It took the collapse of the US economy to give a bit more credit ?and some cash, besides?to the heroes of the Fall of Bataan. But even if a lot of people in this country think that $198 million in lump sum benefits for the remaining 18,000 Filipino soldiers who served alongside Americans in World War II in the controversial US economic stimulus package is too little, too late, it?s still something to cheer about? especially for the veterans themselves.

Indeed, the provision of $15,000 for every fast-disappearing stateside Filipino WWII veteran and $9,000 each for their dwindling colleagues in the Philippines is a small victory in their Second Death March, the one that seeks to secure full benefits for all Filipinos drafted several months before Pearl Harbor by then US President Franklin Roosevelt. These are the approximately 200,000 troops already serving in the Philippine Commonwealth Army, the Philippine Army Air Corps and the Philippine Army Offshore Patrol who were promised full military benefits by Roosevelt out of close to half a million Filipinos who fought for the American side in the last Great War.

FDR offered these Filipino soldiers the same benefits due the American soldiers they fought alongside with, including citizenship. But with the passage of the Rescission Act in the US Congress in 1946 and its signing by Roosevelt?s successor Harry Truman, Uncle Sam took it all back?and the veterans? fight to secure their well-deserved monetary, health and other benefits (as well as to rectify the historical injustice committed on them) began.

Ever since the Rescission Act?s passage, Filipino veterans have sought the reinstatement of Roosevelt?s promises ? and official US recognition of their valor. But in every US Congress since the one that passed that scandalous law, efforts to right this grievous wrong were defeated.

In fact, as late as April last year, US Senator Ken Salazar (D-Colorado) was accusing his Republican colleagues in the minority of stalling legislation that would increase benefits to 25 million American war veterans because, he said, ?[t]he issue of debate... has [really] been the issue of the treatment for veterans benefits of the Filipino warriors from World War II [that was included in the proposed law].? Then Hawaii Democratic Senator Daniel Inouye (who lost an arm in the war) and the few remaining advocates of Filipino veterans? rights in the US Senate saw their chance during the deliberations of the $838.2-billion US economic stimulus package endorsed by President Barack Obama to Congress to perk up the moribund superpower?s economy.

With the inclusion in the Senate of the allocation for the Filipino veterans, the Republicans in Congress were aghast. Critics of the Obama administration?s economic bailout package dismissively called the veterans? benefits pork for special-interest groups, spoken about in the same breath as funding for a proposed magnetic-levitation train from Las Vegas to Los Angeles and funding for cleaner fuels that oil- and coal-backing GOP legislators routinely oppose.

In the Philippines, families of deceased veterans loudly denounced their exclusion from the one-time payment scheme, while many surviving old soldiers said they needed regular monthly pensions like American vets to pay for medicine and other needs instead of a one-time cash payment.

Others were just happy to get something from the US government after all these years?especially recognition of their sacrifice during the war. To these veterans, Washington may have succeeded in waiting out nearly all the Filipino veterans, but those who are still around (in their 80s and 90s) were glad that their heroism was finally being acknowledged.

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Of course, Obama will still have to sign the final version of the stimulus package bill, so even the money that Inouye and his fellow senators gave to the veterans is not a sure thing, at this point. And our veterans, whose hearts have been broken by promises made and then taken back by Uncle Sam before, know this all too well.

After all, the US Congress that included the new cash rewards was the same institution that passed a law in 1942, just a year after Roosevelt drafted Filipino soldiers into the US Army, Navy and Air Force, allowing these troops to become automatic American citizens with full veterans? benefits. The same Congress that, in 1946, amidst post-war cost-cutting measures in the US, submitted to Truman for his signature two bills that took back what they gave four years before.

(Truman, who ordered that atomic bombs were to be dropped on Japan to end the war, was said to have later regretted revoking the benefits of the Filipino veterans. But the historical fact remains that ?Give ?Em Hell? Harry allowed himself to get sidetracked by post-war squabbles in Europe, so much so that he entirely forgot his predecessor Roosevelt?s promise to compensate war-weary Filipinos for every last carabao lost in the war against Japan.)

Through the years, Filipino veterans would stage marches to get back the benefits promised to them, their faces getting as faded as their old, bemedalled uniforms with the passage of time. More than a decade ago in Los Angeles, Filipino war veterans chained themselves to a statue of their old commander, General Douglas MacArthur, at the park named after him (and made famous by the song) to dramatize their quest for recognition and restitution.

Still the US government stonewalled, even if it offered the veterans some crumbs like easing citizenship requirements for a few thousand some years back and allowing burial in US national cemeteries for others. The veterans continued to die off, of old age, disease and plain old heartbreak, at one point at an estimated rate of 850 a day.

Last year, the remaining Filipino veterans were given some hope of repayment and recognition, when the US Congress approved appropriation of veterans? benefits. But because Congress required authorization before the money can be paid (authorization that was not granted), it appeared to the veterans to be another of Uncle Sam?s broken promises.

And now, this. ?It?s a matter of honor and the good name of the United States,? Senator Inouye said, in defense of his inclusion of the veterans? benefits in the economic stimulus bill. ?I?m looking for any vehicle that will carry this forward.?

Let?s just hope that the surviving Filipino veterans of World War II aren?t disappointed one more time by our former colonial masters. And that the US is really serious about doing right by the people who once put their lives on the line to protect the Stars and Stripes? and who still think that America will honor its promises to them someday, before they all die.