. >>> joining us is eric lachica, the american director of coalition for filipino veterans. it's a little embarrassing for us when we started to research the story, to find out 250,000 filipinos served side by side with americans in world war ii. give us a sense of how significant the filipino ii. >> major impact. the filipino soldiers was the first front line. the first battles were fought in the philippines. my dad was a fill peeno soldier who -- filipino soldier that states. >> there were plenty of filipino soldiers that gave their lives for the country. >> yes, more than 60,000 died, a million casualties, civilians, we were the front line in world war ii in asia. >> tell us what is going on now. we are reading 20-30 years. filipino vatsets are waiting to be reunited in the u.s. what is the backlog like. they are waiting 20-30 years. 1990. >> according to our estimates there's 20,000 sons and daughter of filipino veterans waiting in line with petitions to become u.s. citizens, it's a tough situation for elderly filipino world war ii veterans. some have gone back because th