If the 2004 presidential election proved anything, it’s that the controversial legacy of the Viet Nam War ain’t going away anytime soon. Well, maybe one lawsuit spawned by the conflict will finally be laid to rest.
A U.S. federal judge has ruled American chemical companies are not liable for damages caused by the spraying of Agent Orange during the Vietnam War.
Judge Jack Weinstein Thursday dismissed a lawsuit that accused the companies of committing war crimes by producing the highly toxic chemical.
The suit was filed on behalf of Vietnamese citizens who have blamed Agent Orange for health problems including cancer and birth defects.
U.S. forces sprayed some 80 million liters of the chemical during the war to kill jungle foliage that communist forces were using as cover.
Judge Weinstein said the plaintiffs’ claims have no basis under any national or international laws. He also said the plaintiffs had failed to prove a clear link between Agent Orange and their illnesses.
There was no immediate reaction from plaintiffs or the Vietnamese government.
So many aspects of that war against communist aggression, one of the key hot theaters of the Cold War, have long since become indelibly and unfairly cemented into the public mind — the tales of American atrocities, images of a summary execution or a naked child running in fear, the anguished stereotypical veteran, the phrase “We had to destroy the village in order to save it” (which I plan to blog about at a later date), and the lingering horrors of the defoliant Agent Orange.
What is the truth behind the actual health effects of exposure to Agent Orange? Well, despite today’s decision, the scientific jury is still out decades later. However, as the Mackenzie Institute noted in a paper on the controversy surrounding depleted uranium rounds, the evidence to date is not looking too good for those who continue to trumpet the evils of the defoliant.
Anyone remember Agent Orange?
Starting in 1969 and continuing through until the early 1990s, hundreds of Vietnam veterans blamed health problems, tumors and even psychological conditions on purported exposure to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War. The Agent Orange scare was strongly encouraged by the environmental lobby, the Peace Movement, and the Hanoi government. Fabricating or distorting evidence is quick and simple, while a truth that depends on scientific evidence can take a long time to show up. Naturally, as the scientists were dragging their heels, the media turned to the sensationalists and the Agent Orange Myth took on a life of its own.
Dioxin, the accused killer in Agent Orange can be dangerous and in large dosages is very lethal … to laboratory rats. Exposures humans receive are another matter. However, the thousands of Italians who were exposed to heavy doses of dioxin in a 1976 industrial accident did not develop excessive birth defects or reproductive failures. A 1984 Journal of the American Medical Association article on workers who had been exposed to a heavy dose of dioxins in a 1949 accident indicated these men did not have higher rates of cancer, heart or liver damage, nerve problems, kidney damage, reproductive problems or birth defects than was the average for men of their age group. They did have slightly higher rates of chloracne and digestive tract ulcers — both of which are quite treatable.
If any Vietnam Veterans had come down with problems related to Agent Orange, it would have been the high living “cowboys” of the Ranch Hand project — the US Airmen who actually sprayed the stuff. Flying at near-stall speeds about 50m above ground level, these servicemen took a lot of ground-fire. Indeed, one of their aircraft — known as “Patches” — is in the Air Force Museum in Dayton Ohio. Often, they ended up coated in Agent Orange when they sprayed it or had it sluicing around their ankles after being shot-up again. Moreover, at initiations for new members of their Squadron, both the newcomers and the older veterans would drink a glass of the defoliant.
Over 1,174 of the 1,206 veterans of this squadron have participated in a careful 20-year study of the results of their exposure to Agent Orange. Net result? The Ranch Hand group continues to have the same mortality rate as their control group of 1,293 similar men — and both have a lower mortality rate than the average American Male population. The only real difference in rates of those ailments associated with dioxin, despite massive exposure to Agent Orange, was that the Ranch Hand vets had a slightly higher tendency to display problems related to heavy drinking — something many of them engaged in as young servicemen on a nerve-wracking duty.
Otherwise, after $400 million in real research, the great Agent Orange scare turned out to be a bust. Real — verifiable and accurate — scientific research does not indict the material. However, it remains an article of faith among environmentalists and peace-movement members that the stuff is deadly. They believe and that is enough.
Too bad the verdict has already been rendered in the court of public opinion, but that’s true of so much about the Viet Nam War.