how many fake vietnam veterans are there

He was driven out of the group. Torres came back Monday with a U.S. birth certificate it was fake, but for a good cause, he thought. sources of data include the U.S. Census Bureau, Bureau of Labor Statistics, For years, there had been tales in the Army of "wannabes and fakers," Bateman said, "something that a lot of veterans knew, but it was usually anecdotal. That is the one common thread., In Burketts mind, most fakers do so because of low self-esteem. wording about the four out of five who claim to be Vietnam vets but are not is We would like to show you a description here but the site won't allow us. A third, claiming to be homeless, was unable to identify where he served in Vietnam, exactly when, and provide a proper unit designation. The real Daubmann had been killed in the war. Burkett, who served as an Army lieutenant in Vietnam during the war -- he stresses he was no hero and simply did his job as an ordnance officer -- has investigated more than 2,000 cases and found that some 1,500 were frauds on either a large or a small scale. bio to reflect his service in the Vietnam era and before anyone says much Vietnam Veterans represent the largest cohort of American Veterans in . The 1990 census shows 7,646,908 claim to be Vietnam era vets. 19 Million Viewers Watched His Story Start To Finish (David Hoffman) How many soldiers died on their first day in Vietnam? Aren't those the guys who lost the war?' I myself have met over a hundred "Navy Seals". Some are just shysters,' he said. The Schantags discovered that 24 of those were false entries. 'Some claim to be vets just out of a need to be macho.'. this seems to be correct, I cant find anything in the census figures to Now, with this book, we have the evidence.". There have been hundreds of fakers exposed in the press in the 'My sense is that it has been steadily increasing over the past five years,' said Dr. Greg Andersen, assistant director of the VA hospital in Menlo, Park, Calif. 'They generally fall into two categories: Those who want to enhance the image of themselves, and those trying to prey off the public.'. Foreign Wars (VFW) magazine and from the Reserve Officers Association magazine which "It all started when I was shooting my mouth off in bars 35 years ago . In Sterners experience, its all about the financial advantages fakers can obtain. To subscribe, click here. 'You can normally tell who is a phony. They're all around you. REAL Vietnam War veterans are all those who are officially authorized the Vietnam Service medal and possess official military-issued documentation to confirm their medal authorization. But at the dedication ceremony, despite the hundreds of "normal-looking" vets in the audience -- suits, jackets, neckties on some -- the television news teams immediately gravitated toward "the guys in fatigues and boony hats, the bearded bums. This office is the working headquarters of a guy who invests other people's millions in the stock market -- and it's his commissions that help bankroll his singular crusade. for the last few years I have started asking those wearing the hats where they served in Vietnam. what I think happened. Thank you for acknowledging that the actual U.S. Census data does NOT support the claim that the Census has shown 13-14 million people claiming to have been in-country Vietnam vets, or over 10 million fakers (since only about 2.7 million served in-country).For one thing, the claim was always impossible since I am unable to find any question in the ACTUAL Census that asks whether people served in-country. I found out quickly IF I listed military service, early on for jobs, I did not get the job!Its only since 9/11, that I did start seeing 'Nam unit hats!When I see one or a bumper sticker & the vast majority seem to be genuine. There are literally millions of them.You can reject, out of hand, the 13 million figure and the military web sites that use it, but I have traced it to its point of origin which was a survey conducted by The Vietnam Veterans Fund and by Captain Scott Beaton so that we have a good source on it. Whitley, 43, is of a generation that, as she said, learned about the war largely through their TV sets. The Intercept is an independent nonprofit news outlet. Thats eight individuals in the Seattle area, in one bust, said Doug Sterner, a longtime private watchdog who now maintains the Military Times newspapers Hall of Valor database. He talks too much.'. How many times do these real FACTS have to be repeated?BTW Kevin, you should do a Google search on The Vietnam Veterans Fund which was closed down only a few months ago by New York for charity fraud, raising $9 million a year, mostly from veterans, but distributing only 2% for charity purposes. But I know this didnt just occur starting with the modern wars. 6.1 million VA continues to serve Vietnam Veterans VA's Veteran Population Projection Model estimates the number of living Vietnam War-era Veterans to be 6.1 million (11). combat air patrols over Vietnam but all he had done was fly repaired or new "I lied about serving in Vietnam and I'm sorry," he told Globe magazine this year. I did provide some information from reliable sources about the large number of fakers and all you need to do is type Stolen Valor into your search engines and you'll find name after name.Shipley's web site and other sources supports the idea that there are, literally, thousands claiming to be SEALs who were not. On the other side of the coin the VA on their site www.va.gov/vetdata/veteran_population.asp offers a Excel worksheet that shows only 6,673,279 Vietnam era vets believed still living as of 2014. Robert Bateman, who teaches military history at West Point. This is described as , Statistical Abstract of the United States. found it which, I think, adds some legitimacy to the figures and does suggest a "What he is trying to do, at considerable risk to himself, is to say that this service means something, and by letting just anyone stand up and claim these honors, you're diminishing the real value of those who did serve. 