Should veteran status be reserved for those who have deployed?

Even tho i already responded please define deployed:

For the VA, you're a veteran if you served and were not dishonorable doscharged.

Your specific benefits one qualified for depend on the specific type and duration of duty. Appropriately, combat does move you to the head of the line, so to speak, but not being in combat does not strip you of your "veteran" status.

I served between gulf wars for 7 years. No opportunity to deploy. I tell my kids I served but reserve the "veteran" distinction for those who stepped onto enemy soil.

I would say your a Veteran upon completion of you basic and AIT training. I went active duty first and ended up in Afghanistan in 2011. Now I'm ARNG and deployed with them in 2015 to kuwait and then to Iraq. To be honest. I can't speak for other states. But if we want to deploy all we have to do, is fill out a volunteer packet but you will go with which ever unit is going in the state. So you can deploy with NC pretty often if you want. But most I believe get lazy and caught up in the civilian life. Before you know it they have all sorts of attachments at home. But for the Veteran status it should be upon completion of all your contracted training. Then for "Combat Veteran" status is having served for the 30 or 90 consecutive days in a combat zone. I can't remember the exact length of days though.

I served in active duty Air Force , Air National Guard and the Army National Guard. Retired Honorably from all 3 with 23 Years of Sevice. I was never deployed although many of my friends have. Does that make me less of a Veteran? No. Am I a Combat Veteran? No. When people ask am I a Veteran, I say yes. When they ask if I saw combat I tell them no with a brief explanation. Weather God or fate someone or something had other use for me. I am proud to have severed, was willing and able to deploy and always did my job to the best of my abilities.
Joe (Ret.) SFC

If combat deployment status determined veteran status then there wouldn't be many Navy veterans in my mind if you served your a veteran weather you were a POS, POG, or an Operator some just get to ad to the title combat veteran but to be honest if we started talking and you brought up your service I'm going to talk shit to you but don't worry I won't let any civilian talk shit

Charles; You know you're a Veteran and now I and others know.. because some clown that claims that you are not a Veteran because you didn't deploy to a combat zone is Prob'ly just butt-hurt because they didn't.. or a
Minor technicality .. So they want you to share in their sorrow.. to heck with them!
So you didn't go but you provided the support needed by/to those that did go and you're a Vet too! Those in the rear
providing the logistical support to those in
On the line are as important as those keeping the enemy at bay... without support where would they be and what would they be doing w/o that support that you and others provide? You got that right .. I went to 'Nam and served at Tan Son Nhut AB as a Cook and baker. I was part of the support team.. us, MWR(morale, welfare, entertainment), Mortuary affairs, base exchange, base laundry.. and I did a few tours as a security augmentee.. then to Thailand where I did more of the same: providing sustenance to our Airmen and anybody else; Army, Navy(Seabees), Marines, Coast Guard(LORAN), So whatever you did while in the rear with the gear is important and you're important Charles and on top of that you're a Vet and welcome to the best !

First off your out of your mind if you don't think that NG or the Reserves don't deploy. Our of 311 million people in this country less than 2 percent serve in the military to include reserve and the Guard. Active duty can't do it all. During the cold war all those who served but never deployed still were a deterrent. They all still sacrificed time away from loved ones . Sure if you go to combat you truly see the horrors of what you have been training so hard to fight. Does it mean your better than those who never went? All it means is that you were able to be tested. If you survived with out any injuries or not dying does that make you any less than a soldier? Are you a coward because you didn't make the ultimate sacrifice? Absolutely not. Should the recruit who completes basic and their ait but than gets hurt on a airborne jump when he gets to his unit first day career ending jump not be considered a veteran? Of course he should but you should complete basic and ait

Unless somebody has invented a crystal ball, no one who signs the line and swears the oath should be called anything but a veteran. It really ticked me off when people who had never made that "offer" tried to toss stones at President G W Bush, who with his mates flew the widowmakers the USAF had handed down to the Air Guard and Reserve. My only caveat to this: If you were never eligible for the CAR (does the Army have an equivalent? It always seemed to have too narrow a rule for the CIB, but, hey, whatever makes a service happy)--let's just say something that every service member will understand--if you haven't been "in country" or contiguous air or waters, don't be like a certain slimy waste of a Senator who walked around for years claiming to be a Vietnam veteran when he knew that people were thinking "rockets, mortars, blood....and C-rats for 60 or more straight days."

