Free dues - VFW looks to get Iraq war veterans to join

[darrels joy]

Free dues - VFW looks to get Iraq war veterans to join
By ADRIANA JANOVICH
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC


Yakima's Veterans of Foreign Wars post is looking for some new blood.

So it's inviting all the military personnel returning from Iraq to join for a year, dues-free.

"If they just got back from Iraq, we'll pay their dues for the first year just to encourage them to join," says Roy Greenfeather, commander of VFW Post 379.

He's hoping the offer attracts members of the following recently returned Yakima units: the Army Reserve 737th Transportation Company, Army Reserve 907th Engineer Detachment and 181st Support Battalion's Bravo Company, part of the Washington Army National Guard's 81st Armor Brigade. Members of the Pasco-based Alpha Company of the 1st Battalion, 303rd Armor Regiment, also of the 81st Brigade, are also invited. Many of that unit's soldiers live in the Yakima Valley.

Regular dues cost $30 a year, but decrease as veterans get older.

And in Yakima, Greenfeather says, "We're all getting older and need some fresh ideas."

Post 379, the largest VFW post in the state, had 1,485 members last year. This year, Greenfeather expects that number to have dropped by 50 or more members.

In 2004, the Yakima post performed military honors at 112 funerals, more than any other post in the state. About 1,200 American veterans die each day; the majority of them are World War II veterans.

Greenfeather says younger members will help bring vitality and new ideas to the group, dispelling the notion that the VFW is "a bunch of old folks sitting around drinking and telling war stories."

In fact, the VFW raises money for cancer and provides phone cards and care packages for soldiers serving overseas. It also helps with veterans' funerals and local parades.

"We're a large part of the community, and we support a number of community activities," Greenfeather says. But, "We do need some fresh ideas and younger blood."

[82Rigger]

Hmmm.....

I don't recall VN vets being offered free dues. :re:

Seem to recall a lot of VN vets being shown the door.

[b3196]

Yup, your right...The VFW considered the Vietnam war not a war....They classified it as a conflict. Which meant we couldn't join. This was back in the 60's.... After their membership started to dwindle, they reconsidered
I looked at it as just another group saying "welcome home"
Bob K

[SuperScout]

'S far as I know, my post #6441 in Wimberley, Texas, never refused the welcome mat to Vietnam war veterans. Quite the contrary, being the neighborly sort down here, we welcome any and all whose DD 214 has the correct entry. If a local Post wants to offer a year's worth of dues, I think it's a great idea to help attract and ultimately keep new and younger members. In a previous reign, our Post paid some members's dues in order to keep the Post in good standing for certain awards, but that practice of paying for ghosts has now gone by the wayside. I've noticed that members who pay, and are asked to help with various projects, are the most active members.

[DMZ-LT]

My Dad sent me my VFW membership card while I was in Viet Nam

[Boats]

Gentlemen,

I got my first year free for VN duty - at my Legion Hall - but the VFW didn't offer that option. Are the dues regulated? Let's say someone like me wanted to get a lifetime membership to one or the other. I'll be 59 so what would that cost be.

[darrels joy]

I'm sorry for what happened to you but Post 379 in Yakima was never like that.

Go here (News & Information/VFW timeline)
http://www.vfw.org/index.cfm?fa=news.leveld&did=860

click on interactive timeline and click on (decade) 1960.

There is a picture of 2 VFW members holding a VFW sign saying We Support Our Boys in Vietnam. This was done for Veterans Day 1965. Our friends and neighbors did not wait for the authorization to be given to support our troops.

Membership elegibility is determined by Congress, not by the VFW.

I won't go into all that the membership of Post 379 does because they don't need defending. This action fits into the way they have always been. That is why we are members.

Joy & Darrel

[darrels joy]

Boats,

VFW lifetime membership, like their dues, is determined by the Post you belong to. Some cost more than others due to facilities and programs offered.

[MORTARDUDE]

seems the VFW didn't want Korean War veterans either...

http://www.veteransadvantage.com/her...lsRunning.html

.................................


"The war in Korea was not necessarily 'forgotten,'" he said during a telephone interview from his home in Arlington, Virginia. "It's more like 'neglected.' Because you can't forget something you never knew. America was busy rebuilding from World War II and this 'police action' was more hidden than heralded. There was a mountain of ignorance about what was going on over there.

"Back then television didn't have the reach it did even ten years later," he said, noting that fewer than ten percent of American homes owned one of the early black-and-white TVs. "Most of the Korean War vets I've spoken to believed that no one really cared. For the most part they came home individually. There were no parades. Some felt shunned: some VFW posts refused them membership because they had fought in a 'police action' and not a 'real war.

"Most of those who served came home, hung up their uniform in the attic and got on with their lives. For most Americans, the movie and later black humor of the television show M*A*S*H embodied their war.

"It wasn't until veterans of Vietnam agitated and forced the country to pay attention with the dedication of the national memorial in Washington that Korean vets said, finally: 'What about us?'"

...........................................

[MORTARDUDE]

http://members.aol.com/philliprcoleman/pc21.htm

...........................


Although VFW led other ancestral veterans organizations in opening their memberships to blacks and minorities, their segregationist policy of establishing new, separate Posts rather than accept minorities within their existing bodies alienated well over twenty seven percent of those who served in uniform. Over time, after the Vietnam War, more blacks, other minorities and women vets were slowly admitted into previously all-male, all-white Posts. However, a general policy of excluding Vietnam War veterans regardless of skin color until after 1981, the year The Vietnam War Memorial was erected, kept hundreds of thousands who served in America's longest war from joining. Today, still angry at their post-war rejection, many Vietnam vets feel a sense of payback when hearing about yet another VFW or American Legion Post shutting down due to lack of membership.

.......................