Make your voice heard

If you're a veteran or serving now, you know that one of the greatest and yet largely unrecognized challenges facing America is how we will provide for the needs of future veterans — especially those younger people on duty in Iraq, Afghanistan and other parts of the world today. That is why AMVETS (American Veterans) is hosting the National Symposium for the Needs of Young Veterans at the Hyatt Regency O’Hare Hotel in Chicago Oct. 18-21. And that’s why we need your participation at this historic event.

At the Symposium, you will join hundreds of veterans, active duty military, reservists, Guardsmen, elected leaders, and concerned organizations offering solutions to issues such as access to quality healthcare, timely claims processing, veteran hiring preferences, educational benefits and helping homeless veterans and their families. By attending the Symposium, you can help improve the lives of millions of veterans, their dependents and survivors — maybe even yours.

Gen. Franks

The keynote speaker at the Symposium will be retired Army Gen. Tommy Franks, who served as commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command in Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Other key speakers are listed below. Plus, country music stars Lee Greenwood and Darryl Worley are volunteering their time to perform.

We must ensure fair and relevant benefits for all who serve, including for those in the National Guard and Reserve, if our nation is to keep its promise to those who have sacrificed so much in the pursuit of humanitarian relief and our national defense. Make your voice heard. Sign up for the Symposium.

Scheduled guest speakers include Mrs. Birgit Smith, widow of Sergeant First Class Paul Smith, the only Congressional Medal of Honor recipient to-date in the Iraq War; Major Tammy Duckworth of the Army National Guard, a severely wounded combat veteran from the Iraq War; retired Sergeant First Class Dana Bowman; former Iraqi POW Specialist Shoshana Johnson; retired Sergeant Major of the Army Jack Tilley; plus several others.

Click here to go to the Symposium's registration page
Mrs. Smith
SFC Bowman
Maj. Duckworth
SgtMaj. Tilley
Lee Greenwood

If not now, when?

Demand for healthcare services for veterans climbed 34 percent between 2000 and 2004, yet the VA budget failed to keep pace, according to a January 2005 article in Newsweek.

A third of U.S. service members who returned from the war in Iraq in 2003 and 2004 required mental health treatment within a year of ending their deployment, according to The Journal of American Medicine.

The VA estimated that roughly 23,000 veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan would require healthcare services in 2005. The actual total was 103,000, according to Veterans for Common Sense.

A 2004 study by the VA found that its own representatives provided completely incorrect, minimally correct or only partially correct information to veterans about their benefits 85 percent of the time.

The unemployment rate for young veterans aged 20 to 24 is nearly 15 percent, or triple the rate, for non-veterans in the same age group, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics.

More than 500,000 veterans experience homeless at some point during the course of a year.


Chicago • Oct. 18-21


AMVETS National Headquarters
4647 Forbes Boulevard Lanham, Maryland 20706
1-877-7AMVETS
amvets@amvets.org