#SOLDIERPORN

(Article by Amaani Lyle of American Forces Press Service, 21 MAY 2013. Source.)

BROOKLYN – Former U.S. Marine Corps sergeant and retired New York City fire captain John Vigiano is all too familiar with what he calls bad days.

Speaking after the Armed Forces Wounded Warrior Mural Dedication Ceremony at the William McKinley Intermediate School here, the soft-spoken, silver-haired veterans’ advocate discussed his experiences as military member, first responder and grieving father.

Having spent nearly four decades as a firefighter in Brooklyn, he seldom considered his life-saving responsibilities as work so much as a passion.

“Thirty-six years … I think I went to work five days, maybe six,” Vigiano said. “The rest of it was just great.”

Other days, he remembered, were not so great.

“Those were days of pretty significant losses,” Vigiano said. “When a fireman dies in your hands, you never forget that. It’s not a good day. The first time you find someone burned to death, it’s not a good day.”

But nothing, he said, could ever prepare him for the events of Sept. 11, 2001 –- the morning that both of his sons, John Jr. and Joe, perished in the line of duty while saving lives as the World Trade Center collapsed.

“9/11 will take me to the grave; both my sons were killed that day,” he said, his head lowered. “You go to bed saying, ‘I hope I don’t dream about it again, but you do.’”

John Jr. followed in his father’s footsteps as a New York City firefighter, while his younger brother, Joe, served as a detective in the New York Police Department. That particular morning, Vigiano was home watching the tragedy unfold with the rest of the world.

“The police department took my wife and me down to headquarters that afternoon and I stayed there until they closed the site,” Vigiano said. “Everyday from 6:30 in the morning to midnight, I’d walk the pile.”

At his wife’s request, he did not dig.

“She said, ‘if anything happens to you, I have nobody,’” he recalled. “So I just stood in the back and when a body was recovered, I’d go down and say a prayer and go back.”

His voice trembling, Vigiano said rescue teams found Joe’s remains, but they never found John Jr.

The elder Vigiano said his young granddaughter grew to comprehend that the spirit of her father lives on.

“That’s taken a lot to try and explain to her that his soul is still with us – that the body doesn’t mean anything,” Vigiano said.

Still, John and his wife of 50 years, Jan, pray for the day they find the bit of DNA that can finally bring them some closure.

“My wife and I bond together and we had 34 and 36 great years,” Vigiano said of his sons’ respective lives and, ironically, John Jr’s badge number, 3436.

“The last words that I spoke to my sons: ‘I love you’ and they said ‘I love you. It don’t get better than that.”

(From a Department of Veterans Affairs News Release, 21 MAY 2013. Source.)

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Disabled American Veterans and the American Legion today announced a new partnership to help in reducing the compensation claims backlog for veterans.

The effort — called the Fully Developed Claims Community of Practice — is a key part of VA’s overall transformation plan to end the backlog in 2015 and process claims within 125 days at 98 percent accuracy, VA officials said.

VA can process fully developed claims in half the time it takes for a traditionally filed claim, officials noted.

“VA prides itself on our ongoing partnership with organizations that represent veterans throughout the claims process,” said Undersecretary for Benefits Allison A. Hickey. “A fully developed claim is the most effective way to ensure a veteran’s claim never reaches the backlog and is the basis for this new initiative between VA and what we expect will be an ever-increasing number of veteran service organizations and others who represent veterans at various points of the claims process.”

The new initiative “takes a common-sense approach to working smarter to better serve injured and ill veterans,” said Barry Jesinoski, Washington Headquarters executive director for Disabled American Veterans.

“DAV is pleased to be working with the VA to help improve the disability compensation system,” Jesinoski added.

The American Legion has been working with VA since December on its fully developed claims process, said James E. Koutz, the American Legion’s national commander.

“Teams of our experts have already gone to VA regional offices in Denver, Pittsburgh, Baltimore and other cities to help identify best practices for [fully developed claims], and to further train our own service officers,” Koutz said.

Claims are considered to be “fully developed” when veterans submit all available supporting evidence, such as private treatment records and notice of federal treatment records, to VA at the time they first file a formal claim and certify they have no more evidence to submit. This is the information that VA needs to make a determination on a disability claim, VA officials said.

The fully developed claims program supports the sharing of best practices across veteran service organizations that help thousands of veterans each year with their compensation claims, to identify up front all evidence necessary to support a veteran’s claim, officials explained. Veterans then certify that they have no additional evidence to submit, and VA can process the claim in half the time it takes for a traditionally filed claim, they added.