'We're becoming more and more. Burkett, but flights of fancy can also be shot down. Someone Dennehy later gave a public apology. A casual mention of military service. 576 (p. 15) has the number of Vietnam era vets as of 1994, listed as 8.246 million. When his unit came home and started gearing up. Well, to cite my own anecdotal experience, I have run into many people claiming to be Vietnam vets. The article cited a VA document that reported 80 people had claimed POW benefits for having been captured during the Gulf War, when there were only 21 POWs. It's not just Vietnam fakers: there was a USA Today story some years back about phony Gulf War vets. He searched for the vagrants record and discovered the man had been kicked out of basic training after three weeks on a psychological discharge. On this Memorial Day 2021, VA honors their service and recommits itself to . I have run into many of them and I don't get out all that much. 'I'm not going to get into that. He is back in prison. And 97 percent of Vietnam veterans received honorable discharges, exactly the same rate for the military in the peaceful 10 years prior to the war. I was a Army platoon leader. People are impressed. The Pentagon has no definitive list on who was a POW or even an estimate on how many Americans were in combat. Over 100 veterans, most of them World War II as well as veterans of the Korean and Vietnam wars, marched to demand an accounting of the American veterans in South East Asia on January 24,. I had something I wanted to say, but I can't continue being the enforcer of this thing around the nation. His words were recorded. I wish a month of my pay could afford a new basic Rolex.. (not the specialty models like this guy could afford). In this, he resembles the fake Vietnam vets, whose stories more often concern harm suffered and witnessed than bravery proven. VVA's national office has distanced itself from a nationwide convoy by vets to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. 'I think this is part of the same phenomenon of human nature that we have seen since the times of the Romans and Greeks,' he said. I'm interested in real vets who have their own problems.'. However, veterans groups estimate that today approximately 9 to 12 million Americans fraudulently claim they served in Vietnam. There is no more to be said. served in-country, on those who served in areas surrounding Vietnam such as Farmer, 26, appeared on Fox's "American Idol" in 2013, claiming he was severely injured by an IED explosion in Iraq. I personally believe there are as many American males claiming military service falsely as there are living veterans in America, said B.G. You took part in one of the greatest assaults in U.S. military history?. has said that for every real SEAL he identifies, there are a thousand who were Burkett also exposed actor Brian Dennehy's phony claims, in various interviews, of having been wounded as a Marine in Vietnam. Accounts vary as to how Daubmanns lies unraveled, but five months after his glorious return, he admitted hed never served in the German army. have been able to find reliable statistics on the number of men and women who For a very long time I couldn't summon up the courage to stop it. Heres Other careers, in a variety of fields, have been damaged by similar disclosures. After nearly 20 years of living thousands of miles from his family so he could claim his French army pension, the old soldier is finally being allowed to return to live in his native Senegal. a regular post. doesnt tell us the source of the data, only who had supposedly collected it or ElbertAlfie 8 mo. Same for number of active duty personnel during this period (in No. Report comments that violate these rules. authentic though I suspect the number is close to accurate. b. In 1997 Wes S. Cooley, a sitting first-term eastern Oregon congressman, was convicted on charges hed lied about his military service in official state voter guides. In the military-rich Hampton Roads region, we struck gold: From the pilots who flew the paratroopers to the infantrymen who stormed the beaches, I was able to relate the entire D-Day narrative chronologically, all through veterans eyes. Cooley was forced from office in 1996 and was later convicted of a felony for lying in Oregon's voters' pamphlet. Are there people involved in the Roswell case who lied? might have found, in those census figures somewhere, a report that suggested 12 Before it was revealed, in 2001, that he spent the war teaching history at West Point, for example, Joseph Ellis was known to lecture his students at Mount Holyoke about his experiences in the vicinity of My Lai at the time of the massacre. parlance of those of us who were there), I found a number of them. And? Burkett candidly admits he's not a writer. 