.

The medals were the only item taken from Clyde Kellogg's home in the 1000 block of Prospect Place in Vista sometime between Nov. 27 and Dec. 15, according to San Diego County sheriff's detectives.

The medals have no real monetary value, detectives said, but they do hold great sentimental value to the owner, a World War II Marine veteran who earned them while fighting in the war.
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Number of Veterans Who Die Waiting for Benefits Claims Skyrockets

Number of Veterans Who Die Waiting for Benefits Claims Skyrockets
by Aaron Glantz
Dec 20, 2012

Over the last three years, the number of veterans dying before their claims are processed has skyrocketed, reports Aaron Glantz of the Center for Investigative Reporting.

After seven months of delay, the Department of Veterans Affairs finally approved World War II veteran James Alderson’s pension benefits last week.

But it was not a cause for celebration or relief for Alderson, whose life’s work was the farm-supply store he founded near Chico, Calif., after returning home from the Battle of the Bulge.

The 89-year-old veteran had died three months earlier in a Yuba City nursing home.

“My father was a very proud person,” Alderson’s son, Kale, said. “Whenever I saw him, he would ask if I’d heard from the V.A. and whether his money would hold up. It really took a toll on him.”

The V.A.’s inability to pay benefits to veterans before they die is increasingly common, according to data obtained by the Center for Investigative Reporting. The data reveals, for the first time, that long wait times are contributing to tens of thousands of veterans being approved for disability benefits and pensions only after it is too late for the money to help them.

In the fiscal year that ended in September, the agency paid $437 million in retroactive benefits to the survivors of nearly 19,500 veterans who died waiting. The figures represent a dramatic increase from three years earlier, when the widows, parents and children of fewer than 6,400 veterans were paid $7.9 million on claims filed before their loved one’s death.

These veterans range from World War II veterans who die of natural causes without their pensions to Iraq War veterans who commit suicide after their disability claims for post-traumatic stress disorder are denied.
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Belgian teen gets wish to be US soldier at Fort Knox

Belgian teen gets wish to be US soldier
Published December 12, 2012
Associated Press

FORT KNOX, Ky. – A 16-year-old Belgian boy with cancer listened to his grandfather tell stories about United States troops liberating the country during World War II. On Tuesday, he got a chance to be one of those soldiers.

Antoine Brisbois was at Fort Knox for the first of a two-day visit that includes working alongside soldiers and training.
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WWII Medal of Honor Hero Sen. Daniel Inouye Hospitalized at Walter Reed

Sen. Daniel Inouye Hospitalized at Walter Reed
ABC News
Sunlen Miller
Dec 10, 2012

Sen. Daniel Inouye, the longest-serving sitting U.S. Senator, has been hospitalized at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, to regulate his oxygen intake, his office confirms this afternoon.

“For the most part, I am OK,” Sen. Inouye, D-Hawaii, said in a paper statement issued to ABC News, “However, I am currently working with my doctors to regulate my oxygen intake. Much to my frustration, while undergoing this process, I have to remain in the hospital for my own safety and to allow the necessary observation.”

On Thursday the 88 year-old senator was at admitted to George Washington hospital, where he remained thru Sunday. He was then transferred to Walter Reed, just outside of Washington, DC.

Inouye said he hopes to be back on Capitol Hill as soon as doctors will allow.
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Pennsylvania’s Oldest Living Marine From WWII Celebrates Her 97th Birthday

Pennsylvania’s Oldest Living Marine From WWII Celebrates Her 97th Birthday
December 3, 2012
By Kim Glovas

Grace Ricci Bergman is Pennsylvania’s oldest living Marine from World War II. (Credit: Kim Glovas)

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – Pennsylvania’s oldest living Marine from World War II is celebrating a milestone today. She — yes, she — is marking her 97th birthday.

Grace Ricci Bergman of Blue Bell served in the Marines at a time when women had limited options in the services. Bergman’s fiance and brother were serving in the military at the time, and she decided to join as well, unbeknown to her parents. When Bergman was accepted, she told her parents she had a new job. Bergman eventually told them what that job was, and off she went.
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WWII veteran signed up same day her husband did

Oldest Female WWII Veteran In Mass. Dies At Age 104
CBS
November 20, 2012

ATTLEBORO (CBS) – Irene Davey was the state’s oldest living female veteran.

The World War II veteran passed away on Sunday from pneumonia.

Her family remembered her Tuesday as vibrant, honest, feisty and funny.

Davey joined the U.S. Army in 1943.

