U.S. Finally Cleaning Up Some of Its Agent Orange Mess in Vietnam

Saturday, August 11, 2012
More than 50 years after it first sprayed Agent Orange in Vietnam, the U.S. government has started a program to help clean up a small portion of the contamination it caused during the war.
 
The Obama administration plans to spend $43 million over four years to remediate an area near Da Nang in central Vietnam. A former U.S. air base left behind large swaths of land polluted with dioxin, the chemical contaminant in Agent Orange that can cause cancer, birth defects, and other diseases.
 
In a country that commemorates the 10 years of American spraying, many Vietnamese reacted bitterly toward the news, calling the program too little and too late. Many in the country were incensed that Dow Chemical, a producer of the poison, was allowed to be a sponsor at the Olympic Games this year.
 
Nguyen Van Rinh, a retired Vietnamese military commander who now chairs the Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin, told The New York Times: “The plight of Agent Orange victims continues. I think the relationship would rise up to new heights if the American government took responsibility and helped their victims and address the consequences.”
 
It is estimated that the U.S. military sprayed about 20 million gallons of Agent Orange and other herbicides in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos from 1961 to 1971. More than five million acres of forest and cropland—an area roughly the size of New Jersey—were destroyed by the defoliants.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
 
To Learn More:
Fact Sheet (The Aspen Institute)
 

  

Comments

Kelly Porter Franklin 12 years ago
I wonder if the USA will ever do anything about the Agent Orange it caused to be sprayed in Canada? http://www.stripes.com/news/us/cdc-to-probe-maine-troops-possible-toxin-exposure-at-canadian-base-1.184010 I guess we'll have to wait and see if the CDC finds that Americans were harmed, aside from the hundreds of thousands of Canadians of course.
H. Mullins 12 years ago
as i sat and read this article of our government attempting to clean up a past mess of agent orange, i have to wonder if obama himself realizes that his own hand is spreading the same deadly agent and feeding it to the american people currently with his other hand. if he does then he is truly a master of deception to his own people that put him into office. if not than i would hope that blindness of his own eyes be shown the truth to the works of his own hands. for those whom do not know what i am talking about, then i suggest they do the research and learn the background of agent orange in the past and the use of the deadly agent today in our own country by none other than the same company that helped develop its use for warfare. here are a few links to the history of agent orange, as well as the company that helped developed it and is still using it today here in our own country with the approval of our own government. whether our own government consciously approves of this companies product and practice, or if they also have been fully blinded to the truth by the company it is doing business with today [the company monsanto that helped developed the deadly chemical agent orange], we do not know. one would think that our own government would at least take the time to research such a major company such as monsanto, before allowing such a company so much control over its own food supply as well as the food supply of the world’s hunger impoverished nations. now i know that these few story links comes from one source, however i have done more than 2 and ½ years of researching on this monsanto company (one the developers of agent orange with dow chemical aka dupont) from other sources, and this site’s links give a very thorough outline of this companies history and practices in a nutshell. readers may know this deadly compound by its modern usage in the form of the pesticide roundup. i suggest those whom have the desire to know more also search the web for themselves and see this problem is not a joke, nor is it only a past problem. this problem is still very much alive and still active today, and deeply rooted into the workings of our own government, on multiple levels and all parties not just democrats or republican. some two links gives the truth to what this company is about and how they buy their false successes, and to continue bypasses the laws that are supposed to protect us citizens. link 1 http://www.naturalnews.com/023094_monsanto_who_industry.html link 2 http://www.naturalnews.com/023254_monsanto_pcb_toxic.html this link gives one a truth that they are still alive as a company and have not changed in their blatant acts of being a false humanitarian company, as well as their unethical business practices. http://www.naturalnews.com/036262_corruption_health_care_medicine.html

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