Statement About the Vietnam Veteran

AS THE DAY approaches when all our military forces will be withdrawn from Vietnam and all of our POW's will have returned home, it is appropriate that we turn our attention to the debt we owe to those who served America in this long and difficult war.

No group of American fighting men was ever called on to demonstrate their bravery, their endurance, or their love of country under more trying circumstances than those gallant Americans who served in Vietnam.

A few weeks ago, an inspiring voice summed up their indomitable spirit. As Capt. Jeremiah Denton, the first of our returning prisoners of war, stepped off the plane and saluted the American flag, he said: "We are happy to have the opportunity to serve our country under difficult circumstances," and he ended with three familiar words: "God bless America."

In the years ahead, when passions have cooled and old controversies have been laid to rest, let us hope that this spirit will be the spirit of all of us who lived through the Vietnam era.

So long as our Nation produces men of such great character, it can truly be said that God has blessed America.

Words of thanks are not enough for the 2 1/2 million men who have returned home from this conflict.

We must demonstrate the gratitude we feel by the actions we take. We must honor them with the respect they have earned and the affection they deserve. We must assist them with health care, education, training, and housing assistance. These actions alone cannot fully repay the debt we owe our veterans, but they can help.

Today I want to report on the actions we have taken.

These are some of the benefits a Vietnam veteran with an honorable or general discharge is eligible for today:

--$220 per month to pay for a college or university education, with an additional allowance for married students;

--on-the-job training or apprenticeship assistance ranging from $40 to $160 per month;

--free hospitalization for service-connected injuries or illnesses;

--guaranteed loans to help him buy a house, a mobile home, or condominium;

--monthly compensation for any disabilities suffered in the service;

--special allowances for clothing, housing, and other needs if he is severely disabled; and

--small business loans to help him start his own business.

In every area of government concern, we are now doing more than we have ever done before to help our American veterans.

Take health care for example--the most immediate need of many returning veterans. To meet this need, the Federal Government maintains a system of veterans health care under which no eligible veteran is turned away from hospitalization or medical treatment. Our budget request for veterans health programs for the coming year is $2.7 billion--an increase of 80 percent over 1969. More veterans are receiving health care today than ever before, and our staffs in veterans hospitals have been increased by 21,000. We intend to keep improving on this record.

For disabled veterans, we have provided a comprehensive program of treatment and rehabilitation. It begins with high quality hospital care and physical therapy and continues with vocational rehabilitation and job assistance. In 1973, the Veterans Administration will provide vocational rehabilitation for over 35,000 disabled veterans, an 85 percent increase over 1969. Moreover, we have twice increased compensation payments for disabled veterans, and during fiscal year 1974, 354,000 Vietnam veterans will receive benefits under this program.

The returning veterans seeking a permanent home should know that, in the past 4 years alone, the number of home loans under the GI bill has doubled. More than one million loans amounting to $22 billion have been made in this period-about one-third of them to Vietnam veterans. Today, Vietnam veterans are receiving 55 percent of all home loans under the GI bill.

All American veterans deserve training and education opportunities that will open for them a promising peacetime future. To this end, we have increased veterans education and training benefits by 70 percent since 1969. By this summer we expect 2 million veterans to be receiving such benefits under the GI bill--about three times as many as in 1968.

To make sure that Vietnam-era veterans know about all the benefits available to them, we have also launched a massive counseling effort. Veterans Administration spokesmen in Vietnam, Thailand, Japan, Korea, Okinawa, and Europe have provided thousands of individual counseling sessions for outgoing servicemen. In Vietnam alone over the past 6 years, 1.9 million men have been briefed on veterans benefits, and 270,000 have had individual interviews.

In all these ways our Government is helping repay our debt to America's veterans. But we must go even further.

With our men home from Vietnam and with the reductions we have been able to make elsewhere in our Armed Forces, thousands of young veterans are returning to civilian life. They ask no special privileges or favors but they expect--and they deserve--full respect and full economic opportunity.

Theodore Roosevelt wrote of the American veterans of another era that "A man who is good enough to shed his blood for his country is good enough to be given a square deal afterwards." This is just as true of the fine young men who are coming home today.

Courage, selflessness, discipline, and devotion--these qualities are as important in building peace as they were in waging war.

Today I call on every American employer to make the recruiting and hiring of Vietnam veterans a top priority.

Hiring the veteran is not just a good deed it is a good investment. For the veteran has proven that he is a good worker and a good learner who knows the meaning of discipline and the importance of teamwork.

More and more American employers are demonstrating that they realize these facts. The unemployment rate for veterans in their twenties has been dramatically reduced, from 8.3 percent in the last quarter of 1971 to 5.7 percent in February of 1973. This is important progress, but we must do even better.

That is why the Department of Defense is now providing training for civilian job skills for servicemen before their enlistments expire.

That is why so many State and local governments are also working to open up productive career opportunities for veterans.

In Cleveland, Ohio, for example, Mayor Ralph Perk has initiated a promising new program. He is personally conducting a survey of job openings in his city. In about 2 weeks, when he has 500 openings in hand, he will ask local newspapers in Cleveland to print a special questionnaire for veterans. They can return the questionnaire to him, and he and his staff will try to link up each veteran with an appropriate job, job training, or schooling.

In another part of the Midwest, Governor [Robert D.] Ray of Iowa is spearheading a six-State effort to find jobs for returning Vietnam veterans.

This is responsive local government at its best, and I urge other local leaders in all our States to follow these examples. The private sector has an equally important role to play, and many individual businesses and civic groups, large and small, are helping to provide a square deal for the returning veteran.

In New York City, for example, one of the Nation's largest commercial banks has instructed its hiring offices to give veterans first priority in employment. This bank is making a particular effort to hire seriously handicapped veterans, an especially deserving group. Since 1968, this one bank has employed more than 1,500 young servicemen, including over 150 who are severely disabled.

Recently I met with leaders of the National Alliance of Businessmen and the Jobs for Veterans program to discuss their goal of filling 150,000 jobs with Vietnamera veterans by June 30 of this year. They're doing so well that they now expect to exceed their goal by more than 50,000 jobs.

Employers all across America can serve their country, and help themselves, by following such examples.

Thanks to the sacrifices of our returning veterans, America has achieved peace with honor in Vietnam, and the chances for lasting peace in the world are greater today than at any time in our past. Thanks to them, America's word is trusted and America's strength is respected, all around the world.

Just as we have kept faith with our allies abroad, let us now keep faith with our returning veterans at home. They have given much to defend the American way of life; it is time for America to serve them equally well.

Let each of us give them the warm welcome they deserve. Let us welcome them back, not only with open arms but with open opportunities, with sincere respect, and with the chance to play important roles in every phase of community life.

As we welcome the veteran, let us follow the example of Abraham Lincoln. At the closing of the long and tragic Civil War, he urged his countrymen "to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, (and) to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations."