A Crippled Home Front

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A Crippled Home Front

 

 

By Rick Anderson, Seattle Weekly

April 10, 2003

 

The willingness with which our young people are likely to serve in any war, no

matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive the

veterans of earlier wars were treated and appreciated by their nation.

– George Washington

 

 

 

War was his best moment and his worst. Visions of whistling bullets, airborne

body parts, screams of the wounded – and that was a good day for Joe Hooper. The

Medal of Honor winner and most decorated soldier in Vietnam would bolt upward in

his Seattle bed, sweating booze from the night before. Those earlier appearances

on national TV, the possibility of a Hollywood biopic, hanging out with Bob Hope

and several presidents – that just churned him up more inside. The catlike,

strawberry-haired 6-footer and former Washington state football scoring champ at

Moses Lake High School had enlisted at age 19 because he admired the military.

 

 

 

Then came Vietnam. Staff Sgt. Joe Hooper, 29, of the 501st Airborne Infantry,

killed at least 115 of the enemy – 24 of them in a six-hour firefight, lobbing

grenades into Viet Cong bunkers and wading through withering machine-gun fire to

repeatedly rescue wounded American soldiers. Fourteen out of 189 survived. After

treatment for his wounds, Hooper broke out of the hospital to return to his

unit. Part American Indian, he said he could " smell out " the enemy, and thought

he was born to go to Vietnam. His 37 medals were more than those earned by World

War II's Audie Murphy and World War I's Alvin York – names that, unlike

Hooper's, still ring familiar today. Like others of his era, he arrived home to

accusations of being a baby killer. But that's not what eventually soured him on

Vietnam. " At high schools, when I speak, the question kids most often asked me

was, 'Would you do it again?' " he told me once. " I would, the reason being I

thought my abilities helped save lives. But I would tell my children, if [we]

were to do this over, 'Go to Canada. Don't fight a war you can't win.' "

 

 

 

In the end, it was Joe Hooper who needed to be rescued. From the day he left the

service in 1974 with a $12,000 retirement check carried around in his shoe, his

war was with himself and the bottle. Not all soldiers, including the many who

were transported from the killing fields to home just a few days out of combat,

had his agonizing psychological problems. Overwhelmingly, the average war

veteran makes it through decompression to live a normal life. But Hooper wasn't

average, nor was his war. ( " Vietnam, " says vet and psychologist Jim Goodwin, was

uniquely " a private war of survival " by individual soldiers.) Hooper, with two

children and a caring wife, was painfully arthritic and 60 percent disabled from

his wounds. He sometimes toted around a gun when he boozed. " He drank hard,

there's no denying that, " Hooper's friend Larry Frank recalled. " But the VA

couldn't deal with him drinking and running around, and that's exactly what the

VA is there for, people with problems like Joe's. " His binges lasted days, and

sometimes he was carried out of Seattle bars by military buddies the way he

carried the wounded over his shoulders in Vietnam. " When he'd get on a tear, "

remembered Medal of Honor historian Don Ross of Kitsap County, " Bob Bush

[another Medal of Honor winner from Olympia] and I would go after him. It was a

constant battle. " In between bouts, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) gave

him a desk job counseling vets on benefits and then let him go due to " problems

adapting to the bureaucratic environment. " In 1979, five years out of his army

boots, Joe Hooper was dead from a cerebral hemorrhage. He was 40. The VA

eventually was reluctantly persuaded to name a wing of its medical center on

Beacon Hill after him, and the Army's reserve center in Bothell now bears his

name.

 

 

 

His death was said to be from natural causes. And that's what scares everyone to

this day.

