By Michael P. Hart TOWN OF SALINA VETERAN OUTREACH COORDINATOR Please help me in showing support and recognition for the Vietnam Veterans of America — Central New York Chapter 103, a generation of Americans that volunteered and/or were drafted into service at the behest of their government so that they may halt the spread of communism in South Vietnam. These great Americans had to hold down careers and families all the while enduring physical and mental hardships throughout their life brought upon by the memories and scars of war. Many dealt with this by forming chapters where Vietnam Veterans could go and talk with other like-minded veterans dealing with the same issues as their battle buddy next to them. This comradeship bore chapter 103 of Central New York Vietnam Veterans. During the earlier years the Vietnam vets set out to raise funds by starting and maintaining the Northeast’s largest watchfire that took place at the New York State Fairgrounds’ upper parking lot on the southern side of Onondaga Lake. The watchfire became an icon every spring when Memorial Day came upon us, and for over 30 years it was the belief and hope that those lost service members may one day make it back to us by following the light of the signal fire. The money from the event brought in by the chapter has allowed them to purchase meals for veterans with food insecurities, help assist Vietnam veteran families with scholarships for their kids attending college and gather together and break bread with one another on a monthly basis. As years passed, the NYS fairgrounds gained new leadership and started demanding more from the chapter in the form of payments for various items that were supposedly needed to ensure safety and compliance with every future watchfire. This demand grew to be too much for the chapter to handle, so they completed their last watchfire in 2022 and turned it over to another organization to carry on the tradition. Unfortunately, this left a void in funding for the Vietnam veterans, so an alternate fundraising plan had to be established. Having recently taken the position as the Town of Salina Veteran Outreach Coordinator in May of 2023 I looked to reach out to the different veteran organizations in the area and came upon the Vietnam Veterans while having breakfast at the Market Diner. The diner sits just on the outskirts of the town’s footprint but is frequented by town veterans nonetheless. Here is where I met Dan DiFlorio, chapter President of VVA CNY Chapter 103. Side note: If you’re ever in the area on Thursday morning between 8:30 and 9am stop in and grab a cup of coffee or just say hello to a group of patriots that have been having breakfast at the Market Diner on Park Street every Thursday for over 30 years. After hearing about the loss in funding after giving up the watchfire I proceeded to make them the principal beneficiary of the donations rendered at the towns 2024 Memorial Weekend Car Show which was held on the Saturday just before Memorial Day. We were able to raise $2,000 for their organization that year, but it still wasn’t enough to maintain the chapter’s operating costs. Seeing the shortfall I decided to ask some further questions regarding the chapter’s ability to seek donations. My plan was not to inundate them with user names and passwords by trying to sign them up with a Go Fund Me account or something similar. We instead headed to their banking institution to ask questions, and before you knew it the chapter had been issued their very first QR code that will bring donors directly to the payment website for MT Bank, thus alleviating the need for pen and paper or hard currency. All the while, this fundraising site is directly tied to the chapter’s account negating the need for unwanted passwords. My hope is that the generous people reading this will have the overwhelming desire to donate, and if you don’t then read on: My experience This era of Vietnam Veterans really hits home for me. After having one war under my belt at the ripe old age of 22, I was deployed to Fort Sherman, Panama, where I attended JOTC (Jungle Operations Training Center) in the spring of 1994. This unrelenting place was the ideal training environment meant to mimic the jungles around the equator. I had so much fun attending the course that the U.S. Army sent me back for a second time in March of 1998. It was here that I began to understand the relationship one’s body has with the jungle, and how the unrelenting heat and humidity kept your skin moist and, quite frankly, water-logged. The military’s dry stick camo, when applied to the face, usually holds to the skin rather well in most environments, but the equatorial jungles quickly remind you that with the first swipe of sweat from your face you remove the camo, sometimes without a trace. Just imagine getting out of the pool with your clothes on and never getting a chance to dry them off, or having the ability to change into dry clothing, because if you did, you’d be sweating through them within seconds. I lived this for 30 days and was ready to leave upon completion of training; these Vietnam veterans endured this climate for 395 days before being sent home from their “tour” in Vietnam. Nighttime in the jungle was a whole different story. The head games the jungle can inspire, especially at night, are enough to make any man jumpy. Covered in a thick canopy of vines and foliage, the jungle’s huge swamp trees reach 200 feet tall. Referred to as “triple canopy” in height, the foliage grows so quickly that these treetops come crashing down to the jungle floor because the base tree limb can’t hold up the extreme weight of all the vegetation above it. I witnessed this firsthand – the noise of the trees starting to crackle — everyone was trained to get close to the base of big trees in the event the treetops were coming down on you. After the collapse of the canopy happened a great beam of sunshine came through and lit up the daylight rays that were already struggling to get through. The jungle is dimly lit during the daylight hours, but when that sun sets you can’t see your hand if held directly in front of your face. This was by far some of the toughest and most grueling terrain I came across in my 24-plus year career in the military. Google “Green Hell Panama” and not by any stretch of the imagination would one want to have to fight under these conditions for a year straight. All of this is just an example of the temperature, vegetation and light issues the Vietnam veterans were also dealing with during their service , and I began to get a greater sense of respect with each passing day for what my brothers had to endure during their time across the pond. The jungles of South Vietnam were no joke! So, if what I said earlier didn’t make you want to donate, how about now? If not monetarily, can I ask you to say a prayer for all Vietnam veterans at the end of this column and possibly quote the scripture from Psalm 23 — the one part that gives courage and healing the most: “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.” I just want to say thank you for reading this article and doing what you can to support your local Vietnam Veteran of America Chapter 103 right here in CNY. The goal of the chapter is to raise $5,000 to cover the next two years’ operating costs. If the goals are exceeded, the chapter will most assuredly pay it forward in helping other veterans and veteran organizations that are out there doing great things for all our service members within the Central New York community. If you would like to donate just use your phone camera to hover over the QR code here and click on the web address that will pop up. Once you’re in you pick any dollar amount, leave a name or alias and utilize any credit card to make a donation. If a physical donation is not a possibility, again we ask for the spiritual one instead. You guys rock — now drop down and give me 20! ...read more read less