Veteran service organizations have long played an integral role in submitting veterans’ claims — often with representatives working within VA regional offices. VA has consulted with them throughout the development and implementation of its plan to end the backlog in 2015 to ensure best practices and their unique insights were incorporated, officials said.

The American Legion and DAV are the first to step forward to work with VA on the program, officials added, and that program has led to a much more efficient process.

This is the latest effort in support of the plan to reduce the backlog. Last month, VA announced an initiative to expedite compensation claims decisions for veterans who have waited one year or longer.

On April 19, VA began prioritizing claims decisions for veterans who have been waiting the longest by providing provisional decisions that allow eligible veterans to begin collecting compensation benefits quickly. With a provisional decision, a veteran has a year to submit additional information to support a claim before the decision becomes final.

On May 15, VA officials announced that the department is mandating overtime for claims processors in its 56 regional benefits offices through the end of fiscal year 2013 to help eliminate the backlog, with continued emphasis on high-priority claims for homeless veterans and those claiming financial hardship, the terminally ill, former prisoners of war, Medal of Honor recipients, and veterans filing fully developed claims.

As of May 17, the paperless claims processing system known as the Veterans Benefits Management System, or VBMS, has been deployed to 46 out of 56 regional office locations, and about 18 percent of VA’s current claim inventory is in an electronic format, officials said.

Claims for Wounded Warriors separating from the military for medical reasons will continue to be handled separately and on a priority basis with the Defense Department through the Integrated Disability Evaluation System, officials said. On average, they noted, wounded warriors separating through IDES currently receive VA compensation benefits in two months following their separation from service.
 

Related Sites:
U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
The American Legion
Disabled American Veterans
Information on Filing Fully Developed Claims
VA Transformation Plan to Eliminate Compensation Claims Backlog

(Article by Air Force Tech. Sgt. Mareshah Haynes, Air Force News Service 16 MAY 2013. Source.)

COLORADO SPRINGS - Behind her bright brown eyes, easy smile and contagious laugh there is pain — both physical and mental.

Retired Air Force Staff Sgt. Zuleika Cruz-Pereira joined the Army after Sept. 11, 2001, because she wanted to do something to help people.

“I wanted to go out there and do something big,” she said. “I’m one of those people who it doesn’t matter if I know you or not. I’m going to help you if you need help.”

She enlisted as a water treatment specialist and served two tours in Southwest Asia before she joined the Air Force in 2008.

During her time in the Army, Cruz-Pereira saw and experienced things that are still too painful for her to share outside of her closest confidants. Despite her battle with post-traumatic stress disorder, which was undiagnosed at the time, she deployed again — this time as a logistics airman.

Cruz-Pereira was working in a warehouse in Iraq, a job she said she enjoyed, when she was injured. A 75-pound piece of equipment fell off a shelf and pinned her to the floor, crushing her. Cruz had sent her airmen to lunch and was alone in the warehouse.

She picked herself up and continued to work and told no one about the accident, except her husband who was still in the Army and deployed to another location. But she didn’t even tell him the severity of her pain.

“When it happened I didn’t say anything,” she said. “I remember waking up — my head hurt and I touched it and I didn’t see any blood. I moved the box off my stomach and I got back to working. I was in excruciating pain.”

A few weeks after the accident, Cruz-Pereira said she would fall each time she tried to stand and her supervisor began to notice. Her supervisor sent her to the doctor and that’s when Cruz-Pereira discovered just how severe her injury was.

She was diagnosed with a mild traumatic brain injury and cervical, back and sciatica nerve injury. She was sent to Germany for further treatment.

“I thought it was a sprain or something,” she said. “I thought it was something simple.”

Cruz-Pereira returned to Fort Riley, Kan., where her husband is stationed, so she could be with him while she underwent medical procedures. The doctors there weren’t able to perform the surgery to improve Cruz-Pereira’s condition, and she was eventually medically retired.

With few friends besides her husband, her support system was limited and Cruz-Pereira said it became hard to manage the pain, depression and PTSD she endures to this day.

“The Warrior Games is a good thing because it helps me out a lot,” Cruz-Pereira said. “Back at home, with the depression and everything, I don’t really get out of the house.

“[Here], it feels good, it’s like I’m serving again in a different way,” she continued. “It’s feels good to wear blue again that says Air Force. It just feels awesome. When I’m here, it fills the void that I have in my heart.”

Cruz-Pereira heard about the Warrior Games and believed competition was just what she needed. As a life-long athlete, she thought being back in the company of airman was something she felt would benefit her.

“Being injured and being in pain, you think you can’t do sports anymore,” she said. “When they told me about the games, it opened a lot of doors and it opened my mind to it.

