Vietnam Veterans

John Murtha, the Democratic congressman from Pennsylvania and decorated former Marine whose fierce opposition to the Iraq war helped catalyze public sentiment against the conflict, died Monday. He was 77. Murtha died at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, Va., surrounded by his family, his office announced. He had been hospitalized with complications from gallbladder surgery. "With the passing of Jack Murtha, America lost a great patriot," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement about Murtha, who was an ally of the California congresswoman.

It took 43 years, but Marine Pfc. Daniel Hernandez finally got his medal. And when he did Saturday morning in Boyle Heights, the Vietnam veteran stood up straight and proudly puffed out his chest, his eyes glistening with emotion. "His immediate and fearless actions, while himself painfully wounded, undoubtedly saved many lives," said Marine Lt. Jim Lupori, reading from the Silver Star medal citation that, because of lost paperwork, was never awarded to Hernandez by the secretary of the Navy after he left Vietnam in the late 1960s.

Avoiding the embarrassment of what could have been the first successful veto override in California since 1979, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed legislation Friday that establishes an annual "Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day" on March 30. Schwarzenegger vetoed an identical bill earlier this month, saying that it did not address high-priority needs including "comprehensive changes in our policies on water, energy and Corrections" and that he might...

Tears filled the eyes of some Vietnam veterans as they were greeted with cheers from their family and friends in a reenactment of their original homecoming, when they were often met with angry demonstrators and harsh headlines. The ceremony at Ft. Campbell was a first for the 101st Airborne Division and the Army, said Maj. Patrick Seiber, an Army spokesman based there. "Our hope is that other units and other posts will follow our lead in having this type of ceremony," he said. Mickey Leighton, a 72-year-old Army veteran from Naples, Fla., said listening to the applause and praise was very emotional.

Frederick Gulden, an architect dubbed "the last American in Vietnam" when stranded in the country for 15 months after the U.S. military withdrew, died of complications from esophageal cancer April 4 at George Washington University Hospital. He was 86 and lived in Alexandria, Va. Gulden had established a Saigon office for the architectural firm DeLeuw Cather International in 1972, after two years with the U.S. Agency for International Development.

None of his former colleagues in the New York City Police Department can quite believe that Athelston Kelson, the man picked out of a lineup as the "Bling Bandit," is the same hero ex-cop who was awarded the Purple Heart for Vietnam War service before serving 33 years as a detective. But his mother, Hilda, said with his diagnosis of terminal liver cancer, his broken marriage and the effects of a year fighting in Vietnam, she saw disaster looming. "You could see that something was coming," she said.

Ernie Barbosa, a sergeant in the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, sat in the moonlight before a replica of the Vietnam Veteran Memorial -- 58,256 names etched in white that from a distance looked like serrated piano keys against a black expanse. Sitting in Temple City Park, with Memorial Day approaching, Barbosa recalled taking his dad, a World War II and Korean War veteran, to Dodger Stadium after he had retired and buying him a hot dog, a drink and some fries.

It was man-to-man political combat from the predawn hours Monday, but John McCain seemed to be relishing every minute. As the senator from Arizona took a seat among reporters on his "Straight Talk Express" bus in the late afternoon, he playfully clenched his fists in a fighter's stance. "What's the latest incoming? What dastardly deed did I perform most recently?" McCain asked.

President Bush on Tuesday named a retired Army lieutenant general and executive of a firm that earns most of its revenue from federal veterans programs to head the troubled Department of Veterans Affairs. The nomination of Dr. James B. Peake, 63, a decorated Vietnam veteran who was the Army's chief medical officer for four years, was announced by Bush in the Roosevelt Room of the White House. If confirmed by the Senate, Peake will replace James Nicholson, who stepped down Oct. 1.

It's Friday morning, and I'm on my way to finally meet an ex-cop and soldier who lets me have it now and then with stinging e-mails. "I'm Disappointed!" said the subject line of Terry Schauer's latest missive, in which he scolded me for last week's column about my nephew enlisting in the Marines. "I think you took this opportunity to turn your column into an antiwar rant, at your nephew's expense. It is belittling not only to your nephew, but to all who serve." Schauer was in a minority.