Jobless Combat Veterans: Another Horrible Betrayal

There are very few military skills which are transferable to civilian life.

101st soldiers in Iraq. Salem-News.com photo by Tim King

(MOLALLA, Ore.) - An Associated Press article in The Oregonian June 30, 2011 prompts this article. Several newspapers have published that homeless veterans in the U.S. number about 300,000. The news that about 27% of young Military Veterans aged 18 to 24 are unemployed and cannot find work is devastating news to all of us. There must be about 300,000 of them also. Certainly most of them cannot be living with their parents after going through the hell of combat. Combat is a totally different world from home and high school but returning back to the real world is a further stress. It takes a long time, sometimes forever, to just try to shake the demons from our heads.

Most of the recent Combat Veterans joined the service right out of high school, if they even finished. There were no jobs for them unless they could flip hamburgers or some similar task. With no decent prospects they joined the military where most earned a MOS (Military Occupational Specialty?) of Infantryman or the like. There are very few military skills which are transferable to civilian life. When they come back, they are immediately confronted with the guys who stayed home (home stallions) who did get the opening level jobs and have been promoted. What Combat Veteran who has faced death and all kinds of privations and even won his “mark of a man” Combat Infantry Badge or equivalent is going to feel like taking any kind of orders from these “homebodies”?

The Army says 90% of military jobs transfer directly to the private sector (another betrayal). My discharge papers said I would be a good Polar Bear Hunter (only two at the Portland Zoo).

Former Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson spoke to the Western Governors Association and pointed out a Chamber of Commerce program euphemistically called “Hire our Heroes” which obviously is not working but states “there are plenty of education and job training opportunities for Veterans!” “Employers just need to offer jobs.” This is in the face of the worst financial recession in the past 100 years. Jim Nicholson further states that the states should help ex-military veterans find jobs. (Amen to that!)

After going through and surviving the severe rigors of basic training and the worst feature of graduation from that to the extreme stress of 24 hour a day combat terrors just what do these “waffle-butt, swivel chair commandos” think will be appropriate for the Combat Vets who literally saved their butts.

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