At the Manurewa RSA, five not-so-old-soldiers gather around a table to explain why they are calling a truce. There is not a celebratory beer in sight.

Like 3500 other Vietnam veterans, they came home in the late 60s and early 70s to begin the war at home. They returned to a country which didn't want to know about Vietnam.

They were not welcomed back - unlike earlier conflicts, there were few parades before flag-waving crowds. Instead they were spat at, abused and punched by protesters who knew little of what they'd been through.

"We were ordered to march down Queen St and the public told us we were a bunch of arseholes," says Ken McKee Wright, a career soldier who spent six months in Vietnam in 1967.

They were left to fend for themselves by a system which didn't recognise post-traumatic stress. They were shunned by many RSAs because the Government had not declared war.

Then they started dying.

Exposure to dioxin-laden Agent Orange and other defoliants has sent hundreds to an early grave from cancer and left others with health problems ranging from respiratory and heart disease to arthritis and skin conditions. Many of their children and grandchildren were born with spina bifida, cleft lip and cleft palate, foot and limb deformities, heart and lung defects.

You might think few New Zealanders, as a group, have more reason to grow bitter, to hate their government, to demand compensation, than our Vietnam veterans. Many think they protest too much.

Some brought back psychological problems now recognised as conflict-related. Zac Harris, who did three years in the Army including a year in Vietnam, saw mates get "into shitloads of trouble" when they came home.

"Someone would drop something behind you and you'd turn around and drop them, says Harris. "You didn't know why."

What most of these veterans exhibit more than anything is the capacity to get on with life, even to forgive, despite injustices which can never be put right. About 1000 are converging on Wellington next weekend to hear Helen Clark say "welcome home". Clark will speak from the steps of Parliament during Tribute 08, the Government's belated apology for decades of ill-treatment.

They will take their children and partners with them - those that have them. Lasting relationships eluded many of these veterans.

They will attend the formal events and performances and commemorative services and collect the medal - but most of all they will get together over a few beers. A highpoint for many will be the "whakanoa" - a spiritual cleansing ceremony to remove the warrior spirit from a fighter returning from battle.

It may be late, but organiser Tamahou Temare predicts an emotionally-charged ceremony, given the 35 years of deep-seated hurt these warriors have retained.