Agent Orange in Vietnam: Still poison after all these years. - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

cmac2012 · #1 01-12-2006, 03:18 AM

I've been reading more and more about how the gazillions of gallons of dioxin we sprayed on Vietnam have not degraded, how it lurks in the soil and water and almost certainly causes serious birth defects to this day. This is not a historical problem, it is current.

I saw a good film about it on Free Speech TV, on the Dish network here in the Bay area, maybe everywhere for all I know: "Battle's Poison Cloud," puts some images with all the info I've been reading. Shocking and amazing.

http://www.tambutifilms.co.uk/video.htm

http://www.hollywoodinvestigator.com/2004/battlespoisoncloud.htm

My youngest sister had severe birth defects -- could never walk or talk, died at age 10. Watching parents in Vietnam take care of children much like my sister, where resources are short to begin with, was tough.

We were willing to spend around $200 billion, about $900 billion adjusted for inflation, to deliver those poisons, among other munitions, to Vietnam but damn little since then to make amends for our folly.

Researchers have identified numerous hot spots -- sites of former U.S. bases where Agent Orange was spilled -- that are still very toxic, ready to be stirred up by road building or agriculture. It is high in many places still just from the spraying.

People tell me to get over Vietnam. That would be a whole lot easier if we didn't have unfinished business there.

Umpteen million Christians in the U.S. get all animated about Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas, or Intelligent Design vs. Evolution. I move that we embace true Christian ideals and embark on a massive clean-up operation in Vietnam. It's way past overdue. A small percentage of what we're spending on SDI would probably cover it.

People seem to think bad Karma is a joke. It is not. As ye sow, so shall ye reap.

boneheaddoctor · #2 01-12-2006, 08:31 AM

Sorry to hear about your sister but we are not responsible for the worlds ills......if we had any hand in them or not....

aklim · #3 01-12-2006, 11:16 AM

And how much did the vietnamese spend to take care of the problems they created with places like the Hanoi Hilton and the other crap they did? War is war. People die, people get hurt, etc, etc.

TX76513 · #4 01-12-2006, 11:28 AM

Think there was some AO on a shirt I bought recently that was made in Vietnam

R Leo · #5 01-12-2006, 11:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by boneheaddoctor

Sorry to hear about your sister but we are not responsible for the worlds ills.....if we had any hand in them or not....

BHD may be onto something here.

cmac2012 · #6 01-12-2006, 12:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by boneheaddoctor

Sorry to hear about your sister but we are not responsible for the worlds ills......if we had any hand in them or not....

Doc, we used a high-tech array of planes and equipment to methodically deposit one of the most severe poisons known over vast tracts of Vietnam. Poison that we have admitted caused serious problems among our own troops.

We had THE hand in doing that and we are responsible. I didn't mean to imply that my sister's problems had anything to do with anything other than my having sympathy for people going through the same thing.

aklim · #7 01-12-2006, 12:55 PM

Yes we sprayed AO there. What of it? Bad things happen in war. As I recall, their conduct wasn't stellar either. What have they done for our veterans that suffered under them? Lets call it even and move along

cmac2012 · #8 01-12-2006, 01:00 PM

I can't believe you guys. We go on and on about how Saddam poisoned his own people and yet we shrug and smirk at our doing essentially the same thing in Vietnam, only on a much larger scale.

It was a war started on lies (the Gulf of Tonkin incident) against a nation that could not have harmed us in 500 years. The before and after aerial pictures of fields that we repeatedly defoliated then burned with massive amounts of naplam are beyond appalling.

Who else is responsible for that? And as for the Hanoi Hilton, what do you reckon we would do with downed pilots who had been bombing our cities and spraying poison on our fields? I have great sympathy for our guys who went through that, I got all choked up when I saw the film of McCain limping off the plane when he got home, but it is unrealistic in the extreme to expect people to treat enemies of their nation like honored guests.

