By Dennis Camire, Gannett News Service
WASHINGTON — While official Washington scrambles to take care of veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, many Filipino veterans who fought in the U.S. Army against the Japanese in World War II are still seeking full benefits from the U.S. government.
More than 65 years ago, they fought at Corregidor and Bataan, with thousands walking as prisoners on the infamous Death March, which the Philippines will commemorate Monday with a national holiday.
For years after the Philippines fell in 1942, many were part of organized guerrilla units in the mountainous jungles, battling Japanese forces and keeping them from being deployed elsewhere in the war.
But shortly after the war ended, Congress stripped thousands of the Filipino fighters of their eligibility for full veterans' benefits in the Rescission Acts of 1946, limiting the veterans to compensation for service-related disabilities or death.
"I was terribly shocked when I was told that my services in World War II in the U.S. Army forces was, by law, deemed not 'active service for the purposes of any benefit administered by the ... VA,' " said Franco Arcebal, 83, who was a guerrilla fighter in the Philippines.
Arcebal of Los Angeles told the House Veterans Affairs Committee in February that he believed the United States did him an injustice.
"I felt terribly discriminated upon," he said.
Since the 1946 congressional action, Filipino veterans and their advocates battled in the courts and Congress to win some benefits, such as health care, internment in national cemeteries and up to $600 in a burial allowance, but those victories were limited to only some of the veterans.
"We survived four and half years of battle with guns, but we are now having a battle of legal minds for the injustice that the U.S. government has given us," said Art Caleda of Waipahu, Hawaii, a former intelligence officer with the guerrillas in the Philippines' northern provinces.
Caleda, 83, and other Filipino veterans — an estimated 20,000 in the United States and the Philippines out of the more than 200,000 who fought in the war — are backing legislation again this year to give them full benefits from the Veterans Affairs Department.
Caleda, who was wounded in 1944 while helping rescue a downed U.S. pilot, said the aging veterans have pushed the legislation since it was first introduced in 1992.
"At this point in time, we need very, very much the well-deserved benefits for the services we have rendered," said Caleda, scheduled to speak on the issue Wednesday to the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee.
Under current law, many of the Filipino veterans are denied full VA benefits such as pensions for low-income veterans over 65 — almost $11,000 a year for single veterans — and survivors' death pension — about $7,300 for a spouse with no children. Other denied benefits include some health care, home loans, education benefits, job training and handicap adjustments for a house or car.
Bills in both the House and Senate would equalize the benefits with those received by other U.S. veterans.
Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, said most Filipino families today include a World War II veteran or son or daughter of a veteran.
"Sixty years of injustice burns in the hearts of these veterans," said Filner, a sponsor of the House Filipino equity bill. "Now in their 80s and 90s, their last wish is the restoration of the honor and dignity due them."
Alec S. Petkoff who specializes in veterans affairs for the American Legion, called the situation "a shame" and a legal unfairness.
"I hope the Senate and House rectify the problem and give the Filipino veterans the equity that they earned through their service and were promised," he said.
Patrick Ganio, 86, was part of the Philippines Army in 1941 when President Franklin Roosevelt signed the executive order drafting them into the U.S. Army. By December, Ganio was fighting the Japanese on Bataan and later was on Corregidor when it surrendered in May 1942.
Filipino troops, many not properly equipped or trained, made up the bulk of U.S. troops in the Philippines when the Japanese began their invasion on Dec. 8, 1941.
Eventually, Ganio, who now lives in Jacksonville, Fla., linked up with the guerrillas on Luzon in the Philippines and fought on through the islands' liberation in 1944.
Ganio, who moved to the United States in 1980 after working as a school teacher in the Philippines for 30 years, said he and other veterans have battled for two decades to gain equity with other veterans.
"As we think of the supreme sacrifices we paid for serving under the American flag, it is shocking and painful ... in our low moments to feel betrayed from a friend we trust," Ganio said. "This ... is our last cry for justice."