No, if a Reservist with no legitimate active duty time and no deployment, you do not get to call yourself a Veteran. As a Reservist you still enjoyed the education benefits, tax free status at PXs and various other benefits, but never really answered the call. There are enough deployments out there to volunteer for if you really want to deploy, so once again, no.

All who served are veterans. Some are combat vets and some aren't. We all trained to the same standard in our given jobs to carry out or support the same mission - defending the U.S.

Maybe we shouldn't give it to people who always managed to avoid deployments, but we ought not withhold it from those who never had the opportunity to deploy.

Everyone who served is a Veteran those that have been in the Combat theater are Combat Veterans and they have the VFW if they want to hang out with other Combat Vets only. the rest of us have the American Legion if someone wants to feel like noncombat Vets are not vets they can go to the VFW But even there the Vets will tell them you serve you are a Vet. And I have never heard any Veteran EVER say to me or another Vet that did not see combat that we were not Veterans. The Combat Vets I've run into even when in BHOST say "be glad you never saw combat" and " you are one of us, you are a Brother" So I don't know where you are hearing that scuttle butt but that's just what that is Scuttle Butt.

Why ask this? All you have to do is look up what makes a veteran, peoples opinions do not matter!

If you served on active duty ! You are a veteran ! What kind of moronic ,window licking, pole smoking , crack monster even breached this topic ? Youre mother must have beat you for you to be so stupid !

I respect anybody who served. I was in during that wierd time. Where we were still fighting the Cold War. With hot War zones to. Most people dont understand the Cold War wasn't cold. Every day we acted and did things that risked lives. Plus risked turning the Cold War hot. When things finally come out. Some of our most dangerous mission's took place during the Cold War. Nobody will ever get credit for those combat mission's. Even though they should. If you served you are a Veteran. End of Story.

My honest opinion ? All gave some, some gave all ! What I think we should focus more on are those who commit stolen valor . I hate that crap with a passion.

Combat is the determining factor for vet status?
How about sub service? Those guys were at crush depth,put through live scenario drills at all times.Or my bfothers in SAR squadrons in the Navy or Coast Guard?
How many combat soldiers were jumping into rolling seas in 40 degree water ?
Flight decks aren't vet status worthy?
Hell you say. Crab fisherman are a close second to a busy flight deck op.
My MCM community loses helos and crew at one of the highest rates in aviation.
19 brothers, of them clise friends in tge span of 5 years.
Flew aboard an MH 53E heading to Fujirah in a heavy sand storm and we almost dropped outta the sky due to lift conditionsdead air. While deployed to the middle east.
Yeah, Combat is the determinating factor.
Lastly, was in the Philippines in 88-91.
Witnessed two airforce kids killed by a hit squad in AC ,was in CalJam when two Subic stationed Marines were poisoned by a bar girl. List my skipper in an Fclp accident. Yeah, they're not vets......
Danger is not discriminate only to "combat".
Mad respect to my combat tested brothers and sisters,but what is more dangerous? That which is assumed ,or unassumed ?
Your service ,no matter how mundane, insignificant you may have thought, might have been the key component to a combat mission's survival.
Remember, the most important man in a cooks kitchen is the diswasher.
Proud of all of you.

'86-'89 I was a regular Army truck driver and I was a Vet, plain and simple. Got back into active duty '92 as 11b and was deployed a few times, I'm now a combat vet. There you go.

It doesn't matter whether you deployed or not you wrote the check saying that you would lay down your life for this country as someone that has deployed and retired from the military . I see no difference between me and my friends that didn't. my card got pulled theirs didn't I actually think it's great when someone has made a career out of their chosen branch and never got deployed I consider that person to A very lucky veteran!!!!!