Westchester’s Chapter 49 of Vietnam Veterans of America is meeting Thursday (March 6) in White Plains.

Longtime veterans activist Dan Griffin, the chapter’s executive director, says the group is starting a food drive to help stock the food pantry at the Montrose VA hospital.

Also on the agenda is a discussion on reviving the chapter’s security deposit program for homeless veterans. The program helps qualified,  pre-screened vets trying to get back on their feet by paying the security deposit when they find an appropriate apartment.

If you’re a Vietnam veteran and you haven’t joined the VVA, you should check it out. They’re all about veterans helping and supporting each other.  Take a look at the Chapter 49 website to see their newsletter and learn about their activities. Better yet, stop by next week’s meeting, which starts at 7:30 p.m. at the White Plains American Legion Post 135, located at 59 Mitchell Place.

The U.S. Navy’s newest San Antonio class amphibious transport dock – LPD ship has been named “New York.” More than seven tons of steel salvaged from the World Trade Center wreckage was melted and formed to make the bow stem of the ship, symbolizing “the spirit and resiliency of the people of New York,” according to the U.S. Department of Defense’s press release.

The ship’s official motto is: “Never Forget.”

The 684-foot long ship will be christened at 10 a.m. CST tomorrow at the Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding facilities in New Orleans, La. Upon commissioning in 2009, New York will be homeported in Norfolk, Va., as a part of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet.

Cmdr. F. Curtis Jones, of Binghamton, N.Y., the ship’s first commanding officer, will lead a crew of 360 officers and enlisted Navy personnel and three Marines. The ship can transport a landing force of up to 800 Marines.

Four previous U.S. naval ships have been named New York. The first, a gondola Read more of this entry »

The Washington Times reports that Iraqis whose relatives were accidentally killed or whose property was destroyed by coalition forces have received more than $40 million in “condolence payments” since 2005. The report, which can be viewed here, says the payments are meant to mitigate anger toward the U.S. military.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York last week dismissed a lawsuit filed by Vietnamese agent orange victims against some 30 companies that produced the defoliant. As reported by Reuters in a story that can be found here, the suit claimed that agent orange causes cancer and birth defects and that “hotspots” where it was used during the war still contain high dioxin levels some 40 years later.

Apparently, what’s good for the current goose isn’t good for the old gander.

Nothing says “we support you – and hope you come home soon” like thousands of boxes filled with beef jerky, wet wipes, comic books and phone cards, right?

For the fifth time in two years, Jennie McFarland is organizing a “Support Our Troops Drive” in Larchmont, assembling care packages for soldiers stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan. More than 1,400 packages have been sent since April 2006, when her husband was serving with the Marines in Iraq (Col. Thomas McFarland is back now); at least four Westchester residents will be among the recipients this time.

“The touching thank you notes we have received back from the troops confirm how important it is to continue to show them that we are thinking of them and that we appreciate their sacrifices,” McFarland said, adding that she is collecting more addresses from local families with loved ones stationed overseas.

Travel-sized donations – no chocolate, large liquids or used items – will be accepted in the basement of St. Augustine’s Church, 18 Cherry Ave., from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. March 16. Financial contributions can help defray the cost of shipping. Volunteers are also welcome to help assemble the boxes and write letters to the troops on the day of the event.

For more information, post a comment on this blog entry (click on the “Comments” link at the bottom of this post) Read more of this entry »

On my recent trip to Vietnam, several veterans bitterly recalled facing discrimination and trouble finding work when they had returned from their combat tours in the 1960s and early 1970s. They’re determined that soldiers returning from Afghanistan and Iraq get more help than they did, and some schools and employers seem to have gotten the message.

Technical Career Institutes, a technical college in midtown Manhattan, recently announced it will increase the number of courses in its “Dare 2 Dream; Dare to Repair” program, which offers free computer repair classes for veterans and low-income, minority students.

“The New York metropolitan area has numerous returning veterans in need of skills training that will prepare them for lucrative careers,” said James Melville, school president. “We at TCI are redoubling our efforts to help these brave men and women develop bright futures.”

The news got a thumbs-up from Jim McDonough, director of New York’s Division of Veterans’ Affairs.

“Veterans are facing challenging circumstances when it comes to leaving the service and reintegrating back into civilian life,” he said. “Certain skills may not translate directly into Read more of this entry »

J. Robert Lunney of Bronxville, a Navy veteran of WWII and Korea, is in Seoul this week for the inauguration of newly-elected South Korean President Myungbak Lee. He’ll also attend the official reception and dinner.

Lunney first met the new president in 2006, when Lee was mayor of Seoul and Lunney was honored for his role in the evacuation of 14,000 refugees from North Korea in December 1950. Lunney served as executive officer aboard the S.S. Meredith Victory, which is credited conducting the largest single-ship rescue operation in maritime history.

The retired lawyer has also twice served as an official observer to U.S. efforts in North Korea to find and recover the remains of American soldiers killed there.

Look for a story about his trip in The Journal News and lohud.com after Lunney returns in early March.

Seems like Vietnam veteran and former Spring Valley police chief Howard Goldin can’t get enough of returning to Vietnam: two months after my father and I joined him and a group of veterans and Rotary Club members on their last humanitarian tour there, he’s getting ready to head back with more supplies.