She signed up the same day as her husband Harold signed up to join.
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Florida veterans and families not getting benefits they should

Little-known veteran pension hard to get and easy target for scammers
Sun Sentinel
By Ben Wolford
November 17, 2012

Problems with a Veterans Affairs benefit have created a scam industry and left thousands of seniors ignorant of a pension they are entitled to receive, veterans advocates and congressional investigators say.

Many families are unaware of the pension for ailing combat veterans and their dependents, footing the bill for their care as up to $24,239 a year for each veteran sits unused. Advocates blame poor outreach by the Veterans Affairs Department, a massive federal agency that wields $127 billion each year.

Families that do know about the Aid and Attendance pension, sometimes called the widows' pension, find themselves confronted with daunting paperwork. The applications, once submitted to one of three centralized processing offices, can take more than a year to approve.

Lisa Fitter spent 14 months seeking a pension for her mother-in-law, the widow of a World War II veteran, who suffered a massive stroke in May. The Fitters have struggled to provide 24-hour home care, and they pay an aide $15 to shower her each day.

"There is no excuse when you're dealing with a 96-year-old woman," said Fitter, 47, a Wellington Realtor. "She could have died."

Federal Veterans Affairs officials in Washington, D.C., and St. Petersburg did not respond to a series of questions and requests for interviews by email and phone.

But a spokesman told The New York Times in September that 38,076 veterans and 38,685 spouses were granted an Aid and Attendance pension in 2011. That year 1.7 million World War II veterans were alive and eligible for the pension.

Since December, hundreds of thousands have died, but more Korean War veterans, who number more than 2 million, will become eligible. The issue has particular resonance in Florida, where 187,900 World War II veterans reside, according to Veterans Affairs. The Census reports that about 32,846 Korean and World War II veterans live in Broward and Palm Beach counties.

The benefit is a kind of last thank you for low-income veterans — or their spouses or dependent children — who are older than 65 and rely on others for daily care. They must have been a member of the Armed Forces at least one day during wartime and need not have been injured in combat.

On average, veterans received $9,669 in 2011, and their survivors received $6,209, according to a federal report published this year.
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101st Airborne Division Celebrates 70 Years of Valor

101st Airborne Division Celebrates 70 Years of Valor
Oct 18, 2012
by usapatriotism
Soldiers of the U.S. Army 101st Airborne Division (AASLT) gather during the "2012 Week of the Eagles" to celebrate the 70th anniversary of their great division with a truly storied past with active members carrying on this noble proud legacy and adding to its historic heritage of valor.
U.S. Army video by Maj. Robin Ochoa, August 15, 2012

Widow of boiled Marine fighting for change

Wife Of Man Who Died At Claremore VA Looks To Change System
Posted: Oct 03, 2012
Lacie Lowry
News On 6

CLAREMORE, Oklahoma - The widow of a man scalded to death is on a mission to change the Veterans Affairs system in Oklahoma.

Her husband died at the Claremore Veterans Center and a follow-up inspection revealed a multitude of violations.

News On 6 first brought you the facts behind Jay Minter's death Tuesday night. On Wednesday, his widow shared what it was like to see the love of her life die at a VA home.

Frances Minter says she'll always wear her wedding ring.

"We would have been married 62 years if he had lived until June the 20th and he died on May the 3rd," said Frances.

She vows to honor her husband's memory by fighting for change.

Jay Minter was drafted into the Army at age 18. In 1945, he was sent to the Philippines and Japan, where he had to pick up dead bodies after World War II.

Eight years ago, Jay went to live at the Claremore Veterans Center. And on a daily visit to see him, Frances walked into a terrifying scene.

"My husband had his legs up in the air and he was screaming, ‘They burned my legs! They burned my legs!'"

A nurse's aide had bathed Jay in a whirlpool tub for 15 minutes when his skin started tearing and sloughing off.
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Honor for Marine came just in time

Honor for Marine came just in time
October 2, 2012
By RUSTY DENNE

BACK IN JUNE, I got a handwritten note from Lawrence “Reggie” Lucas. He asked whether I might be interested in mentioning that he’d be getting some recognition for a long-ago stint in the Montford Point Marines.

He said his daughter, Cheryl Hepburn, and son-in-law, Marty, would be driving him to Washington to receive a Congressional Gold Medal for his service in the Marine Corps’ first all-black unit.

The medal is the nation’s highest civilian honor; George Washington was among the recipients.

I dropped by Lucas’ home in Spotsylvania County for an interview a few days later. After greeting me in the driveway, he welcomed me inside and told his story of the black men who received little recognition during World War II and for long afterward.

At 88, he was articulate, with a vivid memory and a wicked sense of humor that had me wishing our two-hour visit had been longer.
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