Vietnam vets need our attention

This is to honor more than 500,000 sea-based veterans who fought for their country in the Vietnam War. Many of these veterans are now dying prematurely from an unseen wound. That wound is cancer. Cancer causes great pain, as do the side effects from chemotherapy and radiation. These veterans served in the Blue Water off the coast of Vietnam, in the harbors of Vietnam, in the jungles of Laos and Cambodia, and at our air bases in Thailand. Scientific evidence has shown their cancer rates to be as much as 20% higher than in-country Vietnam veterans. Their lives are no long measured in years, but in months, days and minutes.

In 1991, the Congress of the United States of America created the Agent Orange Act to grant benefits and relief to those affected by cancercausing herbicides used in Vietnam. This legislative body, believing that all veterans of war are to be treated equally, intended to help those who were failing from this unseen wound.

The intent of this legislation has now been twisted, denying veterans their earned benefits by red tape and regulations that have no scientific evidence to support them

These 500,000 veterans have been singled out as not eligible for the benefits given to other American veterans even though they all pledged their lives for their country.

In military tradition, there is sacred credo: No one left behind. The DVA has made a mockery of this tradition. These 500,000 Vietnam veterans are waiting for the voice of the American public to bring them home. Won't you please help?

Contact Representative Randy Kuhl; Senators Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer and ask them to sponsor the "Agent Orange Fair Compensation Act" located at this website: http://vnvets.blogsport.com/2007/11/a gent-orange-fair-compensationact. html.
Willard Hughes
Bath