The federal government has set aside two days of the year to honor our fighting men and women who fight the battles of wars to protect and preserve our great nation and our way of life. On Memorial Day – May 30th – and on Veterans Day – November 11th we pause to honor our veterans to whom we owe so much.
To me, it has always been painful that these holidays, that should be kept sacred, have become events for sales of every kind of consumer product, rather than the solemn celebrations they should be. It is even more painful to realize that while the nation honors them, their needs for mental health care and other help is slow in coming.
The holiday we know as Veterans Day and celebrate on November 11th has traveled a long path to become the holiday to honor all American veterans.
Veterans Day, previously known as Armistice Day, marked the end of World War I and the signing of the Treaty of Versailles on June 28, 1919. However, fighting in World War I stopped seven months earlier when an armistice or temporary cessation of hostilities between the allies and Germany went into effect on the eleventh day of the eleventh month.
At the time, November 11th was generally regarded as the end of World War I, “the war to end all wars.” In November 1919, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed November 11th as the first commemoration of Armistice Day.
In 1938, Congress decreed that Armistice Day become a national holiday, primarily to honor veterans of World War I. But in 1954, after World War II, Congress amended the 1938 law by striking the word “Armistice” and inserting in its place the word “Veterans,” thus making it a holiday to honor all veterans. The 1968 Uniform Holiday Bill to provide three-day weekends for federal employees by celebrating national holidays on Monday. Under the new law, the Veterans Day was observed with much confusion on October 25, 1971. Because of the historic and patriotic significance of Veterans Day, in 1975, President Gerald Ford signed a law returning the observance of Veterans Day to November 11. This action was supported by the overwhelming majority of state legislatures, all major veterans’ service organizations and the American people.
I have been struck by the fact that Veterans Day was established by the federal government, to honor our veterans with solemn ceremonies and patriotic speeches, while simultaneously, dragging its feet in providing appropriate disability benefits and proper care for the 1 in 5 Afghanistan and Iraq soldiers who suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
It has become common knowledge that left untreated, PTSD leads to homelessness, unemployment divorce, substance abuse and suicide.
Tens of thousands of veterans are on waiting lists for urgently needed counseling and psychiatric care. A backlog of more than 400,000 disability claims await processing. Millions of middle-income veterans are excluded from receiving care at Veterans hospitals because of budget shortfalls.
According to the Chief of Psychiatry at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, soldiers tell us that they fear losing their security clearance and losing promotions if they receive mental health care.
Homelessness is another consequence of untreated PTSD. Tens of thousands of former milit