27 January 2020

VA & DOD Release 2019 List of Agent Orange Sites (outside of Vietnam)

VA has released an updated Department of Defense list of locations outside of Vietnam where tactical herbicides were used, tested or stored by the United States military. The last list was released in 2006, and its flaws plagued vets these last fourteen year.

We tried to get DOD or VA to update their list, but both agencies said it wasn't theirs. I found the key USAF official in charge of installations, but LtGen Fedder declined to do anything to add C-123 aircraft to Dr. Alvin Young's 2006 waste of taxpayer dollars.
VA continued describing their new llst: “This update was necessary to improve accuracy and communication of information,” said VA Secretary Robert Wilkie. “VA depends on DOD to provide information regarding in-service environmental exposure for disability claims based on exposure to herbicides outside of Vietnam.”

Thorough review

DOD conducted a thorough review of research, reports and government publications in response to a November 2018 Government Accountability Office report.
“DOD will continue to be responsive to the needs of our interagency partners in all matters related to taking care of both current and former service members,” said Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper. “The updated list includes Agents Orange, Pink, Green, Purple, Blue and White, and other chemicals and will be updated as verifiable information becomes available.”
Veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange or other herbicides during service may be eligible for a variety of VA benefits, including an Agent Orange Registry health exam, health care and disability compensation for diseases associated with exposure. Their dependents and survivors also may be eligible for benefits

A Small Success: Stopping "Weekend Warrior"

In 2018 I complained about VA use of the phrase "weekend warrior." Many of us Reservists or National Guards consider this slur both pejorative and inaccurate. Even Google defines it as "a person who participates in an activity only in their spare time." Doesn't sound much like what we did, does it? The phrase works against us and had to stop.

I'm happy to say that VA has stopped using the phrase, at least by the Board of Veterans Appeals. In 2019 the phrase wasn't used a single time vs. more than a hundred times in recent years. I can see how it got started by reading old citations....one judge used it in a decision and than others did also not by any initiative on their part but because of the all-too-easy habit among VA's administrative law judges to simply clipboard each other's work.
The problem is that a judge is like others...words matter, and to have a mental image of "weekend warrior" while deciding whether that particular warrior is deserving of disability benefits is just too prejudicial!

Is this what YOUR BVA judge thinks?

24 January 2020

BVA Appeal Decisions Reference Wrong AFSC Codes for C-123 Agent Orange Eligibility

Here is one more example of how well-meaning VA folks have let benefits-related publications be used to deny veterans' perfectly valid C-123 Agent Orange exposure claims.

First: Kudos to the VA: I'm very happy that our effort to get exposure benefits for C-123 post-Vietnam veterans has led to seven active duty bases' personnel also considered for entitlement. But that doesn't make up for the harm done our Reserve veterans in the way VA spelled out eligibilities.

Look carefully at the second paragraph below. Notice the AFSC codes....do any of them look familiar to you? Probably not, because the Air Force "modernized" their codes a few years after most of us left service, and our old AFSC is nothing like the current one. Click here for the old Officer AFSC codes. Click here for the old Enlisted AFSC codes.

Example: the old AFSC for aircrew life support specialist was 92250, and the VA is set to deny anyone without the current AFSC they show below, 1220-1229. The example below is from an appeal denied by the Board of Veterans Appeals, meaning even if the veteran or his claims advisor spots the technical failing of AFSC codes, that poor vet is stuck with another years-long wait to appeal, this time to the US Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims. Maybe he'll get lucky there. Disability awards shouldn't have to depend on luck!

So we're given a real disaster is when a regional office or the Board of Veterans Affairs denies one of our claims because we provided on our DD-214, AF Form 623 or other official document the old AFSC.  It conflicts with the VA's publication that honors only the new codes.

I've already written about VA's failure to include the 67th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron, the 905th CAMS, and the VA not listing anything about enlisted aeromedical evacuation technicians and their 902XX AFSC.

I guess that means another VA IG complaint that they'll either ignore or, at best, pass along to the next unsuspecting associate to also ignore.