 

 

 

" He was a casualty of war, and you can expect more of the same after Iraq, " says

David Willson, a retired Green River Community College librarian, editor of

Vietnam War Generation Journal, and a Vietnam vet who worked with Hooper on a

collection of war literature. " Look at the history – this is a country made by

war on the backs of vets who have never, ever been treated as promised. "

Hooper's story is a lesson on that failure, Willson says. " If we can't save our

heroes, who can we save? "

 

 

 

More Patients, Less Money

 

 

 

For the country's ex-warriors, many of them aged and ailing – and thousands of

them homeless – medical and psychological treatment is being rationed at home as

meals and bullets sometimes were in battle. Last year, the VA, the

second-largest government agency (behind the Defense Department) which operates

the nation's largest hospital system, treated 1.4 million more veterans than in

1996, with 20,000 fewer employees. Since 1995, its hospital enrollments have

shot up from 2.9 million to more than 4.5 million annually. At least another

600,000 of America's 25 million surviving male and female veterans will enroll

this year. Some will have to stand in line, others will be refused, and still

others may face new $250 enrollment fees. Though hospital and outpatient care

are readily available, outreach programs are being downsized, and a lack of

funding will force a quarter-million vets to wait up to 10 months for

specialized treatment and surgery. Some clinics and hospitals have shut their

doors to new patients, and the VA has just closed enrollment to about 164,000

vets who have no service-connected health complications and rank in the VA's

" highest income " bracket (about $35,000 for a vet with no dependents, for

example). More than 450,000 disability claims are pending, and vets who are

denied face another long wait for appeals decisions.

 

 

 

The future looks even worse: A House Budget Committee is now proposing to cut VA

spending by $15 billion over 10 years, starting with $463 million slashed from

next year's budget. Legislators claim they're cutting fraud, waste, and abuse.

But Joe Fox Sr., head of Paralyzed Veterans of America, who calls the cuts " an

in-your-face insult to the veterans of this country, " says the reduction will

slam the poorest disabled veterans and cut GI Bill benefits for soldiers who are

currently serving in Iraq. The plan could also mean the loss of 9,000 VA

physicians in a short-handed VA system, he says.

 

 

 

For decades, vets say, they've watched their benefits fade in tandem with the

diminishing national consciousness of their earlier sacrifices. " Pressures on

the VA health care system, " warns Joe Violante, legislative director for the

Disabled American Veterans, " have escalated to a critical point that can no

longer be ignored by our government. " He and others recently told the House

Veterans Affairs Committee that the VA is underfunded by almost $2 billion. But,

in the midst of a stagnant economy, the proposed Bush tax cut, and the Bush war,

where would more money come from? Apparently not from George W. Bush.

 

 

 

A week ago, the president summoned leaders from veterans groups to attend his

live-TV speech urging on the troops in Iraq. " People serving in the military are

giving their best for this country, " Bush said earnestly, " and we have the

responsibility to give them our full support. . . . " But while the president's

$62.6 billion supplemental funding would provide fuel and supplies for the

troops and benefits for the people of Iraq, Bush didn't mention that his agenda

includes a $150 million aid cut to schools attended by military dependents, and

support for billions in VA reductions.

 

 

 

Is anyone surprised? Slashing the VA budget is almost a presidential ritual.

Ronald Reagan, the celluloid warrior, proposed firing 20,000 VA medical

personnel and scrapping part of the VA counseling program – in the midst of a

suicidal epidemic among Vietnam vets in the 1980s. Even decorated ex-trooper

George Bush pared $600 million from the VA and revoked the lousy $237 once given

to families to help bury veterans. (Ironically, one of the vets' best friends

was the undrafted Bill Clinton, who increased benefits and pay with the Veterans

Programs Enhancement Act of 1998.)

 

 

 

" My father, " says Vietnam vet Willson, " a U.S. Marine, came back from Iwo Jima

with spots on his lungs from being buried in the volcanic sand there. He never

got diddly out of the VA in compensation. They treated him like shit. He was of

that generation where you didn't push things much and died in his middle 60s

from brain tumors. My great-grandfather was a Civil War vet and spent his

postwar years battling to get his $15 pension. I fought with the VA for two

years over my son, who was born with spina bifida. I made a claim related to

Agent Orange, which they denied – only open-spine condition is covered, not the

type he has. My Uncle Frank, a Spanish-American War veteran, used to say, 'I

cudgel my cerebellum trying to figure out how Washington is going to screw the

veteran next.' "

 

 

 

Past Wars, Future Patients

 

