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- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -12/+120This is ***** heartbreaking.
This is what happens when politicians make war and demand "results".
Just saw this on wiki:
"However, no Vietnamese have obtained compensation, and on March 10, 2005 Judge Jack Weinstein of Brooklyn Federal Court dismissed the lawsuit filed by the Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange against the chemical companies that produced the defoliants/herbicides."
So NOBODY was responsible. Another embarrassing period in history brough to you by the leadership of the US of A. - bloodomen13, on 10/12/2007, -4/+81Agent Orange is an embarassment. Not only has the US left Vietnam with the results, but also US soldiers who did tours there. My father has been diagnosed with numerous medical conditions and the VA finally admitted a few years ago that it is due to AO exposure. The nice thing... some conditions may be hereditary. I could develop the same conditions later in life and possibly have passed them on to my daughter.
A big thank you the US military for that. - stonebear, on 10/12/2007, -3/+56"Rome brings peace to all the world, but leaves behind a wasteland." - Tacitus
- funkyjunk3, on 10/12/2007, -5/+41you'll notice that it says "direct", but doesn't hint at indirect consequences. There is also a quote:
"A girl, age 11, with no arms learned to write using her feet. Her grandfather was an army officer in the former regime and worked on an aircraft that carried and dispersed Agent Orange during the war"
Agent Orange DOES have consequences, but they are unfortunately more far reaching than just to those who are immediately exposed to it, by affecting their DECENDENTS... - Paroparo, on 10/12/2007, -4/+39I beg your pardon? Vietnam provoked the US? A tiny third world country on the other side of the Pacific forced a super power to invade, and deserved to be attacked with chemical weapons like this?
Last time I checked all of that ***** happened because the country was going to adopt a financial system the US didn't like, and the White House decided they needed some "liberation." - scribles, on 10/12/2007, -14/+47i love the hypocrisy and irony. we do this ***** to those people then complain later about saddam potentially doing the same thing...
- dman99, on 10/12/2007, -4/+32I suggest listening to Anti-Flags "Depleted Uranium is a Warcrime". Bullets with a uranium tip are the agent orange of today's wars.
- quakerorts, on 10/12/2007, -8/+33Chemical weapons?! Not us. The next thing you're going to tell me is we've used nuclear weapons, too. Don't you know that WMDs are only used by bad guys, you know, like Saddam Hussein.
- greenlight2001, on 10/12/2007, -5/+30you're a douche bag
- KhaotikEvile, on 10/12/2007, -5/+28War: what is it good for?
- trer, on 10/12/2007, -1/+23@drunk3nrabbit
"Don't be so quick to bash the US, Vietnam provoked the war, the US went in there to slap them."
You must be referring to the Gulf of Tonkin incident. It has never been proven that an NVA patrol boat fired at a U.S. ship, in fact some say it is more plausible that the United States provoked the NVA and then blew up the incident more than it really was to stir up the frenzy for war. Vietnam was nothing more than a stomping ground for the United States to establish their military might against the Soviet Union during the hey days of the Cold War. The real enemy was never the NVA or Viet Cong, it was the Soviets and the Communist regime (as well as China)
Think about it. Vietnam had just liberated itself from the French following the battle of Dien Bien Phu. Why would a country (who didn't even have a stable government) suddenly pose a threat to the a global superpower in the United States. Vietnam was (and still is) never a threat to the United States and you're telling me that because allegedly a NVA ship fired upon a U.S. ship in Vietnamese waters that that is enough for all out war? If that's the case, then China has every right to declare war on the United States back in April of 2001 following an incident when a U.S. Spy plane off the coast of China collided with a Chinese fighter jet, killing the pilot.
Unless you can explain to me how Vietnam posed a threat to the American people, there is no way to justify a war that killed 60,000 U.S. soldiers and destroyed the lives of millions of Vietnamese. That the United States has never owned up to this (and the fact that people like you who obviously have no knowledge of history except what you are fed by FOX News) is the real crime.
(Don't even get me started on the secret bombings of Cambodia, which Nixon definitely was a part of. Many crimes were committed in Southeast Asia and sadly, justice will probably never be served.) - Kmack928, on 10/12/2007, -7/+28absolutely nothing
HUH! - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+19I remember I met a guy who was a pilot in Vietnam at an aviation museum in Minneapolis.
He told the group I was in, if we ever, any of us, became a politician, that the FIRST thing we needed to do was ban Agent Orange and all it's cousins forever. He was so deeply affected by what he saw it doing to the Vietnamese people, he made sure we'd all remember that advice. - dhakbar, on 10/12/2007, -1/+18First, I have a difficult time believing you were alive during Vietnam but have never heard of Agent Orange.
