Book Review: Home Front: Viet Nam and Families at War

      When will the war finally come to an end? No, we are not talking about Iraq, Afghanistan, or even the War on Terror. We are talking about Viet Nam (Willard D. Gray uses the spelling acceptable back in the day).

      After reading Home Front, and now having something to compare it to
(the Home Front during Vietnam and Iraq), the experiences of military families
who questioned (but few opposed) the Vietnam War receive far worse reception
and treatment than anything today’s military families who QUESTION receive.

      I believe what accounts for this is the overwhelming number of American
citizens who have been willing and able to QUESTION the motives and
declarations of our government. More people today know for a fact that our
government leaders habitually lie to the American people. During Vietnam,
especially the first half of the war, at least until 1968, the vast majority of the
nation, including troops serving in Vietnam found it impossible to believe our
government would lie to us.

      Home Front: Viet Nam and Families at War teaches and informs those of us
who can relate, and the public in general, of the private and public humiliation,
personal family ordeals, and shattered families that a questionable and
controversial WAR had brought to any military family that questioned the
Vietnam War.

      Despite what critics have said to dissuade Willard from writing the book,
and others from reading it, not one Veteran, including Willard, not one family
written about in this book was part of the established anti-War movement
back in the day. Their only socio-political crime was having the Patriotic gall
to question the war and course set for the nation by decision makers who, like
today, cannot relate to those who carry the burdens of war. The basic difference
 between Vietnam and Iraq is that during Vietnam there was the facade of
National commitment via THE DRAFT, but for Iraq precious few have been
asked to and expected to sacrifice for the rest of us.

      Their experiences, an ongoing tragedy since the last U.S. Soldier left
Vietnamese soil, reveal the physical and psychological wounds of war
(PTSD when it was unheard of and its existence challenged, proliferation
of bad conduct and personality disorder (or failure to adjust to military
service) discharges that were less than Honorable, even if the Veteran had
served multiple combat tours in Vietnam.

      The lesson we as military families can take from reading this book is that
as Willard said these are, "wounds that don’t discriminate between soldiers
and their families regardless if they are pro or anti-war."

      From the backwoods of Maine to the rugged wide open spaces of Montana,
Willard has collected testimony from at least a dozen soldiers and their
extended families. On hindsight this is testimony that should have been given
at the first Winter Soldier, but that one did not have a panel for Military
Families shattered by the war. Most families back in the day would most likely
not have attended anyway, because it was the war they questioned, but did not
oppose. Most families only sought, like the Tillman’s today, answers from their
government and military as to why?

      Here is a sampling of what the public will learn about how military families
both during Vietnam and today were and are treated by those most adamant
about continuing the Iraq War, but who refuse to sacrifice their own life blood.

3. From the Ashes

      a. Outcasts – families who experience Patriotic [really Nationalistic] Ostracism,
not because they were Unpatriotic or because they opposed war. The soul
justification for quarantining them was that they QUESTIONED. It was considered
 more UNPATRIOTIC back in the day to QUESTION than it is NOW. Ask any military
family, Veteran, or even active duty troops TODAY how it feels, the reaction and
reception they get when they QUESTION their war, or any war. Then multiply that
response by ten, then you have the equivalent of what families during Vietnam
got if they but QUESTIONED the war.

      The same misguided WWII mentality of war being glorious and valorous,
 sanitized and censored to keep out the downside, racism, nationalism, propaganda
apparatus, and hate and war mongering system existed then as NOW. The vast
exception was that it was more vicious and effective than now, or the national
popularity polls for Bush and his war would be much higher. Point: The national
popularity ratings of Johnson and Nixon never reached the lows of President
G.W. Bush, because it was near impossible to QUESTION anything they or our
government did.

