PODCAST: Desert Storm. And Life Afterwards.

Doc Ray Varney’s military career began in 1962 when he enlisted in the U.S. Air Force.

The Wyoming boy went to basic training in San Antonio, Texas, and then transferred to Tucson, Arizona, where he spent the next four years.

Grinning with memory, he said, “I hated Arizona. Didn’t like the heat. I was so glad to get out of there.”

Varney went home to Worland at 21 years old. He began a career as a truck driver that would span over 30 years, and he was a volunteer firefighter and EMT for 25 years – but not before re-joining the military. He entered the U.S. Army 1022^nd Medical Company in Cheyenne, “and they called us the body snatchers,” he reminisced.

“When we went to Iraq, they asked us what we wanted to be called on the Wyoming radios and all 108 of us spoke up, ‘Call us the Wyoming Cowboys.’”

Going overseas was “major” for the cowboys, Varney said. Behind his kind eyes, a movie of the past played in his head. “We went to Great Britain to fuel up, then the Rhine-Main Air Force (base) in Germany. Then King Fahd International Airport in Saudi Arabia.

Courtesy Doc Ray Varney

“…they dumped us out and told us to get down in the drain ditches because the Scud missles were coming in.” Varney says they weren’t expecting it at all, they laid there for about half of an hour until they got the all-clear signal and were bused to their camp – an abandoned cement factory.

Varney remembers flying over the burn pits to Iraq after attacks to do their job as a medical unit and respond to military members and civilians alike.

It’s been over 30 years, but he still suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.

“I’ll have that the rest of my life.” Varney struggles with recurring nightmares and he’s very jumpy. He said that he is going to counseling and doing therapy through the U.S. Veterans Administration.

The burn pits exposed him to toxins that are still taking a toll on his body today; he has chronic acid reflux and chronic IBS.

Last year, Congress passed and President Joe Biden signed the Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act of 2022, known as the Honoring our PACT Act of 2022.

It expanded the V.A.'s health care and benefits for vets exposed to burn pits, Agent Orange, and other toxic substances.

However, Varney says that despite filling out paperwork, he has not received any help.