Second, the deformities caused by Agent Orange are well-understood today. This isn't just propaganda; Vietnam still suffers today from actions taken by both sides in that conflict, American and communist alike. The poor Vietnamese never wanted all the major world powers fighting a proxy war in their country; all they wanted to do was sort out their own country (the fact that communism was a poor choice is irrelevant). - yubpro, on 10/12/2007, -5/+21@ drunk3nrabbit...
Kennedy 'inherited' Vietnam from Eisenhower's administration, in a similar fashion to the Bay of Pigs in Cuba. Going even further back, however, the entire conflict stemmed from the time when Vietnam was a French colony. It was during the 1940's, when factions in Vietnam decided to fight for political independence, that the war in Vietnam really began. By the time the United States of America actually became involved in the conflict, the Vietnamese had already been in a state of war/conflict for nearly 20 years.
Now quit pulling facts out of god-knows-where... - CloakandSwagger, on 10/12/2007, -1/+15Some Vietnam Photographs from Jonathan Taylor, this is his agent orange gallery on flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wwwjonathantaylornet/sets/72057594123160334/
Very hard to look at. - Racerx52, on 10/12/2007, -2/+16Too late, We've done it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_War_syndrome#Depleted_uranium
DU is used in a lot of our current war-machine, from ammunition to armor plating. When outside the body it isn't very harmful, but once shot is fired or armor is hit, some of the DU can be turned into a fine dust, and inhaled or ingested, this is where the problem arises, "Deposited in the lungs or kidneys,
uranium 238(Depleted uranium) and products from its decay (thorium 234, protactinium and other uranium isotopes) give off alpha and beta radiations which cause cell death and genetic mutations causing cancer in exposed individuals and genetic abnormalities in their descendants."
There are many articles on the Internet about its horrid affects on life and environment around it, a quick google search will bring up hundreds of articles.
Here is an excerpt from an article here (http://mondediplo.com/2002/03/03uranium)
"In Jefferson County, Indiana, the Pentagon has closed the 200-acre (80-hectare) proving ground where it used to test-fire DU rounds. The lowest estimate for cleaning up the site comes to $7.8bn, not including permanent storage of the earth to a depth of six metres and of all the vegetation. Considering the cost too high, the military finally decided to give the tract to the National Park Service for a nature preserve — an offer that was promptly refused. Now there is talk of turning it into a National Sacrifice Zone and closing it forever. This gives an idea of the fate awaiting those regions of the planet where the US has used and will use depleted uranium."
Note: This was just testing, not enemy engagement for 4+ years (not counting the first gulf war). - TxDr, on 10/12/2007, -7/+21With my dad spending over a decade in the Army of South Vietnam reaching the rank of major, and my grandfather whose spent his whole life in the military who reached 3-star general, and both served during the Vietnam War, I will tell you what I heard from them. Kennedy was a major factor in starting the war.
Many people group the North communist Army with the radicals from Viet Minh who were the revolutionary group was an important reason of the civil war. With communist connections, China and Russia supplied goods and arms to the group, whereas the South Vietnamese army were alone in funding and fighting the war. President Diem requested arms and supplies from Kennedy when he offered assistance, and not forces since South Vietnam was doing quite well. After much stubborn attempts to try to get US soldiers into Vietnam, the CIA helped plan the assassination of Diem who was quickly replaced by another president that allowed US soldiers to partake an active role in the war. However, once the US stepped in, North Vietnam felt the south was trying to take over, and this is when the actual BULK of the north communist army took arms and joined the Viet Minh radicals fearing losing their land to the south.
Desires to profit from war as well as to try new weaponry in the Vietnam war, are all part of US's participation. Where US soldiers had helicopters, food packs, and M16s. South Vietnamese soldiers were fighting with whatever they had, and carrying far less technologically advanced packs. Many people like to believe that the US supplied the south as well as the communist allies supplied the north, but unfortunately this was not the case. Most of the soldiers my father led who had weapons issued from the US were mainly old guns, like the masses of M1 Garands to face against the standard AK47s the VietCong had in their possession.
I'm just here to offer my experience from listening to those who actively lived through and took a major part in the war itself.