“When they had the selection camp, I gave 150 percent because I wanted to be on the team so bad,” Cruz-Pereira continued. “I wanted to be involved in sports again because that’s me. I wanted to feel like I can be normal again, even if I’m in pain.”

Cruz-Pereira admits she has a long way to go in her recovery, but the Warrior Games helped her to see there is light at the end of the tunnel.

“In the September camp I told [one of the coordinators], ‘You know what? You just saved me,’” she said.

It is often assumed that the memory of an event is solely based on what actually happened, rather than a process that occurs overtime and through a purposeful process. Like many other veterans, this day was harder for me because all the images of carnage conjured up memories of similar tragedies. I have been watching the images and has sent me back to the aftermaths of suicide bomber attacks on civilians. That is my weight to bear and is less important than trying to make sense of days like today. All of the television footage of the explosions do not hold a candle to what was actually experienced. 

With the shock-wave of high explosives sensations of heat and concussion hit you before your brain can process the image. So the television cameras are less of  an expression of the actual experience, instead, they provide an illusion of clarity. When you see people still running forward its because their brains haven’t even put two and two together yet. It is worse for the injured because they are physically affected by the injuries prior to even full rationalization of what is happening.

When you come to a location after a bombing, people have almost no understanding of their injuries. The adrenaline of the attack will cover up the pain, but there is still such a look of terror. I was just standing here and there was this loud noise, heat, pain, and I am now on the ground. The emotional shock of the event almost overpowers the physical aspects until the chemical groups that manage adrenaline fade away. Medical professionals call this the golden hour. Shell Shock was the moniker of the First World War because it speaks to the confusion and chaos that goes on in the brain in the wake of explosions like today’s. These chemicals often damage memory and will always make these memories difficult without the tragic nature of their content.

Watching the images of people on the ground just looking around aimlessly illustrates how the events are much more chaotic for people present. The capturing of multiple still images does very little to capture it. Just think of the smell of it. You never forget those smells and anything that reminds me of the smell of burning flesh make me sick for weeks.

Despite the horror and misery that these poor runners and bystanders absorbed today, no justice for the terrorist(s) who did this will make it right. The important part of the narrative that will diminish over time is the human capacity for compassion illustrated by this tragedy. It is important that we remember the good that was demonstrated today. Watch the video. One person or a small group of people did this, but before the smoke cleared people were running to help. You could see some bleeding themselves and doing all they could to save others. 

That doesn’t make everything better, but when things like this happen it is important to note that when one or maybe ten people conspire to do something this terrible, hundreds of people will rush into that danger to help others. There is no divorcing today’s attack from the tragic impact it has made on the lives of the injured, but it is another reminder that their will always be many more people rushing to help. Some people have no problem doing terrible things to innocent people, but more people will fight to help the injured. In senseless tragedies we see the worst of a few people, but the best of so many more. It doesn’t make the suffering from today’s events any less acute, but it does speak to the human spirit and how we can stand in the face of tragedy. In the coming weeks we are going to be bombarded with what went wrong today, and I am sure there may be some finite oversights that could have prevented this. However, there were many more good people stepping up as heroes than there were terrorists using the misery of the innocent to draw attention to their cause. We would be wise not to forget this hard earned fact, that many more first responders and bystanders did all they could to save lives today.

[Blogpost by Joe via PTSD: A Soldier’s Perspective, 15 APR 2013. Source.]

(“The Bala Murghab Saga,” by Master Sergeant Kevin Wallace, 4 APR 2013. Source. Editor’s Note: This story is dedicated to all the men who served in Bala Murghab! —- your friend, Kevin.)

BALA MURGHAB, Afghanistan — For some, coming home means flag-waving crowds, cheers and parades. For others, there is no real coming home, just a struggle to adapt to who they’ve become and make sense of what they’d done.

I’m an Air Force photojournalist, a Wounded Warrior and Purple Heart recipient, and not ashamed to admit it. I’ve been involved in numerous combat engagements in the mountains of Afghanistan, yet recently I feel like every sacrifice made by those I love have been nullified as the coalition pulls out of the valley we primarily operated in.

This is a struggle for me.

What keeps me going is the hope that by sharing our stories, perhaps you’ll somehow further dedicate yourself to readiness and become more resilient.

Today marks two years since a team of 7th Squadron, 10th Cavalry Regiment scouts, a few Navy augmentees and I fought a well-trained, well-equipped and outnumbering enemy in northern Bala Murghab (BMG), Badghis province.

The reality is any airman, sailor or coastie at any time can be tasked with augmenting the Army or Marine Corps ground forces, and you could find yourself in a situation you’ve never imagined. 

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