Greg Garcia and Julio Juaquin are Filipino World War II veterans hoping to receive full veterans' benefits.

There's another group of war veterans vying for political attention these days and they have nothing to do with either presidential candidate.

Filipino soldiers who fought alongside U.S. troops during World War II are still seeking full veterans' benefits. And after 58 years, these soldiers and their advocates say, they are the closest they've ever been to seeing their legislative campaign succeed.



The Philippine Islands were a U.S. commonwealth during the war, and residents there were drafted into the U.S. Armed Forces. In subsequent decades, Filipino veterans groups secured naturalization for the former soldiers; then some health and burial benefits for former soldiers living in the U.S.

But what's been missing, they say, has been full recognition by the government that these former soldiers — living here and in the Philippines — were indeed U.S. soldiers. Such recognition would extend to them all the benefits now awarded American veterans, including disability pensions.

"We're asking for our guys to get the same benefits as their American counterparts," said Eric Lachica, executive director of the American Coalition for Filipino Veterans.

"They've been waiting many years," added Jon Melegrito of the National Federation of Filipino American Associations (NFFAA).

Both groups, as well as a large local coalition of Filipino-American organizations, are stepping up efforts to secure congressional support before this year's legislative session ends in October.

One resolution, known as the Filipino Veterans Equity Act, was introduced by U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-Calif., last year. It proposes to deem service in the organized military forces of the Government of the Commonwealth of the Philippines and the Philippine Scouts as "active service," making the former soldiers eligible for benefits administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs.

The proposal, which would cost an estimated $216 million, according to the American Coalition for Filipino Veterans, includes an $800 disability pension for Filipino veterans living in either this country or in the Philippines.

The proposal needs the support of 34 more U.S. Representatives in order to be heard by the House Veterans Affairs Committee.

"We're talking about justice, fairness and equity," said Alma Kern of Bellevue, the daughter of a Filipino soldier who died in 1961. Kern, chairwoman of NFFAA's Pacific Northwest Region, is among those aggressively lobbying U.S. Reps. Jennifer Dunn, R-Bellevue, and Doc Hastings, R-Pasco, to sign on. A rally in support of their efforts is planned at the Federal Building in Seattle at 4 p.m. Friday.

Legislation sponsored by U.S. Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, proposes a $100 monthly disability pension to veterans living in the Philippines — which would bring their income above the country's poverty line, Lachica said. Senate Bill 68, Lachica's group estimates, would cost $22 million.

Of the 120,000 Filipinos who served in the Commonwealth Army during World War II, some 59,900 now reside in the United States and the Philippines, according to Veterans Affairs estimates.

The former soldiers are a gallant group living in their twilight years and rapidly dwindling in number, say local advocates who argue they have waited long enough.

"We fought a war that was not our own. Roosevelt promised to give us all the benefits," said Greg Garcia, 80, who immigrated to Seattle in 1992.

"We're getting old," he said the other day from his regular haunt in a church basement, the International Drop-In Center on Seattle's Beacon Hill. "During the last month, I know of three veterans who have died."