P.S. - The U.S could have won the Vietnam War, but their policy states that they could not pass the boundaries that separate the north and the south too far. If they had the orders to go all the way through all of North Vietnam, I might've been born in Hanoi instead of the U.S. (Not that I'm complaining). The war was ugly, US soldiers whose prowess in battlefield fighting is unmatched in the world, had to face new obstacles by fighting guerilla warfare, as well as the confusion of seeing the blend of Vietcong and South Vietnamese citizens looking identical, which led to many villages burned down and the mass killings of civilians. Kind of reminds me of the war in Iraq and how the terrorists blends in to look like the regular citizen and use surprise to their advantage. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+16Good God, ya'll.
- CrimsonBlur, on 10/12/2007, -3/+14Nothing can undo what we did over there, but we definitely owe them something, and someone should have been held accountable for this. Hopefully, someday we will fairly compensate them somehow for what we did with those chemicals.
- Racerx52, on 10/12/2007, -4/+15In the years to come, we will be reading about countries in the middle east dealing with "The Horrific Legacy of Depleted Uranium".
While the United States government pays the veterans of the war on terror a paltry sum of money per month, those countries affected will receive no recognition or apology from the government, only left with dead and/or horribly deformed children. - fiver22, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11I live in New Brunswick, Canada where (at CFB Gagetown, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CFB_Gagetown ) Agent Orange was tested along with Agent Purple (see: http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/agentorange/ ). The people affected by this are still battling for recognition. There are many people fighting for compensation due to the effects of the spraying -mostly military, but also civilians.
It's a dark chapter in Canadian, and New Brunswick, history that we were accomplices to this form of chemical warfare.
The "party-line" is that we needed a way to clear training areas at CFB Gagetown -which may be true. But it could be argued (painful as it may be to fellow Canadians) that the Canadian government wanted to placate the American government because of our refusal to enter the Vietnam conflict.
Further reading about Agent Orange and it's use at CFB Gagetown:
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art33651.asp
http://archives.cbc.ca/IDC-1-71-1413-9130/conflict_war/vietnam/clip9 (video)
http://www.agentorangealert.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_Orange - jjcechva, on 10/12/2007, -2/+11This really isn't new information...
We ***** up obviously, lets not do it again in Iraq plz? - bigtoe416, on 10/12/2007, -5/+14Agent Orange: Brought to you by the same company that makes Round-Up weed killer and rBST growth hormone and terminator seeds.
Monsanto.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto#Criticism - japc, on 10/12/2007, -2/+11"Of course Canada doesn't commit atrocities"
it does! Brian Adams comes to mind. - tymaishu, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9What is even more horrifying is that this wasn't just sprayed on the forests. They were also sprayed on farmlands to get the rural population to move to cities where they could be controlled so they wouldn't join the communists. Over 1/3 of farmland in Vietnam was destroyed after the war
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12Is there any doubt why people in the third world hate America and wish to attack our country? It's not just the way we act in Iraq or Vietnam. It's the way we act in the Philippines, Guatemala, Congo, Palestine, Indonesia, Haiti, Grenada, Iran, Mexico, South Africa, Afghanistan, Nicaragua, and on and on and on. The chemical warfare we inflicted on Vietnam wasn't an aberration. Crap like that is what WE have to change.
Killing brown people is counter-productive. The way to stop terrorism is to become a better world citizen. The problem is us. - yubpro, on 10/12/2007, -3/+11also...
@ P4yn3...
Nixon and in fact Henry Kissinger had actually pulled up a peace agreement with North Vietnam. However when the agreement was brought to the South Vietnamese to sign, they refused. But before Nixon and Kissinger could put more effort into ending the conflict, the Watergate Scandal occurred.
Nixon wasn't so terrible a leader from present day's perspective, sure, he lied to the American people and stole some documents. But I think the Soviet ambassador Dobrynin had it right when he thought "how funny it was that such a powerful leader (Nixon) could fall from power over a few stolen papers..." - jimmiss, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9They tested this stuff on us Candians in the 70's in CFB Gagetown which is only about an hour from here. The news only came out last year. They also used a much more powerful Agent Purple as well. A whole pile of people realized why they all had cancer and other problems when the news broke. Apparently they weren't given any warning as to the danger, and some people where using it to wash their hands etc.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -11/+19Kennedy 'started' Vietnam in the same way Wilson 'started' WWI.
