Has anyone heard anything else?
Something not smell right?a Lt. with the Rangers during the Somolia Campaign. He missed Desert Storm and go out of the Military after his commitment, pretty much because what he went thru in Mogodishu soured him on a lot of things. He had been a Life Member of the VFW and last night I got this.
This is what he sent me.
"...evidently Somalia does not count as a Foreign War because no AEFM was ever issued. I called them up and asked them if the Bronze Star with V-device I was awarded and that they should see on my dd-214 was good enough, and they said "No". To which I asked, "Well war hasn't officially been declared in Iraq and was never declared in Vietnam, so all those members are void as well?"
He said, "A campaign medal was authorized and awarded for both those actions."
The guy said because of Iraq, their fradulent membership is way up (I guess people saying they were in Iraq but weren't), anyway I sent them my dd-214 like 10 years ago, now suddenly this is an issue. I called a buddy of mine who was there with me, and they did the same thing to him.
From talking to a few other people, this is a very "Good Ole Boy" run organization, that was controlled up to about 5 years ago by WWII vets, and is now controlled by Korean Vets (ironic that was never a declared war either).
Basically there are two main criterea, you have to be in the combat zone for a minimum of 30 days (we were there for about 25), and there has to be a campaign ribbon.
Grenada, Bosnia, Panama, Desert Storm, Vietnam, Bosnia, Desert Storm II (or whatever they call the current one) all have them, we did not.