      Willard’s book breaks the MYTH spread by the pro-war movement that it was
liberals and the liberal media that lost the Vietnam War as it would be the shameful
 elements that would lose Iraqnam. The center of the anti-war movement back in the
day was urban areas, college campuses, NOT rural America by a long shot.
Frankly, the center of the anti-war movement TODAY pretty much remains the
urban scene, there is realistically no anti-war resistance on college campuses,
because we have NO DRAFT, and if a family resides in rural America, that is
where most volunteers for Iraq come from – YOU BETTER NOT QUESTION
LET ALONE OPPOSE THEIR WAR! However, the price you pay comes nowhere
 near what these families endured.

      Career Moves – Yes, there were and still are successful Veterans, even a few
who still complain about their VALOR being stolen. That does not mean WE
were immune to or free from the horrors of war, just better equipped to cope.
[BACKGROUND: Stolen Valor was a ultra-conservative, partisan book written
by friends of the Bush family in Texas to ironically expose Fake Veterans, as they
ignored just how fake G.W. Bush was and still is. These right-wing Veterans
created the MYTH that liberals [Rush Limbaugh, and his ilk, helped enhance
this myth] within the anti-war movement and leftists within Vietnam Veterans
Against the War (VVAW) turned the American people against the war effort
 and against our troops].

      The Rudow Family – it was this chapter more than any comes not from an
anti-war viewpoint, because it tells the story of how many Vietnam Veterans
returned to the world and what they perceived as back to normal. If anyone
even admits they were in combat, tells you as they look off with that thousand
mile long stare that they had no problems readjusting to the world after combat,
either they were never in Vietnam, in combat, or they still are just as unstable
now as when they returned from Nam. (Point: You are not going to find too
many Nam Vets telling you they returned to a normal life, successful maybe,
like me, but I wouldn’t go as far as to say NORMAL).

      Honor Restored – Willard saved the best for last. What stolen valor is really
all about. The story of his family coping with trying to upgrade their son’s less
than honorable discharge during a period of time when draft dodgers were being
granted amnesty and welcomed home from Canada, was what focused public
attention, prejudice, hate, and anger toward Willard’s family.

      Being a Life Member of Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA), and volunteering
 for Veterans for America (VFA), I know first hand that the Justice Project formed
by Bobby Muller after he left VVA and now has legal expertise allied with VFA,
was designed with a mission of trying best they could to upgrade less than honorable
 discharges and get the coding of DD-214s stopped. (Coding that told employers
everything about a Veteran from low IQ to drug and alcohol abuse even if the
discharge was Honorable). This in fact, was an effort of VVA, and still remains
so with our incarcerated Veterans program. Did you know that VVA is among
the only Veterans Service Organization that allows Veterans in prison and jails
to form a chapter?

      The Gray Family. I want to provide an extract from this chapter in order to
give members of MFSO, or military families thinking about QUESTIONING any
aspect of our war (deployments, expectations, PTSD, national commitment to win)
 food for thought. Are YOU prepared to potentially go through what these families
 did? Some in fact went through more horrible experiences than the Gray Family.

     As WE read this excerpt from the last chapter in Home Front, I ask that WE
take a moment and walk in the shoes of the Gray family. Here is a Retired
Military Senior NCO, a fellow military retiree (who BTW is treated as a fifth
class citizen, as our generation is treated like third class or stowage) when it
comes to the military retiree benefits they have been legislated out of. The
most successful among that Greatest Generation sweeps the stench under
the carpet for political expediency for they have money to burn at Casinos,
and could care less if they got Social Security or not, because they can’t take
the $$$ they have with them when they depart the mortal plain.

     Anyway, his son or daughter (our son or daughter) patriotically and proudly
joins the Army (or Marines), they survive a combat tour or two, three or ten, but
when the pressure and heat of battle fries their brain, who do you think will be
the first to make a move to dispose of them? GIs were (and are) referred to as GIs
 (or Government Issue), because WE were and are expendable.

       You got it the Pentagon. Figuring that cost savings was not as much of an
incentive to prevent Veterans from becoming Veterans by giving them bad
conduct or less than honorable discharges, there was an epidemic of them
compared to today. Ask anyone at VVA or VFA staff who has had to work bad
papers how the numbers compare to our relatively smaller All Volunteer Force,
and I rest our case.

