Ex - Gen. Shelton to Have Surgery

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Ex - Gen. Shelton to Have Surgery
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS


Filed at 3:17 p.m. ET


WASHINGTON (AP) -- Retired Army Gen. Henry H. Shelton, the former Joint Chiefs chairman who injured his spine two months ago in a fall from a ladder, said Thursday he will undergo spinal surgery next week.

In his first public comments on the accident, Shelton said he is not assured a full recovery but has made more progress than originally expected after falling at his Fairfax, Va., home on March 23.

``My goal is to get as close to 100 percent as I can get,'' he said in a conference call from Walter Reed Army Medical Center with several reporters at the Pentagon. He spoke confidently and showed flashes of the humor for which he was well known during 38 years in the Army.

``My reserve chute failed, and I took a dive,'' he said in describing his fall.

He said he was about 10 feet high when a branch he had pruned from a tree in his yard knocked him from the ladder and sent him tumbling to the ground. He landed on his head and immediately lost feeling in much of his body, he said.

``I realized the minute I hit, I had damaged something,'' he said.

Shelton, 60, retired in October. He was a Green Beret, an expert parachute jumper and more physically fit than many men years younger. He served two tours of duty in Vietnam, led the Army's air assault on Iraq during the 1991 Gulf War and commanded the U.S. Special Operations Command.

As chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for four years he was the senior military adviser to the president and the secretary of defense.

Shelton said his doctors were not uniformly optimistic about his recovery prospects immediately after the accident. He said he dedicated himself to doing more than expected and reminded himself of the old saying, ``When the going gets tough, the tough get going.''

Next week doctors will perform a procedure known as a laminectomy and fusion to widen Shelton's spinal column and relieve pressure on the spinal cord. The damage is in his upper spine.

He said he probably would be in a neck brace for a month or two after the surgery.

In the two months since the accident, Shelton has made substantial progress in regaining use of his limbs. He said he can walk, although his balance is less than normal, and has almost full use of his right arm. Recovery in the left arm has been hampered by a ligament tear sustained in the fall, he said.

Asked whether he had resigned himself to never again being able to jump from an airplane, Shelton said:

``I wouldn't say that. I don't give up that easily.''



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