Commentary––

What Are Veterans Worth?

By William A. Collins

Save our soldiers,

There’s no doubt;

Till that day,

When they get out.

The shabby treatment of veterans these days is largely a symptom of their shrinking numbers. The Connecticut State Veterans Hospital and Home in Rocky Hill, for example, has sunk so low that the staff there no longer bothers to seek professional accreditation. The conditions reported in an inspection last year sounded positively Third World.

It didn’t used to be that way. The American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars were once real powerhouses. The veterans got what they wanted (and deserved), no questions asked. In return, of course, their leaders showed up to support whatever military incursion the President of the day was promoting. You scratch my back…etc.

But now the WWII vets are a little frail for all that, and the Viet vets, having served in a far more ambiguous war, are a bit less hawkish. Worse, a newer group, Veterans for Peace, is reversing those old roles entirely. Members carry peace signs in patriotic parades, rebuild bombed-out Iraqi water treatment plants, and otherwise subvert the rumbling war machine. They even got the biggest cheers along Fifth Avenue on Veterans’ Day.

So much the worse for vets appropriations. With smaller numbers of veteran voters, and their reduced reliability as supporters of military adventures, who needs them? This shows up in both national and state budgets. The big federal hospital in West Haven has surely not declined to Rocky Hill’s depths, but it’s nowhere near what it used to be.

Neither is access to cheap medicines. The Veterans Administration (VA), being a gigantic buyer, bargains a pretty decent price from the pharmaceutical companies. It used to tout these discounts as a pass-through to many vets. No more. It got too expensive. Promotion of that and all other VA programs is now prohibited. If you want your rightful services, you have to go ferret them out for yourself. Government orders.

Worse yet is the Pentagon’s widely publicized reluctance to level with Gulf War vets as to the stuff they were breathing over there, and the effects it might have on them later. The poor grunts have had to sue to get clues as to what may be afflicting them. But this kind of abandonment is hardly new. Viet vets suffered the same stonewalling over Agent Orange, and whatever else they may have inhaled. And in the Cold War we purposely exposed servicemen to radiation, poison gases, and germs to see what would happen. They were never told the truth, and have had to pry it out of the Pentagon, with much still remaining secret.

All this neglect seems out of character with the current glorification of war. Young men and women are recruited to do their patriotic duty, combating the forces of evil. Nothing is too good for them. We spend billions on the latest gadgets to see that not a hair on their heads is injured. If one is captured we pay anything, risk anything, to get him back. But once he leaves the service, good luck!

Yes, the statutes say that any service-related ills will be cared for. But just try to prove they’re service-related. Gunshot wounds, yes. Depression, uh-uh. Breathing problems, immune system disorders, endocrine breakdown…well, we’re not sure. They’re not on the list. And it may be a long hike to the nearest VA hospital anyway.

Consequently most vets don’t get much government help. They largely pick up medical care from employer health insurance, and later Medicare. Or if really down on their luck, Medicaid. But oodles don’t have health insurance, or qualify for Medicaid. Still others are so devastated by their ills that they can’t handle those bureaucracies. Worst off of all are retirees. Unlike those who return after a few years to civilian life, they have their disability payments deducted from their regular pension.

In short, it doesn’t pay to be a vet. The supposed glory of war is lost on the survivors, which is one reason they rarely talk about it. The glory goes to the politicians and the defense contractors. The vets end up on the slag heap.

(Columnist William A. Collins is a former state representative and a former mayor of Norwalk.).