VA has published a list of military units who had regular and repeated exposure to contaminated C-123 aircraft.  The affected reserve units and dates of service for affected crew members are as follows: Pittsburgh International Airport, Pennsylvania (1972-1982), Westover Air Force Base and Hanscom Field Air Force Base, Massachusetts (1972-1982), and Lockbourne/Rickenbacker Air Force Base, Ohio (1969-1986). The affected active duty units and dates of service for affected crewmembers are Hurlburt Auxiliary Field, Eglin Air Force Base, Florida (1970-1973), Langley Air Force Base, Virginia (1962-1963, 1970-1973), Luke Air Force Base, Arizona (1970-1973), Tainan Air Field, Taiwan (1969-1970), Howard Air Force Base, Panama (1970-1973), Osan Air Base, South Korea (1970-1973), and Clark Air Force Base, Philippines (1969-1970).
VA has also published a list of specialty codes for military personnel who had regular and repeated exposure to contaminated Operation Ranch Hand (ORH) C-123s, used to spray Agent Orange in Vietnam, as flight, maintenance, or medical crew members. Those codes for enlisted personnel are flight engineer/aircraft loadmaster (1130-1149), aircrew life support specialist (1220-1229), and aircraft maintenance specialist/flight technicians (4314-4359). See https://www.benefits.va.gov/compensation/docs/AO_C123_AFSpecialityCodesUnits.pdf.
In order to warrant a presumption of exposure based on contact with a C-123, a veteran must have had duties at one of the above listed places during the time frame specified, and the veteran must also have had a duty which entailed that he or she regularly and repeatedly operated, maintained or served onboard C-123 aircraft.

22 January 2020

President's Statement on Military Injuries Following Iran's Missile Attack

(28 Jan 2010: Update on the injuries the President dismissed as 'headaches": 
Fifty US military personnel have now been diagnosed with concussions and traumatic brain injuries following the Iranian missile attack on US forces in Iraq earlier this month, according to a statement Tuesday from the Pentagon.
That's an increase on 16 from late last week when the Pentagon said 34 cases had been diagnosed.)

In his press conference this morning from Davos, Switzerland, the President was asked about American troops hurt during Iran's missile attack. I feel he spoke (or hopefully only misspoke) of their injuries as something unworthy of his consideration.

I'm deeply disappointed in his response. I am a 100% service-connected totally disabled paralyzed war veteran, and so messed up the VA tossed me into something called "catastrophically disabled." But I would never dismiss TBI as "not very serious" compared to my injuries or those referred to by the President. 

I am not political, but I take a stand here: TBI is a lifelong threat to health. TBI is more serious than youthful bone spurs that somehow disappear without treatment.

The President said:
"I heard that they had headaches, and a couple of other things, but I would say, and I can report, it's not very serious, They told me about it numerous days later, you'd have to ask Department of Defense. I don't consider it very serious relative to other injuries that I've seen. I've seen what Iran has done with their roadside bombs to our troops. I've seen people with no legs and with no arms. I've seen people that were horribly, horribly injured in that area, that war. No, I do not consider that to be bad injuries, no."
Separately, and with somewhat more perspective on the medical issues facing the injured, a CENTCOM spokesman has informed reporters nineteen injured troops have been evacuated to Germany, from a current estimate of at least 34 blast injuries 

Read more about TBI from the National Institute of Health and the Department of Veterans Affairs. Serious attention has been given since President Obama began an annual $100 million effort to address military TBI. The effort has continued with similar funding in the present administration. Since 2003 nearly 400,000 veterans have suffered moderate to severe TBI, typically blast injuries from ever-more lethal IEDs.

TBI, and indeed every military injury and illness, is worthy of our president's concern, respect and careful attention. Read here about DOD guidance for award of the Purple Heart for TBI injuries. That gets my respect.

Perhaps the administration should forward its new "not very serous" guidance to Building 3737 at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center (LRMC, ) the hospital's Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) & Rehabilitation Clinic. Blast injuries get serious respect there!

C-123 VETERANS ASSOCIATION FILES ANOTHER VA IG COMPLAINT ABOUT VBA PUBLICATIONS AND WEB PAGES

Several months ago we brought several problems to the attention of VA staff regarding their publications. Problems like not listing C-123 units, or enlisted AFSCS, but specifically not properly describing eligible veterans.

Today, because of their inaction, we've filed an IG complaint. Typically the VA IG won't get involved in something like this but just as often, they'll forward the issue to responsible officials to resolve.  L:et's hope for the best here, because we're all tired of C-123 claim being denied by regional offices, or even the Board of Veterans Appeals, by VA citing their own inaccurate literature as justification.

Today's specific complaint deals with "C-123 Airplanes and Agent Orange Residue" published by the Veterans Benefits Administration. VBA has a terribly misleading paragraph towards the end of the document:

Both points in this paragraph are false. The VA's own manual VA M21-1MR as well as 38 CFR § 3.307 (Presumption of Herbicide Exposure and Presumption of Disability During Service for Reservists Presumed Exposed to Herbicides) makes clear that EVERY C-123 veteran who served in a squadron known to have had C-123 aircraft after Vietnam is considered presumptively exposed and need not prove anything except the unit assigned to, and presence of an Agent Orange illness. And there is no "case-by-case' evaluation any different than any other Agent Orange claim, other than the fact all of our claims have to be directed ONLY to the VA St Paul Regional Office That's in their regulation also!


