By Olga R. Rodriguez
SAN ANTONIO — Former Sgt. Santiago Erevia remembers the day in May 1969 when his Army unit came under heavy enemy fire in Vietnam. While crawling from one wounded soldier to the next, the radio telephone operator used two M-16s and several grenades to single-handedly destroy four enemy bunkers and their occupants.
Decades later, the Texas man’s heroic feat earned him the Medal of Honor.
“I thought I was going to get killed when I started to advance because when you fight battles like that you don’t expect to live,” Erevia told The Associated Press on Saturday.
Erevia is one of 24 veterans who served in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam to receive the U.S. military’s highest honor after a congressionally mandated review of minorities who may have been passed over because of long-held prejudices. The veterans — most of Hispanic or Jewish heritage — will be recognized in a March 18 ceremony that will try to correct the long-ignored ethnic and religious discrimination in the armed forces
The 68-year-old retired postal worker is one of 18 Latinos whose heroic deeds earned them the Distinguished Service Cross, the nation’s second-highest award for gallantry, and whose recognition is bringing to light the long history of military service among the Latino community — despite the prejudice they faced.
“For Mexican-American and Latino veterans, it’s a really high point,” said Ignacio Garcia, a Vietnam veteran and Latino history professor at Brigham Young University. “It highlights the no- tion of duty — in spite of problems, and despite limitations that people put upon the Latino community, and despite having being treated as secondclass citizens.”
Erevia, cited for courage during a search and clear mission near Tam Ky, South Vietnam, on May 21, 1969, is one of three of the 24 veterans who will be honored who are still alive. Former Sgt. Jose Rodela, from Corpus Christi, Texas, who will receive the medal for bravery during fighting in Phuoc Long province, Vietnam, in early September 1969, also lives in San Antonio.
The Pentagon said the Army reviewed the cases of the 6,505 recipients of the Distinguished Service Cross from World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars and found an eligible pool of 600 soldiers who may have been Jewish or Hispanic.
Of the 24 who will receive the Medal of Honor, eight fought in the Vietnam War, nine in the Korean War and seven in World War II.