Speaker 1:

East winds one more over this land and these villages. A green freshness has returned to this mountain forests. No one arriving today would think a ruthless war raged here 30 years ago.

Speaker 1:

Our hero sacrifice will be engraved on our thoughts and feelings for generations to come.

Speaker 1:

The war stole the lives of millions. Millions more lost limbs. No one knows how many still suffer from wounds inflicted by bullets and bombs. The bodies of others may be in tact, yet Harbour wounds left by agent orange, who can describe that pain.

Speaker 1:

From 1961 until the end of 1971, the US Military sprayed 15 kinds of chemicals, totaling 72 million litres on the rural delta and mountains of South Vietnam. After 1965, Agent Orange was the major chemical used. Agent Orange contains Dioxin, an extremely toxic and stable chemical. No other known substance is as poisonous or as dangerous as Dioxin.

Speaker 2:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 1:

Misses Jonti Li is the former head of the Women's Union of Cam Lo.

Nguyen Thi Dung:

Two of the aeroplanes flew over head and sprayed me. I was soaking wet as if I had been cloud in a hidden rain.

Speaker 2:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Thi Dung:

I vomited black blood. It was terrifying.

Speaker 2:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Thi Dung:

My skin rose up in welts as if I had been burned in boiling water. They weren't burns, they well stung and itched. It felt like someone was lancing me with needles.

Speaker 2:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 4:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

In 1967 I went to the South in fought in Thai Binh, [inaudible 00:03:41], and [inaudible 00:03:42]. I was sprayed by Agent Orange three times.

Speaker 6:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

Two or three of the aeroplanes released poisonous chemicals that hung in the air like a yellow mist all morning.

Speaker 6:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

At the time we didn't know what this was. It turned out the air campaign would destroy our cover by spraying the [inaudible] in mountainous areas. The leaves dropped from the trees.

Speaker 5:

Then after the time, the planes dropped bombs. The forest burned.

Speaker 6:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

The spray destroyed our crops, standing in the fumes, leaving us with nothing to eat. Our drinking water was poisoned. We couldn't move to another area.

Hoang Binh Cau:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 13:

Professor Hoang Bing Cau is President of the 1080 Committee, which researches the effects of Dioxin. When Dioxin enters a human body, it damages the genes and immune system. The adverse effects on genes continues from generation to generation.

Speaker 4:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

I married in 1977 after the end of the war. In December 1977 my wife gave birth to [Zoan 00:05:13], who was abnormal from birth.

Speaker 4:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

She's so retarded, she has little awareness.

Speaker 4:

[Vietnamese]

Pham Thi Tuyen:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Thi Dung:

Anyone looking at our children will think she's healthy. She's usually sick every five or seven days. Sometimes she'll have convulsions three times or even five times in a day.

Pham Thi Tuyen:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

In March of 1981, my wife gave birth to this, our second child. She was also abnormal at birth. Her body was small, her head large.

Speaker 6:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

After demobilisation in late 1975, I married and had my first child in 1976. Her skin is very thin. When she was six months old pimples appeared all over her. After that, the pimples turned into splotches. Now the splotches have grown larger and thicker. They cover her body, even her skull.

Speaker 6:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Duy Dang:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

I was in the battle fields of [Vietnamese] and Cam Lo. But why it was a socially thing where afterwards, we returned home, married and had three children. Not one is healthy. My own health is weak.

Speaker 5:

After Red Cross doctors examined us, a number of times they wrote in their records that we had been poisoned by chemicals during the war.

Nguyen Duy Dang:

[Vietnamese]

Dinh Thi Mang:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Thi Dung:

This is my younger brother who was a solider at the front from 1968. He returned in apparent good health. But three years later became so seriously ill the he didn't know anything.

Nguyen Thi Dung:

When we took him to the hospital, the doctors said he had been contaminated by poisonous chemicals. The toxin also harmed his three children, not a one is normal.

Speaker 2:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Thi Dung:

I was sprayed by poisonous chemicals when I was three months pregnant with my daughter [Hian 00:07:51]. She's been demented from birth. It is not terminal dementia. Sometimes she knows things but then she immediately forgets. And then there are these growths like extra muscle emerging from inside her body.

Nguyen Thi Dung:

They continue to emerge and continue to emerge.

Speaker 2:

[Vietnamese]

Bang Van Minh:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

I fought along the banks of the Thai Cam River in Western [inaudible] Province. Where the Americans sprayed poisonous chemicals, killing all the vegetation.

Speaker 5:

After demobilisation I married and had two children. Both like this.

Bang Van Minh:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 13:

Dang Thi Wa, age 20 and Dang Thi We, age 18 are both blind and toothless. They can neither talk nor smile.

Speaker 13:

Mr. Lock was sprayed by chemicals while on the [Hochimane] train. He has since died, leaving his wife to care for four handicapped children and his elderly mother, age 80.

Speaker 13:

All three children of a Veteran in Bok Min began to have muscle contractions at age 14 or 15.

