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Off V.A. Drugs

By VVAW

During the summer, a fierce struggle erupted among the 269 patients at the Drug Dependency Treatment and Rehabilitation Unit in the Brooklyn VA hospital. Fed up with the miserable conditions and treatment, vets on the drug treatment program began organizing themselves to do something about changing the situation. Forming a group called Vet-Pac, the patients took up the struggle to help fellow vets cure themselves and fight against the mistreatment and indifference from the bureaucrats running the VA program.

Members of Vet-Pac were either on the VA's drug maintenance program or had recently gotten off it. They saw the goals of their struggle as (1) helping vets on the drug program get off ALL drugs--methadone as well as heroin, and (2) having some control over the drug program being administered while they were in the VA. The fact is that millions of us were forced into a nightmare situation like Vietnam--or just the bone-numbing misery of life in the military--which led many of us to try to escape into the world of dope. When the Brass in Nam began freaking out about GI resistance, they aided the process by having the CIA supply us with mountains of powerful Laotian heroin. A GI numbed out on dope was a hell of a lot safer than a mad GI with a loaded M-16 in his hand, or so the Brass figured.

Well, now there are between 60 and 200 thousand vets back in the US with a drug addiction problem directly resulting from military service. At first, VA refused to deal with the problem at all. Then when public pressure became too much to ignore, the A honchos dished up the methadone maintenance program which is still in effect. Rather that cure drug addiction, the VA's solution was to take us off one drug and substitute another--methadone. Of course methadone ain't no cure at all. It's MORE addictive than heroin! While withdrawal from heroin isn't a pretty experience, withdrawal from methadone is worse. It's more severe, painful and prolonged. Attempted too rapidly, it can be fatal. What methadone is, in reality, is a way for the VA and the government to control totally the vets on the program. Play ball with the VA or it's cold turkey and you're off the program and out on your ass.

It was these conditions that the vets in Vet-Pac began to fight. As one Vet-Pac member put it, vets want an alternative "which will get a man off drugs without using drugs to do it." Moreover, the vets were fed-up with the threats and harassment they got while on the program. Like every other part of the VA system, the attitude from the administrators was that the hospital belonged to them, that vets/patients are only a bother -- the idea that the VA is only there in order to serve the needs of veterans has never gotten through to them.

For the slightest "infraction" of VA rules patients were threatened with being kicked out of the program. Patient's dosages were regularly held up as "punishment," and Mickey Mouse violations of hospital rules led to threats of removing recreation room "privileges." VA security guards regularly harassed patients and tried to order them around like they were 1st week recruits in basic training. Fights between patients and the VA goons were regular. Even more intolerable, however, was the lousy medical treatment. In one 5-week period this summer, 4 patients died from VA administered overdoses. Over the past 2 years, 20 patients died from ODs.

When it began, Vet-Pac found widespread support among drug patients. Initial victories came quickly--such as a patient self-policing policy where the patients took care of their own problems and kept VA guards the hell out. The influence Vet-Pac began to gain with vets utterly freaked out the VA bureaucrats. In retaliation they ordered Vet-Pac out of the hospital, disbanded the self-policing policy, and stepped up harassment of patients.

In response to these attacks, Vet-Pac organized a demonstration on June 13th which members of the VVAW attended. Some 75 people demonstrated and picketed at the hospital in a highly spirited demo that lasted for 7 hours. Some of the patients came in uniform and spoke about the bullshit treatment they'd gotten from the service and were not getting again from the VA. In memory of the dead patients at the hospital, one vet in a Navy uniform took a bullhorn and talked about how VA neglect and indifference had killed them. The demonstrators cheered him as he spoke. A VVAW member was also cheered by the vets as he spoke on the bullhorn about how lousy this whole system is and how vets were first used as cannon fodder to fight a rich man's war and were not getting royally screwed over by the VA. Vet-Pac members and other patients saw that their fight with the VA drug program was the same fight vets all over the country have with late checks, disability cutbacks, VA red tape and harassment. A number of Brooklyn vets later joined VVAW in the fight around Jose Rosario's late GI Bill checks (see story on p. 3) on June 19th. Their participation made that action stronger and more spirited by showing the unity of vets involved in different struggles against the VA.

On June 27 Vet-Pac held another action again attended by about 75 people. Like the first, it was spirited and a real success. Primary demands again centered around firing key VA administrators responsible for the shit coming down there and demands like "We Don't Want No VA Jive, Drug-Free Programs to Survive," "VA says Cutback, Vets say Fightback," and "Vets Say Nope to VA Dope."

After that action, the VA administrators again packed and threw individual leaders of Vet-Pac out of the hospital, barring them for good. One Vet-Pac leader still on the program was threatened with a forced 21-day detox if he didn't shape up (since normal detox time would be 6 months, this was clearly a threat to kill him).

At this time, the struggle at the Brooklyn VA has suffered a temporary setback. Vet-Pac was rooted out of the hospital, at least for now. Leaders of the struggle against the VA failed to unite with enough patients, particularly through the rest of the hospital, and with VA workers and the community. As a result, the VA hacks were able to isolate Vet-Pac leaders, throw them out of the hospital and stifle the organization. But in one form or another resistance continues, as it will continue to grow against the repression of the VA brass. The same lousy conditions and harassment continue at the hospital, and vets are still determined to fight it. Next time around we will have learned from our mistakes and use this knowledge to wage an even more effective struggle in the future.