This article was co-written by Chris Villines and Rachel Allison.

“As a combat vet, you have to wear a steel helmet. It’s amazing how small you are able to make your body to hide beneath your helmet when bullets start dancing all around you.” –- Joe Eden

Imagine being drafted for a military you had no intention of otherwise joining. You get three months of training and are shipped off into a jungle on the other side of the world to fight a war where you can’t see the sun during the day, and it’s so black at night that you begin to hallucinate. 

Now imagine you are lucky enough to survive this deployment and can return home. Instead of being celebrated, you are spit on and called a “baby killer,” by protestors the minute you step off the plane. 

You go back to the church you’ve attended your entire life, and no one asks you where you’ve been or what you did. It was taboo to talk about the war. 

Life goes on around you, but you continue to flash back to moments of terror. You struggle to fit in with society and turn to alcohol to soothe your pain, both physical and mental.

This was reality for local veteran Joe Eden, amongst many others who survived the Vietnam War. 

Thanks to helpful resources like the Veterans Affairs (VA) Hospital, and the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) club, Joe has been able to create a life of meaning. He now spends his time encouraging and helping other men and women who served in overseas U.S. military conflicts.

More specifically, he’s the current Commander for the CPL Clifton East Smith Sr. VFW Post 2120 in Robertson County. His hope is to attract new members who served in more recent conflicts in order to help carry out the VFW’s mission “to give back and help both veterans and the community.”

In 1969, Joe was drafted into the United States Army and fought in the Vietnam War as a member of the famed 101st Airborne Unit. His brother, the late Don Eden, was also in Vietnam with the Army’s decorated 5th Special Forces Group, where he encamped near the Cambodian border.

“I never slept on a bed the whole time I was there,” Joe recalls. “My unit was up north next to the DMZ (demilitarized zone). We chased the North Vietnamese Army around, and they chased us.”

When Joe returned home from the war, he was lonely and struggling to enter back into society. Thankfully, one special interaction in 2013-– over 44 years after his homecoming—changed his outlook and quite possibly saved his life.

“I had went by my friend’s house, and he is a Vietnam Vet. We got to talking and telling war stories, and got to crying. He said, ‘I’ve got someone I want you to meet.’ He called his friend Bill Crawford who was the Commander of 2120. Bill came over. He said, ‘Joe you’re eat up with PTSD for what you’ve seen and what you did.’”

After that, Joe took a trip down to the VA Hospital and was able to confirm he did indeed have PTSD. He also discovered that he had Type 2 Diabetes which was directly caused by Agent Orange, a chemical used during warfare that gets into your DNA and can be passed onto offspring. 

Around the same time, Joe became an active member at VFW Post 2120 which had recently reformed in 2012. Currently, there are around 100 members, about a quarter of which attend the post’s monthly meetings held at the American Legion building in Greenbrier. There are some 20,000 VFW members statewide and 1.5 million nationally.

At the Post 2120 meetings, the central focus is on planning the yearly events that help raise funds for veterans and community causes, such as Junior ROTC in Robertson County and both Boys and Girls State at East Robertson High School.

The largest undertaking each year occurs each Memorial Day and Veterans Day, as Post 2120 sets up at nine different locations across Robertson County to hand out the VFW’s Buddy Poppies. All proceeds from donations go toward assisting veterans in need.

“It always amazes me to see someone run across a parking lot and hand you a $20 bill,” says Joe. “People want to help.”

He cites one such example where these donations made a difference for a female veteran in Springfield.

“I got a call on Christmas Eve night about her stove going out,” he explains. “We were able to find one and took it to her a couple of days later. She was so appreciative.”

For Joe, joining the VFW changed his life drastically, and he knows there are many combat vets out there who would also benefit from the comradery and the community they offer. 

“In my 74 years I’ve been a member of just about every club,” he says. “I’ve never been with a group of guys and gals that’s just like me. We’re all combat veterans. You cannot join the VFW unless you’ve been shot at and done shooting. I’ve done both…It was an experience I wouldn’t do again, but I wouldn’t take a million dollars for either.”

Individuals interested in joining VFW Post 2120 must provide a copy of their DD214 form. Dues are $35 a year, or a lifetime membership can be paid for up front.

For more information, contact Joe Eden at 615-812-8737 or jeden2120@gmail.com. 

You can also visit the VFW 2120 Facebook page here.