20 January 2020

C-123 Veterans Association Challenges VA to Correct Agent Orange Exposure Publications

Our C-123 Veterans Association has identified numerous errors by which VA denies our aircrews and maintenance veterans earned Agent Orange benefits.

So, we today submitted a 68-page detailed analysis of these errors to as many VA managers for whom we have email addresses.

Here's what we've addressed about VA's C-123 literature:

1. 905 CAMS maintainers cross-trained on the C-123 at Westover and should have their exposure claims honored.
2. Rickenbacker's 67th Aeromedical Evacuation squadron flew their base C-123s between 1972-1986 and their exposure claims should be honored.
3. VA has failed to specify enlisted medical crew AFSCs and has for five years simply denied most of their applications, even when submitted with ample evidence.
4. Certain aerial port units at the three C-123 bases should have claims honored, particularly for ramp and fleet service staff.
5. VA failed to see the 911th AES at Pittsburgh IAP was previously named the 33rd AES, and has let the confusion lead to denied veterans benefits.

VA has had most of this sent their way for two years and has failed to act. Perhaps there is hope this time. Worth the try!


06 January 2020

White House again delays decision on new Agent Orange diseases; is decision delayed for "late 2020" election impact?

Comment: To me, this decision, promised since the Obama administration and repeatedly promised by the Trump VA, seems timed to the election. Mulvaney seems to have even raised the bar for coverage. Previously, VA acted when Institute of Medicine studies revealed a statistical impact for Agent Orange on a disease: Mulvaney now demands "compelling evidence" for VA to act. Or...to avoid acting at all? And why wait until the election?
The clear problem is his term compellingconclusive, convincing, decisive, effective, forceful, persuasive, satisfying, strong." That's a new, much higher standard. Science and medicine will find it almost impossible to establish "compelling" proof. Very few other exposures have "compelling" evidence for diseases. Tobacco, asbestos, radiation, perhaps only exposures like these fall into that category. The original 1991 laws for Agent Orange exposures forced VA to act when IOM showed an increase for the statistical odds of a disease. Mulvaney wants more. Very, very much more.
by Patricia Kime,
The day President Donald Trump signed a funding bill including a provision ordering VA to announce its plans to add four conditions to the list of Agent Orange-linked diseases within 30 days, VA Secretary Robert Wilkie said the decision wasn’t likely to come until at least “late 2020.”
In a letter to Sen. Jon Tester, D-Montana, dated Dec. 20 and obtained by Military Times, Wilkie said he would not make a decision until the results of two long-awaited studies are submitted to or published in scientific journals.
Then Wilkie said he was just awaiting the results of the studies — the Vietnam Era Health Retrospective Observational Study, or VE-HEROES, and the Vietnam Era Mortality Study — expected in 2019.
But the requirement that the results be analyzed, peer-reviewed and in the publication pipeline could add months to the process. VE-HEROES results are currently “being analyzed,” while data from the mortality study is “expected to be available for peer review and publication in late 2020,” Wilkie wrote in the letter.
It’s unclear whether VA plans to comply with the new law that requires it to announce its plans on a decision within the 30-day requirement.
For the 83,000 veterans with one of three conditions under consideration, including bladder cancer, Parkinson’s-like symptoms or hypothyroidism, as well as an unknown number of Vietnam veterans with high blood pressure, the wait continues.

05 January 2020

VA Fails Another C-123 Veteran's Claim

Veteran's VA Experience
Not again!

But yes, VA has screwed yet another C-123 claim beyond all recognition. In this case, an aeromedical evacuation technician from Pittsburgh's 33rd AES died while his claim was in process, so his widow continued the application.

It took quite a bit of detective work, but enough documentation was uncovered to establish the veteran's AFSC, his unit, and flying status with the 33rd during the years the C-123 was in service at Pittsburgh. I had the opportunity to provide a supporting statement, the VA Form 41-2138 to explain enough of the facts that the claim should have succeeded.

But that was not to be. For some reason, the regional claims office disregarded all the veteran's supporting documentation and also disregarded my own input, calling it "unqualified lay input."

We were lucky in this case to get support from the National Veterans Legal Services Project, and they rebuilt the claim for submission to the Board of Veterans Appeals. Once again, VA pretended everything in the claim was inadequate to satisfy their critical eye. BVA denied the widow's claim on two reasons. The judge wrote that the veteran was assigned to the 33rd AES, but VA forms explaining the C-123 program only specified the 911th AES.

