Vets Under Siege: How America Deceives and Dishonors Those Who Fight Our Battles Book

Pt. 1 The Unending Battles of War and Peace

1 The Wartime Battles of Bill Florey: E4 SPC, U.S. Army, 82nd Airborne, Persian Gulf War 11

2 The Peacetime Battles of Bill Florey: E4 SPC, U.S. Army, 82nd Airborne, Persian Gulf War 23

Pt. 2 The Shaping of a National Mind-set

3 The Bonus Army: The Sad Summer When the Veterans Invaded Washington 47

4 Old Soldiers Sometimes Die - Waiting After a Lifetime of Delays 61

5 Decades of Waste: How the System Spent Decades Making a One-Day Decision 75

6 Veterans at War at Home: DAV vs. DVA 85

7 The Mystery Caller: VA Help Lines Are Often Helpless, Hapless, Hopeless 95

8 A Government History of VA Failures: Decades of Reports About Delays 107

9 Outpatient Delays: Diagnosis and Cure 139

10 The Pain of Unseen Wounds: Slow to Learn the ABCs of PTSD 151

11 A New Generation of Vets: Ratings Games and Waiting Lists 161

12 Seeds of Dishonor and Disservice: How a System in Trouble Sows Disrespect 167

13 An Agent Orange Veterans Day: Retired but Still Battling 183

14 Living Monuments: The True Cost of the Iraq War 195

15 Whip-Cracking Washington: Revelations at Walter Reed 211

Pt. 3 Solutions

16 Blue Ribbons and Red Tape: Commissioning Change 225

17 Reality Check, Gut Check: An Interlude in the Search-for Solutions 253

18 A Department of Veterans Advocacy: Renaming the VA, Rededicating Ourselves 279

Index 291