BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Hundreds of thousands of holiday cards and letters thanking wounded American troops for their sacrifice and wishing them well never reach their destination. They are returned or thrown away unopened.
Since the Sept. 11 attacks and the anthrax scare, the Pentagon and the Postal Service have refused to deliver mail addressed simply to “Any Wounded Soldier” for fear terrorists or opponents of the war might send toxic substances or demoralizing messages.
Mail must be addressed to a specific member of the armed forces — a rule that pains some well-meaning Americans.
“Are we going to forget our soldiers because we are running in fear?” Fena D’Ottavio asked. The suburban Chicago woman was using her blog to encourage friends to send mail to unspecified soldiers until she learned of the ban.
Last season, despite the rule, officials say as many as 450,000 pieces of mail not addressed to anyone in particular managed to reach Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington. But they were returned or thrown out, because the hospital lacked the manpower to screen all the mail, spokesman Terry Goodman said.
“A lot of this is because of security concerns because it’s unsolicited mail that someone is going to have to go through,” Goodman said. “Also, being a democratic society, there could be inappropriate mail from someone who, say, doesn’t support the war, and then you’ve got a wounded soldier getting it.”
Lt. Col. Kevin Arata, a spokesman with the Army Human Resources Command, said no one tracks the amount of unnamed-soldier mail being returned, so it is impossible to judge the size of the problem.
Officials said they are receiving far less mail this year addressed simply to “A Recovering American Soldier” or “Any Wounded Soldier.”
USO spokesman John Hanson said that like the military, the nonprofit service organization does not deliver unopened mail to unspecified recipients. He said the USO worries about security as well as hateful messages from war critics.
The USO is one of the organizations the military is encouraging people to support with donations as an alternative to sending cards to unspecified soldiers. The military is also referring people to the American Red Cross and a Defense Department website, www4.army.mil/ ocpa/tooursoldiers, where supporters have posted thousands of messages to troops.
Some groups are offering to forward mail to the troops. Aides to Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., are offering to accept letters, screen them through the U.S. Capitol mail operation, and get them to members of the armed forces.
