Battling Gulf War Syndrome

(CBS)  One of the enduring mysteries of the last Gulf War has driven 48-year-old Navy veteran Bill Finnegan to the far eastern tip of Long Island. Correspondent Susan Spencer reports.

"I live out here in the boonies, and I pretty much stay to myself all the time," says Finnegan, who mostly keeps company with his horses and dogs. "It's my choice, because I just don't feel right."

It's easier, he says, than trying to explain the ravages of Gulf War Syndrome to his friends.

"Sometimes, when I get up in the morning, I feel like I'm 80 years old. I can hardly get out of bed. I'm hurting so bad."

Being sick was not something he worried about in 1972, when he first enlisted as a 17-year-old soldier. By the first Gulf War, nearly 20 years later, he'd risen to senior chief petty officer on the USS Okinawa.

He says he went through hell, several times. He breathed the smoky air from burning oil fields and navigated mine-infested waters to help downed pilots. He brought home more than a few medals. And he brought home unexplained health problems as well.

Over the last eight years, he's spent a small fortune on prescriptions for insomnia, sinus and stomach ailments, joint pain, muscle aches and depression.

And then there's his memory.

"I feel lost, I feel stupid. It's ridiculous," says Finnegan, who had to make a list in order to remember his complaints.

Approximately 20,000 veterans struggle today with Gulf War Syndrome, which the government acknowledged to be a real illness back in 1994. A higher percentage of soldiers became ill after the first Gulf War than any war in U.S. history. But remarkably, even after some 200 studies, no one knows exactly why.

With thousands of U.S. troops again in the Gulf, what causes this illness has now become an urgent question. For years, the best guess was simply combat stress.

But veterans' groups don't buy that idea -- since all wars have stress –- and Finnegan doesn't buy it either.

"Stress probably is a factor, but not the whole factor," he says.
"There's no way that just stress does this."

Veterans point to a host of other possiblities -- polluted air from burning oil fires, insect bites, exposure to small amounts of toxic agents, even medications given the troops.

But veterans affair secretary Anthony Principi says they haven't been able to find an answer to Gulf War Syndrome because they don't have precise records, hard data, of who was exposed to what. He hopes that mistake won't be repeated.

"The proof is in the pudding when they come home," says Principi. "Will we have the data about their health? Will we know where they were stationed, what their unit deployments were, troop deployments? I will need that information."

This time around, every soldier has had blood drawn, which will be compared to samples taken after the war. The defense department is testing air, water and soil, and monitoring each soldier's location. And medics in Iraq are recording all vaccinations, medications and illnesses.

Finnegan knows that none of this will undo the effects of the last war, but he hopes it will solve the mystery for soldiers serving in this war -- for one soldier in particular.

His 24-year-old son, Eddie, is in the Marines. For the last three weeks, he's been stationed somewhere in Iraq.

"The way I am with the sicknesses I have," says Finnegan, "I don't want to see him become like that. I hope he gets through there and nothing happens."