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Children of Agent Orange

How a group of US veterans in Vietnam are trying to atone for the mistakes of the past. People and Power Last Modified: 28 Sep 2011 12:56 inShare16 Email Print Share Feedback

Fifty years ago this month, in the early stages of the Vietnam War, the US military began spraying rural areas of the country with the herbicide, Agent Orange. The programme's goal was to defoliate forested land, depriving the enemy Viet Cong of cover and driving peasants to the cities, thus destroying the Viet Cong's support base and food supply.  Over the next 10 years more than 80 million litres were deployed across 7.4 million hectares of Vietnam, eastern Laos and parts of Cambodia. They were an effective defoliant, but there is strong evidence that the deadly dioxins contained in Agent Orange also had a catastrophic effect on the health of millions of Vietnamese – killing hundreds of thousands and causing dreadful diseases and birth defects in subsequent generations right up to this day. Thousands of US servicemen - men who handled the herbicide and who operated in areas where it was deployed - were affected too, and they and their families eventually won compensation through the courts. But attempts to get similar US financial aid for the Vietnamese victims, or even much help with a clean up of polluted land, have been less successful. With many areas of Vietnam still poisoned by the dioxin and the country's hard pressed health and welfare services struggling to support those suffering, this film by Risto Vuorinen tells the remarkable story of the children of Agent Orange and a group of US veterans in Vietnam who are trying to atone for the mistakes of the past. Click here for more on People & Power.' http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/2011/09/2011928111920665336.html Related Vietnam's forgotten war victims Effects of toxic Agent Orange continue to haunt civilians 35 years after US war. ( 23-Jul-2010 ) Toxic legacy of the Vietnam war Agent Orange still haunts Vietnam Agent Orange case back in US court LATEST UPDATE: 19/01/2011  - HEALTH - VIETNAM - WAR Vietnam: for victims of Agent Orange, the war isn't over In Vietnam, 30 years after the war, Agent Orange is still claiming victims. Used on a massive scale by the US army to prevent Viet Cong soldiers from hiding, this powerful herbicide permeated the ground. From encephalitis to congenital deformities and leukaemia, thousands of children are being born severely handicapped due to the chemical. By Dung Vo Trung / Gael Caron / Michaël SZTANKE From 1961 to 1971, the US army sprayed massive amounts of dioxin over Vietnam. In total, between 2.1 and 4.8 million people living in some 20,000 villages were directly affected. 40 years after it was sprayed, Agent Orange continues to cause deaths, cancers, leukaemia and birth defects. The Vietnamese Red Cross estimates that there are one million victims. At the end of 2009, US President Barack Obama decided to double the amount of American aid set aside to repair the damage caused by Agent Orange in Vietnam. Six million dollars will now be put towards decontaminating the worst-affected areas. Part of this money is expected to go to centres where the victims of Agent Orange live. The Vietnamese welcomed this gesture by Obama, but found it insufficient considering the amount of damage caused in their country. Unable to attack the US government, the Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange filed a lawsuit in the US courts against the main American herbicide suppliers, including Dow Chemical, Thompson, Diamond, Monsanto, Hercules and Uniroyal. The first verdict was delivered on March 13th 2007: the lawsuit was dismissed. But the NGOs are not giving up. They want those responsible for this sanitary catastrophe to be tried, and the victims awarded compensation. On May 15th and 16th 2009, an International People’s Tribunal of Conscience met in Paris to hear the testimony of Agent Orange victims and determine responsibilities. Over 40 years after it was sprayed, Agent Orange is still a daily preoccupation for the Vietnamese. Our reporters went to the contaminated zones of Vietnam to meet the victims. http://www.france24.com/en/20110119-reporters-vietnam-agent-orange-war-usa-children-handicaps-chemical-herbicide-courts-obama