Goldin, his wife Doris, and Stony Point Town Magistrate Bill Franks and his wife Margaret, are joining a two-week tour led by Seattle Rotarian Son Michael Pham’s Kids Without Borders Spring Humanitour on March 30. Scheduled activities include a stop in Dalat to check on the construction progress of The Rose School, a project largely funded by the Spring Valley Rotary Club’s Schools to End Poverty (STEP) program.

The school, pictured here in November, still needs about $30,000 to finish construction, said Ed Franks, Spring Valley Rotarian and president of Rockland’s Vietnam Veterans of America, Chapter 333.

Donations to The Rose School can be mailed to: Spring Valley Rotary, Vietnam School Project, Po Box 59, Spring Valley, NY 10977.

The Goldins are also packing the usual toiletries and medical supplies – toothbrushes, toothpaste, vitamins – and children’s clothing and Beanie Babies to give out at the orphanages and schools they visit on their trip. For more information about making contributions Read more of this entry »

An Ossining resident recently assumed command of the New York Naval Militia in ceremonies in New York City.

Major General Robert Wolf, a 20-year Marine Corps veteran, became the first Marine in the history of Naval Militia to lead that component of the state’s military forces.

Check the Marine Corps League’s Westchester Chapter site here to read more about the ceremony. To find out more about New York’s Division of Military and Naval Affairs, visit their website here.

There are dozens of organizations for veterans, so we’re counting on our readers to help us get to know all of them. Post a comment (click on the “Comments” link at the end of this post) about any military organization you belong to in Rockland, Putnam or Westchester counties, and we’ll link to the group’s Web site and get the word out about your events.

If, like my father, you have one of these – a Combat Infantryman Badge, awarded to Army soldiers who have served in battle – the Headquarters Company of the Combat Infantrymen’s Association wants you. The regional group has about 500 members, including 20 “just signed up in Camp Smith last week,” said Dominic Esposito, the company’s corps commander and a World War II veteran wounded at the Battle of the Bulge.

Don’t be fooled by the name: female combat veterans are Read more of this entry »

Interest in the presidential race is high among troops overseas, according to The Stars and Stripes.  A story published yesterday reports that record numbers of soldiers, their families and other Americans who live overseas are accessing the Federal Voting Assistance Program website to obtain information on using absentee ballots.

Click here to see the report.

Interesting story on military.com about an Army Reservist in Utah who was sentenced to five months in prison for wearing medals he didn’t earn and telling tall tales about his previous service. His BS apparently helped him get a promotion to Major before he was found out.

You can see the story HERE.

This guy has taken it to the extreme, but I think most of us have known vets or people claiming to be vets who spin stories about military exploits that never happened or didn’t really happen the way they were told.

A couple of years ago my friend and colleague Phil Reisman wrote about a local WWII vet who told a vivid story about his experience at Iwo Jima that turned out to be fantasy.  Here’s that column.

In both of these cases the guys telling the lies really did serve in combat. How sad that they felt a need to embellish records they should have been proud of.

Added 2/22: Here’s the link to Sarah Netter’s story about this event in today’s Journal News.

I must have jinxed myself with yesterday’s post about breaking news, but I just manage to get to Rep. Nita Lowey’s press conference on veteran health care benefits. We’ll have the story at 6 p.m. on RNN-TV (Channel 19 or 20 for local viewers) and in tomorrow’s Journal News, but here’s an advance scoop for you savvy blog readers out there.

Before an audience that included Rockland County veterans who served in World War II, Korea and Vietnam, Lowey said she will fight to get the VA health care system to restore eligibility for Priority 8 veterans.

In a nutshell: in 2003, the VA system cut costs by making Priority 8 veterans – those with no service-related disabilities and with incomes above about $40,000 – ineligible for VA medical coverage. Lowey argues this hurts troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan who do not realize they have to claim a disability to get benefits; Jerry Donnellan, director of the Rockland County Veterans Services Agency, added that it also hurts older veterans who were counting on VA insurance once they retired from their jobs but now find out Read more of this entry »

Sen. John McCain spent more than five years as a POW during the Vietnam War. I’m sure I’m not the only one who think of this whenever he faces a particularly ugly political situation, for example, those ridiculous allegations during the 2000 South Carolina primary that he had fathered “a black baby” – really his adopted Bangladeshi daughter! Today, the Republican presidential frontrunner fights a new battle: challenging a New York Times story suggesting he had an affair with lobbyist Vicki Iseman during his last presidential campaign.

McCain’s campaign flat-out denies the relationship, and the Navy veteran will personally respond also denied the rumors during a press conference this morning. I wonder what kind of support he’ll get from fellow veterans during Read more of this entry »

My best friend from my Army days just called me, out of the blue. We met at the Defense Information School in 1977, when it was still in Fort Benjamin Harrison, Ind. Graduates were jokingly referred to as DINFOS trained killers or Chairborne Rangers.

We were both 18 at the time, away from home for the first time. In between being homesick, we had a blast.

We’ve kept in touch and remained close over the years, through marriages, divorces, kids, mortgages and the rest of what life brings. It’s funny to me that we’re both now 50, but when we talk it’s like we’re still 18. We always bring up crazy things we did back then. We laugh a lot.

I bring this up because I noticed that some of you are posting sites that help veterans find old buddies. I’m going to compile a list of my own and post it in the next couple of days. I think it’s well worth the effort. We’d love to hear from any of you who have kept up with old friends since you left the service, recently found one or are still trying. What is it about our friends from the military that’s different than the friendships we’ve made as civilians?