As Iraq and Afghan wars end, costs mount on pace to rival Vietnam
By Chris Adams | McClatchy Newspapers
Posted on Monday, December 5, 2011

WASHINGTON — The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan may be winding down, but the long-term costs of caring for those wounded in battle is on path to rival the costs of the Vietnam War.

While Vietnam extracted a far higher death toll — 58,000 compared with 6,300 so far in the war on terror — the number of documented disabilities from recent veterans is approaching the size of that earlier conflict, according to a McClatchy analysis of Department of Veterans Affairs data.

The data, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act and detailing all disability payments to veterans of all wars, show that veterans leaving the military in recent years are filing for and receiving compensation for more injuries than did their fathers and grandfathers.

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Compensating veterans for those injuries is the duty of the VA. The department has long been guided by the words of President Abraham Lincoln, who vowed "to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan."



unhappycamper comment: I like to think the Veterans Administration will do the correct thing, but the nutbags running the Greedy Old Party like to protect their owner's tax cuts.