25th Aviation Unit Needs Your Help! 
Mayday! Mayday!

A request from Ron Leonard

I have a little problem I need some help with.

         The 25th Aviation, our old Vietnam units,  have been sending care packages to
the troops in Afghanistan, Kuwait, Bosnia and a few other places for a while.
We had been scrambling to find enough concerned souls to keep the packages
going.
         I was hoping Wal-Mart would step up and help, but as yet - no reply. Then a miracle happened. A lady contacted me today, someone's Granny. Who's son was in Vietnam, and they sent packages then. During Desert Storm she did it. Now comes the good/funny part.
         One little Granny, has now turned into 15 chapters of Grannies of about approximately  25 Grannies each and friends. Who want to sponsor an entire unit each  - A whole damn Army of Grannies. We will run out of units quick...I need more units. So if you have kids in the gulf, or know someone that is please have them contact me. I need one point of contact for each unit.  I will match up one Granny Battalion with one Army/Marine/Air Force unit. The packages will be delivered from the ground up  -  PFC's upwards.


Mayday Mayday....send addresses

Ron Leonard
Diamondhead 085
Webmaster 25th Aviation Battalion
http://25thaviation.org

 

NEWS BRIEFS 

VietnamVets.org: Serving the Vietnam Vet Community
http://www.VietnamVets.org/

VietnamVets.org's Weekly Newsletter for the Week of 2/21/2003

If you see news that you think our readers would like to see, be it an
editorial, legislative alert or news from a newspaper, send it on in:
http://www.VietnamVets.org/submit/
 

The McDowell News: Former Army nurse will return to Vietnam
http://www.mcdowellnews.com/news/MGBG3GWEPCD.html
Posted 2/28/2003

With our nation on the brink of another war, a local Vietnam veteran will
return to a former war-torn country to revisit many of the places from her
past. Janis Nark of Nebo served as an Army nurse for 26 years, retiring as
a lieutenant colonel. She served in Vietnam as well as Desert Storm.
Currently on the Board of Directors of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund,
she will accompany members of a group called Sons and Daughters in Touch
(SDIT) for 18 days traveling from Ho Chi Minh City to Hanoi.
 

San Antonio Express: Vietnam era photos slated
http://news.mysanantonio.com/story.cfm?xla=saen&xlb=180&xlc=955582
Posted 2/27/2003

An exhibit of photographs taken by journalists who died while covering the
decades-long conflict in Vietnam and Indochina will be on display at the
Institute of Texan Cultures from March 11 through May 25. 'Requiem: By the
Photographers Who Died in Vietnam and Indochina' is a memorial to 135
photojournalists who died or were reported missing in action.
 

Norwich Bulletin: Pentagon to explain MIA search
Posted 2/27/2003

The U.S. Department of Defense's POW/MIA Office has agreed to hold two
sessions in Waterford next month, explaining the process used in the
search and recovery of American soldiers unaccounted for after war. The
Waterford sessions are a result of renewed interest in the case of Capt.
Arnold Holm, a Waterford native killed in Vietnam in June 1972, but whose
remains were never recovered. An investigative team from the DPMO will
conduct a third inspection of an area outside Hue in April based on new
information it has received regarding the Holm case.

Norwich Bulletin: Searchers to renew hunt for Vietnam War soldier
Posted 2/27/2003

Margarete Holm admits her hopes rise each time she learns of the discovery
of another American serviceman's remains being returned from Vietnam for
burial. 'I've been to the point of giving up hope,' she said this week
from her home in Lebanon, Pa. 'But you still continue to hope.' Capt.
Arnold Holm, a Waterford native, was reported missing in action in June
1972 when his helicopter crashed in Thua Thien province in the central
highlands of Vietnam. He was one of three eastern Connecticut servicemen
listed as 'unaccounted for' when the war ended in 1975. The remains of
Colchester native Maj. Peter Cleary were recovered last year and buried in
Arlington National Cemetery. The case of Old Mystic native Peter Dean
Hesford has been classified as 'no longer pursued' after extensive
investigations failed to produce evidence that his remains would be found.

Associated Press: Supreme Court debates agent orange case
http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/politics/5264195.htm
Posted 2/26/2003

The Supreme Court debated Wednesday the pitfalls of letting ill Vietnam
veterans sue chemical companies over Agent Orange exposure despite a
long-resolved settlement. Companies that made the herbicide thought their
liability ended with a 1984 class-action settlement. Justices will decide
before July whether people who got cancer or other diseases long after
1984, and didn't even know about the $180 million settlement, get a chance
to challenge the deal. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said she was concerned
that the newspaper advertisements that ran at the time didn't reach people
who could have been entitled to money.