      It was also far easier to get rid of used up troops during Vietnam, because
not only was PTSD unheard of, but efforts to research it and get it recognized
were being opposed by every right-wing, conservative element that supported
a continued presence in Vietnam, including established Veterans organizations
like the American Legion and VFW working with the Pentagon to keep troops
wounded in mind and body continuously fighting in the jungles of Viet Nam.

      In fact, PTSD became associated with Vietnam Veterans within the
anti-Vietnam War movement and jokingly referred to VVA as Vietnam
Victims of America a derogatory term for Bobby Muller’s VVA back in the
day, because it was one of the only Veterans groups fighting to have both
Agent Orange and PTSD recognized by our government worthy of compensation
and future treatment.

      Willard begins his families’ story by talking about his own military career,
blends in how his son joined the military following in Dad’s footsteps only to be
 disenchanted by the war as a combat medic, how it was going, and gaining a
disdain for "lifers" like his Dad, and me.

      The moral of Willard’s story is that here is a Career Military Family, with the
father a Senior NCO, having to deal with the fact that right, wrong, or otherwise,
their child [a military brat] has gotten a bad conduct discharge from the Army
after gallantly serving in Vietnam as a medic. We are talking about a Brooks
Army Hospital certified and trained medic here.

      Talking about bursting your patriotic bubble, in their trials and tribulations
trying to and successfully getting their son’s discharge upgraded to a General
Discharge, that would make him eligible for VA benefits, this military family
went through HELL ON EARTH!!!

      Willard writes from page 318 to 322 in Home Front: Viet Nam and Families at War.

"On a Sunday afternoon in the spring of 1972, I approached the pastor at a local
church which I had attended in my childhood. I was still considered a member of
 the church. I presented [the pastor] with three documents on the [Vietnam] war
[that were intended to inspire questions and debate on the war within our
congregation], and I asked him if I may address the congregation on a
"human needs issue."

[In many Churches of the Christian faith such soul searching testimony is
called to Bare of Give Spiritual Witness or share spiritual inspiration with
the congregation even if it bordered on  ethical, moral, spiritual, or political
controversy. Any bible will reflect where even Jesus, the Christ, was placed
in a position of having to respond under duress and torture to political
questions regarding Caesar, and the son of God.]

      I did not ask [the pastor] for money, or for any specific time. The pastor
seemed to be very open [minded] to the idea and took the manila envelope,
promising to look over the documents and discuss them with me the following
week. When I returned the next Sunday, I found the church empty, and the
parsonage occupants would not respond to my knocks. Disappointed, I visited
an old family friend nearby who, upon hearing my story, said, "Now I know
what this morning’s sermon was about!"

[Depending upon denomination churches may have an early morning service,
and Sunday school, then a service later in the morning before lunch].

      Eager to discover if perhaps I had struck a cord with the pastor, we both
hurriedly returned to the church, where we found [the pastor] exiting with the
package I had given him the week before. "Good!" I exclaimed as we got out of
the car. "What’s the word?"

[The pastor’s reply was shocking to say the least].

"After the services this morning," [the pastor] said, "they held a special deacons’
meeting and decreed that you are not welcome in this church." [We are talking
about a House of God here folks????]

"Apparently, [the pastor] had not mentioned me by name in his sermon, but had
managed to arouse the curiosity – and indignation – of several in the congregation. Upon finding out the source of the sermon, the church deacons met and wasted little time in
officially banning me from the church.

    Honest debate on the war, I was finding out, was not just unpatriotic. It was
heretical. "

      The parallels between how military families were ostracized during Vietnam
and Iraqnam is frightening. These families were literally terrorized by fellow
Americans. Thought not as bad, such harassment continues today and will
continue as long as there remains QUESTIONS.

Robert L. Hanafin
SP/5, U.S. Army (69-76)
Major, U.S. Air Force – Retired
Military Families Speak Out (OHIO)