Back From The War ... And Into Homelessness
Black Commentator, Commentary, Bill Fletcher, Jr. Posted: Nov 25, 2007
Editor's note: BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board member, Bill Fletcher, Jr. is a labor and international writer and activist, a Senior Scholar with the Institute for Policy Studies and the immediate past president of TransAfrica Forum.
The report this past week confirmed what veterans’ advocates have been saying for some time: one quarter of the homeless are veterans! While this came as a shock to many people, anyone of age at the time of the Vietnam War would not have been surprised at all.
In the 1960s and 1970s we saw returning veterans discarded by the government that had placed them in harm’s way. Many returned strung out on heroin and were completely unable to adjust to life at home. As homelessness became a national phenomenon in the 1980s, we often saw the face of the Vietnam War veteran staring back at us on the streets of the USA.
Yet few of us stop and realize that the mistreatment of veterans is not just peculiar to Iraq or Vietnam. After each major military conflict, with the possible exception of World War II, soldiers who were drafted or enlisted in the context of a patriotic fervor, returned home to a society that rarely knew what to do with them and, sometimes depending on the nature of the conflict, found them to be an embarrassment. The years following World War I are an example of this. Veterans, including a great uncle of mine, returned from the war scarred for life physically and/or psychologically, yet the government was unwilling to step forward and assist them in achieving any degree of normalcy.
This recurring situation is what infuriated me in the lead up to the illegal and immoral U.S. invasion of Iraq. At the same time that the Bush administration was fanning the flames of war hysteria with misinformation, half-truths, fear and calls to patriotism, it was simultaneously cutting back on funds for the Department of Veterans Affairs At a moment when soldiers needed assurance of U.S. government support, should they return injured or otherwise facing adjustment issues (including needing assistance in finding housing, jobs and psychological/emotional counseling), the Bush administration was quietly cutting back; some would say, cutting the soon-to-be veterans adrift.
I have found myself wondering each time the U.S. -- and especially the Bush administration -- beats the drums of war, why and how we so easily forget this history, and particularly the disposability of the citizen soldiers after they have served the objectives of whomever happened to have been in power.
Given the racist reality of the USA, it should come as no surprise that the crisis of the veteran becomes the catastrophe for black and Latino veterans. I saw this after Vietnam and I am seeing it again with Iraq. But even in black America, there are few voices speaking up for the veteran. Perhaps we simply think that the issues they face are just another variant of those which we all suffer. While there is a truth to this, such a view is nevertheless unacceptable. Particularly in an environment of dramatic black opposition to the U.S. aggression against Iraq, we have to make sure that we do not transfer our hostility to the war to hostility toward the veteran.
This totality necessitates a black veterans’ movement that reaches out to other black veterans, provides a leading voice against the war and all future plans of aggression and also becomes a means to help our community focus our collective opposition to the war. It necessitates as well as advances the demand that the government take care of those it was willing to sacrifice for a lie.
Let’s hear the voice of the black veteran!
Related Stories
NAM in Washington
Page
1 of 1
|
User Comments
john on Dec 08, 2007 at 15:59:59 said:
The US Govt. treats its soldiers like crap and then throws you away like yesterdays news. Killing is NOT OK, period. Even if the US Govt says so. Killing Iraqis isn't spreading freedom. The US Govt. should give these vets housing for life for destroying their lives. It's all a lie.
Ellis D Chubbs on Dec 06, 2007 at 14:31:42 said:
What country would have it,s vet's come back to live on the streets .Why dont the US look north at their neighbour and learn how to treat their cetizens and vet's . I know this wont go over to will with the majorety of your reader's but Canada is the real land of the free . And anyone who dont think so look at our record in everything and you will have to agree .
Ruben B. Botello on Nov 26, 2007 at 05:13:14 said:
I add my support to your call. As a Vietnam veteran, I was in and out of homelessness myself for several years, and may be again.
I am also a Chicano who knows how racist the U.S. can be, not only toward the people it chooses to call "the enemy" in far off lands but toward native-born U.S. citizens like you and me who don't happen to be the right race or color.
Yes, it is a shame military veterans get blamed for what our racist White House commanders order us to do but I must say it is partially our fault as veterans, too; at least, those of us who volunteer to serve in their racist wars. Servicemen should never volunteer to fight any racist or unjust war because all it amounts to us us becoming mercenaries or murderers for hire.
We reap what we sow, right; live by the sword, die by the sword. Homelessness is kind of like that for some of us. It is a sort of punishment for our being stupid enough to believe killing "to spread freedom and democracy" or for Jesus or whatever is somehow okay if the U.S. government says so. It is not okay. We should all know better.
As for helping homeless vets, I say help all homeless people, especially the homeless women, children and elderly. I as a young homeless vet was always willing to let these poor folks into the line ahead of me for life-sustaining needs when I was out there on the streets.
I didn't join the Marines and fight in Vietnam just so the rich and well-to-do could profit from my sacrifices. I offered my life for this country and expected nothing in return except a better life for everyone, including the Vietnamese they told us we were fighting for and especially poor folks like my family, friends and neighbors in the USA on my poor side of town.
Of course, Vietnam was not about either America's poor or the Vietnamese gaining a better life, it was about the rich getting richer and more powerful as usual; and their Middle East wars are no different.
So believe me, many homeless vets do feel guilty about the innumerable war crimes they aided and abetted the commission of, and that includes me. This is a major reason why I have been homeless so many times, and this is why the White House is not too eager to help us. We're supposed to be proud of what they ordered us to do, right?
War is nothing more or less than the mass murder of innocents; "collateral damage," they tell us. It's mass murder by hired killers and we're supposed to be proud of that? No dice.
Support The Vets on Nov 25, 2007 at 22:09:12 said:
I couldn\'t agree with you more. We need to organize an Iraq and Afghanistan vets\' Bonus Army and a marxh on Washington. We must demand a bonus for all vets because the VA IS BROKEN and the vets suffering.
-->This is our country\'s most shameful moment. I never thought any wa or the treatment of it\'s veterans could get worse than Vietnam. But here we are.
You should really check out this film WHEN I CAME HOME - there's a trailer at www.whenicamehome.com
Peace