Norwich Bulletin: Vets' reactions to a VFW post in Hanoi mixed
Posted 2/26/2003

Dan Carr laughed when asked what he thought about the Veterans of Foreign
Wars' plans to open a VFW Post in downtown Hanoi, Vietnam. 'I think it's
great,' Carr, who served in Vietnam in 1969, said. 'I think we need to be
open to everything to help vets heal.'  VFW officials announced last week
that discussions are under way to open a VFW post in Hanoi for American
veterans living and working in Vietnam. As part of his official visit to
Vietnam this week, VFW Senior Vice Commander Edward Banas of Voluntown
will meet with Vietnamese and American officials in Hanoi to discuss those
plans. He'll also meet with potential members of the post, American
veterans who now work or live in Vietnam.


TimesDaily.com: Local war vet hopes Air America stamp takes flight
Posted 2/26/2003

Ray Jeffery fought in World War II and Korea, then flew with Air America
in Laos. After a life spent fighting, he figures he's got one good fight
left in him. Jeffery is the only former Air America pilot in northwest
Alabama. He retired from the Air Force as a major in 1965 and joined the
CIA's air transport service a few days later. The CIA didn't recognize the
civilian pilots who risked life and limb in Southeast Asia until 2001.
Now, the Air America Association, a group of retired Air America pilots,
is shooting for recognition on a wider scale. The group has spent the past
eight years trying to get the U.S. Postal Service to issue a commemorative
stamp as a tribute to the civilian pilots who served with Air America.

Norwich Bulletin: Vet works to ensure 'no one gets left behind'
Posted 2/26/2003
Outside Richard Cyr's home on Gill Street, below the American flag on a
flagpole in the front yard, flies the familiar black POW/MIA flag. It's a
reminder that the job of bringing home those who died defending their
country in Vietnam is not finished. The U.S. government makes a promise to
every man and woman who serves in the military: No one gets left behind.
There are still 31 men from Connecticut in Vietnam.

Norwich Bulletin: Veteran hopes to find soldiers' remains at dig site
Posted 2/26/2003

Last year, during his first visit back to Vietnam, Edward Banas had hoped
to visit one of the excavation sites where the search for the remains of
American servicemen lost during the Vietnam War was under way.
But it didn't work out. His trip was delayed by a couple of weeks and by
the time he arrived in Vietnam, the sites were closing down because of
monsoon season. Later tonight (Thursday morning, Vietnam time) Banas
finally will take that trip. He and the delegation will board a
Russian-made helicopter and fly to a landing zone outside the ancient city
of Hue. From there, they will walk to the dig site.

The Courier Mail: 30-year link with Vietnam marked
Posted 2/26/2003

Australia and Vietnam have marked 30 years of diplomatic relations between
the two countries. On February 26, 1973, the then Whitlam government
announced that Australia and the then Democratic Republic of Vietnam, now
the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, had agreed to establish diplomatic
relations. The announcement marked a reconciliation between the two
countries after Australian involvement in the Vietnam conflict, which
ended when the last handful of military advisers left in December 1972

The Garden City Telegram: The Value of Freedom
http://www.gctelegram.com/news/2003/february/24/story2.html
Posted 2/24/2003

When Garden City resident Mitch Young watches the news about the
possibilities of war in Iraq, it's like he's seen it before. And he has.
Young said he and his family fled Vietnam by a small boat in April 1975,
the day before communists took over South Vietnam. 'We fled the country on
a boat, and the 7th Fleet picked us up in the ocean,' he said. He was 18
at the time. 'I don't believe in communism,' he said. 'We knew they would
take our property away. They would put my parents away because they
support the old regime.'

Daily Breeze: Soldiers' children try to fill Vietnam void
http://www.dailybreeze.com/content/bln/nmvietnam24.html
Posted 2/24/2003

Eleven years ago, Tony Cordero came to a sad realization: He was to about
turn 30, reaching an age his father never attained. He'd no longer be able
to use his dad as a guidepost. His father, Maj. William Cordero, an Air
Force navigator, died in 1965 on a mission in Vietnam. Tony Cordero was 4
years old. 'Everyone has singled out that day they outlive their dad,'
said the 41-year-old San Pedro resident. 'We grow up with the experience.
The void is always there. I wondered if other people felt the same way.'
Other people did feel the same way. Lots of people. Now, about 80 of them
are set to embark on a journey back to Vietnam, a place where world events
shaped their lives, where their fathers went and never returned.