Somehow, it got past these "experts" that the 33rd is the same as the 911th! Some years after the C-123 era, the squadron's name was updated to the 911th.

The other thing that got past the "experts" was the veteran's AFSC of 90210 and 90250. VA's various C-123 publications failed to list enlisted aeromedical evacuation technicians' AFSCs, and had only flight nurses listed. Ordinarily this isn't a problem because all C-123 claims are supposed to be processed by the VA St. Paul office where experts can drill down to the real facts.

Unfortunately, this claim drifted to some other regional office and there, was denied, and then prepared for resubmission the the Board of Veterans Appeals. The BVA also denied, and we found about it by reading the monthly BVA decision summaries.

The BVA errors were obvious and fatal to the claim. It was wrongly denied, for the two reasons named above. The last few days we've tried to alert every contact we know at VA to see if reason can prevail, to get the claim reconsidered without having to await the next higher level of appeal, the US Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims.

Will it work? There's a chance, and we've succeeded before when VA's mistakes were so glaring. NVLSP has continued their involvement and won't let this go unchallenged. We sure could use help from Pennsylvania's legislators to pressure VA to reconsider the denied claim and to update the publications that caused these problems.

Stay tuned!

04 January 2020

I'm troubled by the attack on Iranian General Qasem Soleimani

     Was it assassination for American drones to target and kill Iranian General Qasem Soleimani? I hope not, but I'm very troubled and trying to learn and understand more. Was this combat, or crime, or somehow both?
     As a student of history, particularly World War II, I read with concern about the shoot-down of Japanese Admiral Yamamoto by US Army Air Forces. Knowing the enemy's flight plans, American flyers conducted an extremely challenging mission ("Operation Vengeance") and shot down the Admiral's aircraft over the Solomon Islands on April 18, 1943.
     Writing about it, some historians called it an assassination, questioning the morality to intentional targeting even of combat leaders. Tellingly, Navy Secretary Knox himself had to give permission for an attack he considered morally questionable in targeting an individual, and in this case he knew it was both for vengeance and for tactical advantage. Rather than the legality of it, Knox questioned the insult to American morals He was swayed by the military considerations of eliminating the Japanese naval mastermind. Researching it, Knox concluded that, under the laws of war at that time, the mission to kill Yamamoto was a legal act of war. But not necessarily a moral act; Knox was forever troubled by the injury done to American values with his attack order.
     Avoiding targeting of opposing leaders isn't just a modern moral or legal question: even at Waterloo, Wellington stopped his artillery firing upon Napoleon.
     So the American drone targeting a specific Iranian general (a legal visitor to Iraq and a military officer from a nation with whom we are not at war) certainly has invited questions and even direct challenges, especially because our moral and legal foundations have evolved over the years since 1943, in part influenced by serious and appropriate self-questioning about the Yamamoto mission. For instance, assassination has been illegal per American law since 1981. It is clear that the morality of war changes with time. Let's hope that's for the better.
     For me, the most serious question comes about because of recent years and clear legal prohibitions against CIA and other intelligence assassinations.
    Generally-accepted morality and the laws of war do not prohibit the targeting of generals and admirals; in fact the killing of soldiers is nearly always permissible, unless they lay down their weapons in which case it is always illegal. In fact, the underlying concept in the laws of war is military necessity, meaning that even those things prohibited by the laws of war, such as the unintentional killing of civilians, can be argued as permissible if they are a matter of military necessity.
     It is the motivations of the decision makers that dictate the morality of the mission, for targeting military leaders solely for the purpose of revenge is in fact unethical and immoral – lethal revenge is best left to legal processes, if possible! If we accept what has been reported about General Qasem Soleimani's actions in Iraq, he was actively targeting American and allied interest and conducting terror campaigns, and thus himself became a legitimate target.
     The 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force Against Terrorists, a congressional resolution, seems to grant the president the power to use “all necessary and appropriate force” against terrorists with impunity. Thus, nobody should expect to be completely safe (physically, morally or legally) from an overhead MQ-9 Reaper armed with a Hellfire missile when actively plotting the deaths of Americans and our friends.
     While US officials have determined that Soleimani is a terrorist, he was also a ranking general in a sovereign government, so targeting him tempts war with Iran in a new way.
     I don't expect nations in the Middle East will see it our way, especially with administration speaking points focusing more on the general's death to prevent vague future operations against us, or as retaliation for suspected bad acts in the past...because those excuses sound more and more like an illegal revenge assassination.