This notion that American military might brings freedom and nothing else is seriously misguided one.

cmac2012 · #9 01-12-2006, 01:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

Yes we sprayed AO there. What of it? Bad things happen in war. As I recall, their conduct wasn't stellar either. What have they done for our veterans that suffered under them? Lets call it even and move along

You make it sound like the tables were even there. They were not. We started the damn war and when the damn little gooks wouldn't say uncle, some geniuses thought maybe defoliating the whole damn country would show them who was boss. Easily one of the top ten war crimes in the 20th century.

aklim · #10 01-12-2006, 01:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmac2012

I can't believe you guys. We go on and on about how Saddam poisoned his own people and yet we shrug and smirk at our doing essentially the same thing in Vietnam, only on a much larger scale.

Who else is responsible for that? And as for the Hanoi Hilton, what do you reckon we would do with downed pilots who had been bombing our cities and spraying poison on our fields? I have great sympathy for our guys who went through that, I got all choked up when I saw the film of McCain limping off the plane when he got home, but it is unrealistic in the extreme to expect people to treat enemies of their nation like honored guests.

I think Hussien was deliberately poisoning them and that was the reason Chemical Ali dumped that stuff on the Kurds. IIRC, we dumped AO there to defoilate the plants so they couldn't do their hit and run attacks. Yes, this came back as a problem but I think the aim of AO and whatever Chemical Ali used are totally different.

Oh really? No kidding. I thought you would feel like they should be treated like POWs and all that. After all, you expect that of our troops when they capture enemy "soldiers". You'd be yelling and screaming if our troops dragged captured "soldiers" behind the Hummer for a couple of miles in the desert or just plain shot them in the head. Weren't you the one that was unhappy at Gitmo Base and the prison Gen Janice Kapinski ran in Iraq? I guarantee they were way better than the Hanoi Hilton and the other camps and all the missing servicemen

aklim · #11 01-12-2006, 01:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmac2012

some geniuses thought maybe defoliating the whole damn country would show them who was boss.

You don't think defoilating the area had anything to do with removing the ambush points where the VC could hide had anything to do with it, do you?

boneheaddoctor · #12 01-12-2006, 01:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmac2012

Doc, we used a high-tech array of planes and equipment to methodically deposit one of the most severe poisons known over vast tracts of Vietnam. Poison that we have admitted caused serious problems among our own troops.

We had THE hand in doing that and we are responsible. I didn't mean to imply that my sister's problems had anything to do with anything other than my having sympathy for people going through the same thing.

THe Communists started that fracus..(remember Ho CHi Mihn)...aided by the soviets......we didn't.

cmac2012 · #13 01-12-2006, 01:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

You don't think defoilating the area had anything to do with removing the ambush points where the VC could hide had anything to do with it, do you?

Of course that was the logic, but it was twisted nonetheless. Destroying the country to save it. Brilliant. Bleepin' brilliant.

It was their damn country. The south never fought as hard as the north. Our own guys said so, many times. Face it: we were on the wrong side and are now walking away from a hughmongous war crime. I know you're conditioned to believe that the US is the bastion of all that is good and proper. Hate to break it to you, but we're a collection of people just as prone to arrogance and error as anyone else on the planet.

boneheaddoctor · #14 01-12-2006, 01:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmac2012

Of course that was the logic, but it was twisted nonetheless. Destroying the country to save it. Brilliant. Bleepin' brilliant.

It was their damn country. The south never fought as hard as the north. Our own guys said so, many times. Face it: we were on the wrong side and are now walking away from a hughmongous war crime. I know you're conditioned to believe that the US is the bastion of all that is good and proper. Hate to break it to you, but we're a collection of people just as prone to arrogance and error as anyone else on the planet.

We all know you are pro-communism from your other threads......

have you considered many of your Fellow Vietnamese countrymen did not feel that way.

Money · #15 01-12-2006, 02:06 PM

This issue is a result of every war, isn't it? What about the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki? What about those damn Tories and the atrocities they committed on the James River?

I have the greatest sympathy for those affected, but don't feel that the US Govt. owes the responsibility of dealing with it because it was resultant from a war that no matter what your personal opinion was ultimately deemed a 'legal' war.

That being said, I can tell you are pretty emotional about the situation, and with good cause. This is an example of where the private sector (ie: you) should jump in and join with others like minded and do something about it. And by doing something about it, I don't mean trying to goad the govt. into doing something about it.