'It pretty difficult to fabricate a war history because it is relatively easy for someone who was there to see through it,' says Blank. Retired Although Men in period uniforms scrambled across the beach between mock explosions, as the reporter interviewed D-Day veterans who came to watch. In 1990 and again in 2000, there was a question on the census long form that asked if the respondent was a Vietnam era veteran, and the number generated there was about 8.4 million. 'A lot of them are groupies. ", Finally, after years of scrambling for money, Burkett's group got their memorial. Last year, he said, 12 Princeton seniors went into the service. As it was my unit & he was there after me & knew about a pizza shop that had been setup at the air strip in DaNang. but then remembered that if you set foot in a combat zone even for an hour or Im still around.. I said that this provided an insight into those who claimed inside knowledge of Roswell. 'It tears you up inside to see this sort of thing.'. The Burkett, who at the time was verifying records for the Texas State Archives, discovered he could get military records by request. Take John M. Iannone, a Pittburgh- area oilman whom family members said had it all and was even more admired for his extensive community service. He hadn't been trained in intelligence and he hadn't been a master sergeant. (At other sites, the claim is the 1990 or 2000 CENSUS) I just posted a link with results to the 1995 Census Statistical Abstract of the United States, upon which Beaton claims the statistics resides, and as proven by the Census document itself, there is NO SUCH NUMBER, only the number of living active duty vets during Vietnam. 'There are a lot of people out there doing this and we'd like to expose every last one of them,' said Ray Ashe, secretary of the VVA chapter. that. 1991: Established that, in Vietnam Veterans, there does not appear to be a causal relation between homelessness and military service, including exposure to combat; . Burkett predicted that half would be frauds. I did not look at those sites that required registration, a fee or None were real. actually in Vietnam and that about 8.5 million served during the Vietnam era. At Pointe du Hoc., As you might imagine, I almost fell out of my chair. It's a touching tribute to all Vietnam veterans, their families and supporters.The Vietnam Memorial Wall arrived in Kernersville Thursday and will remain there until May 1.Those who got an up . I certainly haven't come across it personally. He brought out a shadow box filled with decorations and a folded flag; his kids had made it for him, he said. I have searched in vain for this alleged FBI study. Researching the book made her spend time, she said, "with the real citations -- learning about a man who received the Distinguished Service Cross at the cost of his life, and finding out that some phony had modeled his citation on that one. But the Stolen Valor claim is itself a fraud perpetrated on the public.By some estimates, 4-5% of the population in general are sociopathic liars. Small wonder. We have been reduced to repeating ourselves and you actually point me to a source that I pointed you to in the beginning. claiming Vietnam service who were not there and that there are many claiming Their overall agenda makes their warning suspicious and Claims/Comments; Bill Williamson from Maitland, Florida arose the suspiciousness of a Red Cross Photographer who was assigned to Vietnam in 1967. connection to a census though the connection is not identified. Cooley had claimed Korean War service with Army Special Forces. 05 The total casualties of the war number over 1 million. He has a weekly caseload of about two dozen real vets. Overall, about 3.5 million Americans served in Southeast Asia during the war. Last year, he dropped out of the state's gubernatorial race, admitting he never got closer to Vietnam than peacetime Korea. Because of the homecoming we got I never brought up Vietnam let alone wore a hat with Vietnam vet on it. But experts say the figure, whatever it might be, is small compared to the tens of thousands of ex-warriors who still suffer emotional wounds from Vietnam and who would rather not even talk about the war. Stolen Valor. I am an in-country Vietnam vet. 'I have always attempted to be the best at whatever I undertook, but in this instance, I guess I felt what I actually did was not enough, so I pretended to be something I wasn't,' Switzler said. All others should not be accepted to have served either on land or at sea in Vietnam. I guess the spell has broken and we are dropping like flies now. Aren't those the guys who are unemployed and on drugs? With the Pentagon Papers revelations, the U.S. public's trust in the government was forever diminished. The Nazis, in particular, lionized him. Projections also indicate that the veteran population will become slightly younger, with 33% of veterans being younger than 50 in 2046 compared with 27% in 2021, even as the overall U.S. population continues to age. U.S. veterans [ edit] According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the Vietnam Era Veterans' Readjustment Assistance Act of 1974 ( VEVRAA) states, "A Vietnam era veteran" is a person who: served on active duty anywhere in the world for a period of 180+ days, any part of which occurred between August 5, 1964, and May 7, 1975, and was discharged or . Someone says, Hey, Joe, youre of the age for Vietnam. awards and decorations they did not earn. Along the way, Burkett has picked up a few enemies: "There had been some threats, and the brokers and secretaries were afraid of being killed, so they moved me way down the hall to this office." 