The VFW Washington Office attended the Korean/Cold War Family’s annual meeting this week in nearby Arlington, Va. Hosted by the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, the purpose was to highlight successes and continuing challenges to locate and recover more than 7,700 unaccounted- for Americans on the Korean Peninsula. Atop the agenda was the lack of movement in reopening DPAA-led recovery operations in North Korea, which 

the U.S. is trying to keep separate from denuclearization talks. One year ago this 

week, 55 transfer cases containing the co-mingled remains of perhaps more than 

150 Americans returned to U.S. soil. To date, eight have been identified, with another two dozen IDs expected to be announced within a few weeks. The VFW is all-in 

where it concerns the return of missing and unaccounted-for servicemen, and looks forward to continuing to work with DPAA and the families to bring our troops home. 

  The Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans Act. The bill intended to guarantee disability benefits to 90,000 veterans. The bill is just one more provision in a decades-long fight to guarantee the same benefits to thousands of Navy veterans who served in the waters offshore of Vietnam that their land and brown-water comrades are entitled to after potentially being exposed to toxic Agent Orange.

    Tens of thousands of Vietnam veterans can have their disability benefits restored, and well as an expansion of benefits to military dependents, veterans of the Korean DMZ, and those exposed to toxic hazards in Southwest Asia.”   

Veterans with one of 14 diseases presumed to be related to the herbicide Agent Orange and who served offshore or in the specified areas of the DMZ, can now file a disability claim with the Department of Veterans to receive benefits, thanks to a law enacted June 26.

H.R. 299 extends disability compensation to personnel who served off the coast of the Republic of Vietnam between Jan. 9, 1962, and May 7, 1975. It specifies that veterans must have served on a ship not more than 12 nautical miles off the coast. The expanse of territorial water covered begins on the southwestern demarcation line of Vietnam and Cambodia and runs through several points spelled out in the law.  June 26  2019