Dumbass. - wazzledoozle2, on 10/12/2007, -3/+11My dad's uncle was in Nam, he would walk through brush that had been sprayed with that agent orange *****. All these years later, he has testicular cancer, and had to get one removed. It's now coming back into the other =(
- TxDr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Oops, *Edit*
Kennedy was the major factor in US's Involvement in the War was what I meant to type, not starting the war. - CrazedChemist, on 10/12/2007, -5/+12@ addrake
Some soldiers complained about rashes/headaches and such when exposed to Agent Orange, but USA decided to ignore complaints and not even investigate the chemicals effects further, continuing to say the chemical is COMPLETELY safe. After a few years, it goes from "unintended side effects" to "ignored side effects". - drgmdp, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8@addrake
the US was the one selling those chemical weapons to saddam hussein, when iraq was a friend, during iraq/iran war...... read some history, please................... - jsdratm, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8My chemistry teacher had really bad shakes from agent orange. Poor guy :(
- gullevek, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Stunning Photos, really heartbreaking, shocking and make you think about all the war machinery. Those things are so easy forgotten. Really sad ...
- Kmack928, on 10/12/2007, -3/+9problem is, we are repeating it right now. uranium tipped weapons ftl
also, does anyone see the irony in saying we need to learn from and not repeat things that happened in vietnam, given our situation in iraq. (not trying to bring the debate to similarities/differences between iraq and nam, but still ) - bardamuclichy, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8Americans need to be VIGILANT. The excuse for doing things behind closed doors and covered by propaganda in the name of 'national security and patriotism' is a travesty. You don't defend freedom in foreign lands... you defend our freedom right here at home.
- yubpro, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7"Someday..."
Unfortunately, look back at all the things that have been put off for "someday" in history. For god sakes look at the first genocide of the 20th century, the Armenian Genocide. Even today it is being denied and the perpetrators were never brought to justice. Putting things like this off until "someday" nearly ensures that compensation will never be truly given. - sarazen, on 10/12/2007, -11/+16Agent Orange was not a chemical weapon, it was used as a defoliant to reduce the size and scope of the jungle. It wasn't until many years later when our own soldiers started to die of cancer that it's bad side effects became apparent.
Also, with all do respect to the people pictured, this article doesn't provide anything other than shocking pictures. Almost all of these defects occur to some degree naturally everywhere. This provides no information about an increase in rates of these deformities which would point to a more definable connection to agent orange. It rather states in the title that all these images are the defacto product of Agent Orange with absolutely no supporting evidence. Poor reporting. One can only presume that this was intended to produce outrage without much thought. - neo1513, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7As an American, intention or not, when it comes down to it, we ***** did it. Agent Orange isn't just a single generation mistake and should not be treated as one. No amount of reparations are enough to right our wrongs. Permanent genetic changes ruin the entire genealogy, and very slowly at that. No one can possibly pass this off as a consequence of war because it reaches far beyond a single conflict over a period of time.
- halcyon100, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I lost my father, a vietnam veteran, to non-hodgkins lymphoma, caused by exposure to agent orange. He was 59. When I was little, sometimes his legs would start to bleed without explanation. It was where his skin brushed against the defoliant. I haven't seen many people in so much pain. I don't think anyone will read this, but I had to say it. It's about 2.5 years since he's gone from us much too soon.
- Zaetha, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5"However, no Vietnamese have obtained compensation, and on March 10, 2005 Judge Jack Weinstein of Brooklyn Federal Court dismissed the lawsuit filed by the Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange against the chemical companies that produced the defoliants/herbicides."
From Judge's entry on Wikipedia: "Judge Weinstein was appointed in 1967 by President Lyndon Johnson."
Oh, that's a shocker... - falcooonpunch, on 10/12/2007, -11/+15Yowza. ***** chemical weapons.
- siska1, on 10/12/2007, -4/+8Some of the pictures coming out of Iraq and Afghanistan of deformed babies resulting from Depleted Uranium exposure (yes, from our government's bombs) are making those photos look tame
- nebel, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@bloodomen13
I also know all too well what it is like to have a family member with health issues due to Vietnam and exposure AO. Last month my uncle was given a 20% chance of living six months if he could get chemotherapy but due to an infection he will not get it. Last week the doctors gave him three weeks to live. - Futurejunior, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5There is no single person or group that is responsible, it is the culture we are forming in to that is to blame, digg is a prime example, where people get together and point out societies flaws and then move on in an instant to an article about spiders in some kids ear, if everyone who is sitting here on Digg actually did something when they say "someone should do something" or "who's responsible for this?" we would all be better off.
I'm not saying be a hero or anything, but be heard, write to your congressman or start a charity and do something! - japc, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_orange
- shinynew, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5@TxDr
yea its also funny how G.W. wants to mirror the success in Vietnam in Iraq. - stonebear, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7Celine Dion
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