 

 

With the first wars came the first mystery illnesses – the " irritable heart " of

the Civil War veterans, later found to be a psychological disturbance not unlike

shell shock in WWI, battle fatigue in WWII, and post-traumatic stress disorder

in Vietnam. With new ways to fight wars came new ways to die from them – the

ever-growing Agent Orange division of medicine. It took 30 years of Vietnam

veteran complaints about toxic defoliants ruining their personal and family

health and shortening their life spans before the VA accepted the disorders as

treatable diseases. More discoveries continue: Only last year did scientists

find a new Agent Orange link to a form of leukemia. Desert Storm vets – about

150,000 returned disabled from the " 100-hour war " – are the latest to try to

prove their many illnesses are related to the effects of chemicals, radiation,

and biological weapons. But the VA says evidence does not support claims that

depleted uranium and sarin gas, among others, are culpable. (Storm vets are,

however, twice as likely as the general population to develop ALS – Lou Gehrig's

Disease – and treatment for that is now covered.)

 

 

 

Other generations of vets are trying to resurrect their own lost causes. In

Florida, for example, ex-POW and Medal of Honor winner George Day has taken a

class-action benefits lawsuit to the U.S. Supreme Court. The old warhorse calls

it " the crusade of my life, and I won't rest until the last round is fired, " as

he seeks to hold the Navy to its 1914 promise that " during your life, you

receive free medicine, medical attendance, and hospital service whenever

required. " Day contends the Pentagon breached its contract to continue to

provide hospital care for military retirees over 65, forcing them to buy

Medicare and other supplemental insurance costing thousands of dollars annually

– a prohibitive price for many elderly military or surviving spouses. Retired

Army Col. David Hackworth, the columnist and frequent guest on TV's war

channels, describes the government's history of handing out veterans' benefits

as " shameful double-talk, backpedaling, and welshing. " American vets, he says,

" from our Civil War to Desert Storm have been consistently treated like

orphans. " Hackworth, not unlike Joe Hooper, worries most that troops may be

politically sacrificed. Hooper's friend Willson says, " Joe would be mighty upset

by the politics of this war. " Hackworth is. A member of Soldiers for the Truth

(www.sftt.org), which includes citizens and congressional members concerned

about troop readiness, Hackworth recently told me: " If you're not a member and

inclined to volunteer for SFTT duty, please do. We still need a few more good

men and women. It's only with numbers that we can make the bastards listen. "

 

 

 

Based on his reading of government studies, Hackworth says more than 161,000

Desert Storm vets have been disabled, and almost 10,000 have died from Gulf

War-related illness that may have been caused by chemical munitions, oil-fire

fumes, untested inoculations, local bugs, or all of the above. Officially, in a

January report, the VA said 8,500 direct and indirect combat vets from Desert

Storm have since died, but warns in a military voice: " The use of these data to

draw conclusions regarding mortality rates will result in inaccurate

conclusions. " (There were 148 killed in combat and 467 wounded during Desert

Storm.) " Now Bush, " Hackworth wrote in a recent column, " and his war hawks – who

almost to a man dodged service in the Vietnam War, just like the majority of our

members of Congress – are again sending warriors to employ the military solution

in the Gulf at even greater risk, since the Pentagon has just admitted the

bio/chem suits our attacking troops will wear are good only for bunker duty. "

 

 

 

Clearly, war casualties aren't the making of just our enemies. Like U.S.

defoliants in Vietnam, the radioactive residue from U.S. munitions fired at

Saddam's tanks are thought to have contributed to cancer and birth defects among

Desert Storm vets – U.S. forces used weapons containing 640,000 pounds of

depleted uranium during Desert Storm – all in violation of the Geneva accords,

according to a United Nations report. Ralph Nader and others are seeking

congressional hearings on the likelihood that troops in Iraq today are traveling

through a " zone of death " contaminated by the 1991 war. Last month, U.S. and

U.K. officials were reassuring the world that there was little threat from

depleted uranium weapons today, even though more than 10,000 allied bombs and

missiles, some tipped with depleted uranium, have rained down since Operation

Iraqi Freedom began. Other earlier Born-in-the-U.S.A. miseries are still being

uncovered, some of them intentionally inflicted on our own troops. The Institute

of Medicine last month opened a study to determine the possible long-term

effects of biological and chemical agents secretly sprayed during the Cold War

on 5,000 servicemen aboard U.S. ships. Including sarin and VX nerve gas, the

sprayings were intended to test the effects of another chemical used to

decontaminate the ships. That chemical, too, was hazardous.