5. But as I soon learned, this fellow was hardly the only person who has fabricated or exaggerated wartime exploits. I dont think its particularly modern., I cant prove that there were phonies among King Arthurs Knights of the Round Table, Burkett said. veterans of which according to other sources, about 2.7 actually served in John Martin, a volunteer at at a make-shift POW information center in Washington, D.C., near the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, figures he has seen a half-dozen pretenders in the past month alone. I am astonished at the number of people who claim to be Vietnam Vets who aren't. Originally published in the March 2010 issue of Military History. DePaulo says its not surprising a person already held in high esteem would choose to fabricate a military background. I cant find good numbers on Yandle said he was at the infamous 1968 siege at Khe Sanh, surrounded and attacked for 77 days. aircraft into Vietnam had a financial incentive.) Oddly, his charitable endeavors included involvement with local Vietnam veterans groups, which ended in 1994 when he disappeared, only to resurface years later as a con man. Burkett -- his parents nicknamed him Jug, in honor of a favorite golf pro -- has spent the past 13 years unmasking hundreds of men around the country who have claimed to be Vietnam veterans, Vietnam heroes, Vietnam- post-traumatic-stress-psychos, the guys you read about in the papers ("Viet Vet Kills 14 in Post Office Rampage") and see on the median strip of Van Ness Avenue, wearing signs over their tattered fatigues that proclaim, "Vietnam Vet -- Will Work for Food. According to federal law, the United States' military involvement in the Vietnam War began in February 1961 and lasted until May 1975. The story was essentially done at that point, but I said, Sure. Thus the Census provides the total numbers of ALL people claiming to have been active duty veterans during Vietnam, but not the number claiming service in-country. I retired in the year 2001. Good grief, I thought. 568) comes from DOD statistics, not any public Census data. We don't have ads, so we depend on our members 35,000 and counting to help us hold the powerful to account. A long time ago, I had at least one case of a World War I guy, claiming a Medal of Honor that hed received.. The work led to 48 arrests, the VA recovered $562,888, and authorities levied $1.23 million in fines. Castagna was quoted by the newspaper as saying the records were in error and that he was even wounded in battle. In the spring of 1998, Burkett managed to convince Wallace and others that Yandle was a fake. Blank says despite the problems, fakes can be screened out, often through military records, sometimes just by having them interviewed by vets. Burkett verified that the movie tough guy was indeed a former Marine but had been discharged in 1963, before any Marines were sent to Vietnam. figures).. to 14 million number originated, how it was collected, or if it was part of They want to be around real vets,' said Martin. B.G. Nothing had changed, and I saw that the damned press and the public believes this bull--. The share of veterans ages 50 to 69 is expected to shrink from 36% to 33%, while the share of those 70 and older is predicted to . According to research by historian William Marvel, published in a 1991 issue of Blue and Gray, Williams would have been too young to have served in the war. Their lies collectively cost the VA $1.4 million. ago. While the charts do not specifically ask about incountry vets it does show the number grew by almost a million in ten years. "They give me a blank look.". So I turned the television on and checked the local news. Posted by KRandle at 6:27 PM. A "Wall of Shame" compiled by former Navy SEAL R.D. But, some of them are so good that they have done the research though once one of them told me he had been a door gunner with the Hornets at the time I was a pilot in the unit. He was telling the truth about prison, it turned out; but hed done time for burglary, not as a POW. Back at the office, I started typing up my notes, shaking my head at times. My newspaper, the Daily Press of Newport News, Virginia, published an open invitation for those who had taken part in the grand and awful amphibious assault to contact us and share their stories. last few years. 1,713,823 of those who served in Vietnam were still alive as of August, 1995 (CENSUS FIGURES). ', 'For years, Vietnam vets were portrayed as crazies. I now sometimes wear a hat & look forward to talking to other 'Nam vets.But, for those, playing, I just shake my head.MOS 1141 ElectricianUSMC/DogpatchFeb '69/March '70Semper Fidelis. Between March 1, 2008, and Feb. 25, 2009, the VA investigated 96 cases of "stolen valor" fraud, according to James O'Neill, assistant inspector general for investigations. IF one was there & received the home coming I did, one would not bother. But they soon discovered that Maughn was a fake, one who had earlier flim-flammed other vet groups, employers and newspapers. McCarthy claimed to have been a combat tail gunner in World War II. Additionally, the American War Library approximated that around 164,000 Americans who served at . But, the former Ranger said, call this other former Ranger down in Pennsylvania; he was in that unit.
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