Brunei Press: Cambodia remains neutral amidst threat of war
http://www.brunei-online.com/bb/mon/feb24w5.htm
Posted 2/24/2003

In his heyday, King Norodom Sihanouk would cajole, irritate and even sing
to the world's leaders to keep his small country free and out of the
conflicts and revolutions that engulfed the Cold War world. He also proved
a great survivor, and now the ailing, 80-year-old monarch remains the lone
living founding member of the Non-Aligned Movement, a haven for countries
like Cambodia that chose not to side with either the United States or the
Soviet Union. Sihanouk was present in Bandung, Indonesia, in 1955, along
with Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt, India's Jawaharlal Nehru and Sukarno of
Indonesia, when the formation of the movement was initially discussed. He
also attended its formal launch in Cairo in 1961.

FrontPageMagazine.com: "Peace" Propaganda, Then and Now
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=6292
Posted 2/24/2003

During the Vietnam War, on college campuses throughout the country, the
conventional wisdom among the anti-war protesters was that the war was
conducted for the rich. The 'peaceniks' said that Vietnam was an economic
war -- a war for natural resources. They said that the majority of
American troops serving in Vietnam were blacks, and poor or working class
whites. The unspoken truth about the conventional wisdom was that it was
merely Communist propaganda. However, to say so would have been
Red-baiting. Just as it is considered Red-baiting now to call the
Communist leadership of the Iraq 'peace' demonstrators Communist, so it
was then to call the Vietnam peacenik leaders Communist.

Associated Press: Agent Orange Case Headed to Supreme Court
Posted 2/22/2003

During an appendectomy in 1996, surgeons discovered that Vietnam veteran
Joseph Isaacson had a form of cancer associated with exposure to the
defoliant Agent Orange. But when he tried to claim payment from a
settlement fund set up by Agent Orange manufacturers, he was told he was
too late and, besides, the $180 million kitty had been exhausted. On
Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments on whether Isaacson,
a vice principal at a middle school in Irvington, N.J., and Daniel
Stephenson, a retired helicopter pilot living in Florida, can sue the
chemical companies that made Agent Orange.

BBC News: Vietnam welcomes Cuba's Castro
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/2790335.stm
Posted 2/22/2003

General Vo Nguyen Giap - the mastermind of Vietnam's guerrilla warfare
against France and the US - embraced Mr Castro in front of the cameras
before the two held private talks in the capital, Hanoi. Earlier, the
Cuban president met Vietnam's leadership troika for talks in which the
communist allies stated their opposition to any US-led war against Iraq.
After his three-day visit to Vietnam, Mr Castro is travelling to Malaysia
to attend the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit, which is also expected to
be dominated by the crisis in Iraq. As President Castro's convoy of
limousines took him to the presidential palace in Hanoi, hundreds of war
veterans holding Vietnamese and Cuban flags waited to greet him.
 

Times Record: Veterans Measure Gets Nod
http://www.swtimes.com/archive/2003/February/21/news/veterans.html
Posted 2/21/2003

A Senate panel easily approved an amended bill Wednesday that prohibits
public access to veterans' service records kept in county offices
throughout Arkansas. After sticking on a last-minute amendment that cooled
some concerns from Freedom of Information advocates, the Senate Committee
on City, County and Local Affairs recommended House Bill 1345 on a voice
vote. The bill, sponsored by Rep. Jeff Wood, D-Sherwood, now goes to the
Senate floor. Wood and Nick Bacon, director of the Arkansas Department of
Veterans Affairs, testified that the bill was written because of concerns
about the increasing number of identity theft and 'stolen valor' cases
among U.S. veterans.

 

In The Shadow of The Blade Update

The ongoing editing process will take several more months (Some 200 plus hours of film and video to edit) In the mean while there is a short clip on the website that is a wonderful teaser of what is to come. 
http://www.intheshadowoftheblade.com/shadow.nsf/html/MovieClips 

DUST OFF REUNION - Film Director Patrick Fries and the Creative Director Cheryl Fries, along with some members of the ITSOTB Team went to The DUSTOFF Reunion in San Antonio, Texas in February and shared a clip of the documentary that related to the Dust Off operations. ITSOTB crewmember, DUSTOFF veteran Bob Baird, spoke on behalf of the mission and introduced a sneak preview clip from the film.

VHCMA REUNION - In June 2003,  Team members will be at the reunion in Atlanta to give a longer clip of the film and to show a slide show and present some music from the movie. I will be introducing the film and giving a talk on the journey we took. I look forward to meeting all those who can make it to the reunion. Information on the reunion can be found at: http://www.vietnamexp.com/Reunions/reunionindex.htm