 

 

 

Politicians' Memories

 

 

 

Many war vets say their complaints aren't about the working folks at the VA or

those who staff their hospitals, as I found out during unauthorized strolls

through the Seattle VA medical center a few days back (reporters must have

clearance, I was later admonished). " My doctor's great! And the people here are

the sweetest, " said a woman who gave her name as Emma and said she was in the

Army during WWII. Others echoed that sentiment. The VA Puget Sound Health Care

System, which includes the updated 1950s Seattle hospital on Beacon Hill,

American Lake hospital south of Tacoma, and specialty care services to vets in

four states, ranks high in the VA system. But it, too, is under pressure from

new vets – 3,000 more (a total of about 54,000) vets used hospital services here

last year than the previous year, and 17,000 new outpatient visits were

recorded. " Obviously, we can only work within the parameters of the funding we

receive, " says Seattle VA hospital spokesperson Ellen Flores. " But we have a

staff that truly cares and an administration dedicated to patient care – the

deputy director and chief of staff are veterans themselves. " The state has

670,000 vets, and hospital public affairs director Jeri Rowe says care for some

of them is evolving almost daily. " We'll have more women vets than ever before,

and though fewer WWII vets will be here, we'll have aging Vietnam and Gulf War

vets. " The regional system is serving more vets with fewer dollars, she says,

" but we're among the most cost-efficient in the VA system. "

 

 

 

Washington's congressional delegation, whose districts encompass almost a dozen

military bases and 60,000 troops (a third of which are in Iraq), has been

sensitive to veterans' causes, however political their motives may be. Dovish

Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Seattle, much maligned by the right for his prewar trip to

Iraq, is pushing a bill to study the true effects of depleted uranium. Sen.

Patty Murray, D-Washington, criticized by conservatives for voting against the

Gulf War II resolution, was subsequently given the American Ex-Prisoners of

War's Barbed Wire Award for her campaign to help vets (she's the first woman to

sit on the Senate Veteran Affairs Committee, and her father was a wounded WWII

vet). Rep. George Nethercutt, R-Spokane, who may be planning a run against

Murray, recently began handing out medals to survivors of the WWII invasion of

Normandy (the medals are made in France, by the way). The eight other state

delegates all say they're fighting for vet rights, too. But why do veterans have

to keep reminding us not to forget them?

 

 

 

VA Secretary Anthony J. Principi promises better days, and veterans' groups are

pressuring legislators to vote down Republican funding cuts. The VA and Defense

Department are now collecting medical data during fighting in Afghanistan and

Iraq that could be used to determine causes of future mystery illnesses. Most

everyone hopes a nation that supports its troops in battle won't forget them

again when the smoke clears.

 

 

 

During my visit to the VA hospital, I went looking for Joe Hooper's plaque,

which I had seen unveiled when a wing was named in his honor a dozen years back.

" Joe who? " said a man at the information desk. Others were stumped, too. I

couldn't recall the plaque's exact location and rode elevators and roamed a mile

of hallways unsuccessfully. Last week, public affairs director Rowe told me she

had found the plaque in the Addictions Services building, but the area was

off-limits to me. She wanted me to know that, if the VA system failed Hooper, it

learned from those mistakes. " People back then didn't give much credence to

understanding [post-traumatic stress disorder] and addiction as they should

have. I think we know a lot more and have moved forward with a greater

understanding. " In that sense, you can say Joe Hooper, even if forgotten,

continues to help rescue his fellow soldiers. He is buried, by the way, in

Arlington National Cemetery. Near the Tomb of the Unknowns.

 

 

 

 

 

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