Speaker 13:

Misses Hin in Thai Ming Province gave birth to five children, all without eyes.

Speaker 13:

According to estimates made in 1995 by the Ministry of Labour, [inaudible] and social welfare, the number of Asian outage victims in our country is more than two million. More than half a million of these are children.

Speaker 13:

The toxic chemicals the American Military sprayed didn't distinguish between sides. Both sides were victims.

Lehuu Dong:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

During the war I was a soldier for the [inaudible] Army. In 1965 I was stationed in the [Ching Son 00:10:50] Mountains between Com Lo and Kua [inaudible 00:10:53]. I was sprayed by poisonous chemicals. After that I had two children, both handicapped.

Lehuu Dong:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 13:

After a third of a century, Agent Orange has moved into the third generation. To the grandchildren of the first victims. Who knows how long these after effects will continue. Will it be 50 years or 100? Or even longer?

Speaker 13:

During the 20th century, two cruel events of war were the Atomic War in Japan. And the chemical war in Vietnam.

Hoang Binh Cau:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

Dioxin didn't only harm Vietnamese. It also injured American soldiers. American Veterans suffer from its destructive after effects.

Speaker 5:

We have a clear example in the family of Admiral Sam Walt. Walt at the Spring of Agent Orange during the war. His son, an Attendant in the Navy was sprayed. Ten years later he died from cancer and his son is mentally and psychologically handicapped.

Speaker 5:

Admiral Sam Walt wrote this book, My Father, My Son, describing the illnesses of two successive generations. His sons and his grandsons. He gives us a poignant image of the destructive effect of Dioxin.

Hoang Binh Cau:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 13:

Individual American Veterans sued the manufacturers of Agent Orange and settled out of court for damages. American Veterans Associations are suing the United States Government over Agent Orange.

Speaker 13:

The Australian Government and the Korean Parliament have passed laws providing compensation for their Veterans who are victims of Dioxin during the Vietnam war.

Pham Van  Khai:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

I was sprayed with toxic chemicals in Thai Ming but haven't yet had any assistance.

Nguyen Duy Dang:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 5:

My family has difficulty now because my wife died leaving me with four children. But I have yet to receive any assistance.

Speaker 13:

When the war ended, the soldiers returned home. Married and had children, never thinking the worst aftermath would bring them such painful wounds. The families of those who died or lost a limb during the war have received financial assistance. But soldiers like these men sprayed by chemicals have yet to receive any help.

Pham Minh Tam:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 13:

Mr. Pham Ming Tam is Chair of the committee for the care and protection of children in Thai Ming Province.

Pham Minh Tam:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 17:

In Thia Ming we have 1,483 handicap children of soldiers who were sprayed by poisonous chemicals during the war. Most of these children face difficulties because they don't fit the requirements to children of fallen or wounded soldiers. That's the reason we've concentrated on these children.

Speaker 17:

Our committee has assisted 516 children with regular and intermittent handouts. It's a small step to solving their difficulties.

Pham Minh Tam:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 13:

In past years, the committee for the Care and Protection of Children has moved from national to local levels to assist tens of thousands of children who are victims of Agent Orange. Local authorities, charitable organisations, and local residents have helped with rice, money and medicine.

Speaker 13:

Assistance and compassion for near and far have been life savers for families suffering from the effects of Dioxin.

Speaker 13:

The Vietnam Fund for The Protection of Children has drafter a rehabilitation plan for handicapped children in Juan Chi, the Province of former South Vietnam bordering the demilitarised zone. A number of children there have been harmed by Agent Orange.

Speaker 13:

This first step has drawn upon the financial assistance of millions of individuals and 700 national and international organisations. Especially the Australian Christian Fund for Children.

Speaker 13:

Veterans wives who are mothers of handicapped children have borne hardships for years.

Speaker 18:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Thi Dung:

I've been pregnant 10 times, each time the foetus atrophied during the fifth or sixth month. And each time in the ninth month, doctors at the Provincial Hospital told me the foetus had died. The doctor said this was an after effect of the war. Til this day I haven't been able to give birth to a normal child.

Speaker 18:

[Vietnamese]

Speaker 13:

Misses Dung's husband, Veteran [inaudible] was sprayed by toxic chemicals during the war. Now he is blind. Even though he spins [inaudible] from morning to night, he makes less than seven cents a day. If the local leaders, neighbours and the editors of Labour Newspaper hadn't given help in time, they would have committed suicide.

Pham Thi Khanh:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Thi Dung:

Neighbours try to help the families beset by difficulties. But it can't do anything, it can only help now and then or a time the greatest need. But it can't tend their ordinary daily needs.

Nguyen Thi Dung:

These brothers and sisters get their health for our countries revolution, but now they live in a state beyond poverty. They have to bear these additional losses. The worst thing of all is that their children are damaged.

Speaker 2:

[Vietnamese]

Nguyen Thi Dung:

A child in such desperate need, yet she's lucky to have a father and a mother. But after we are gone, who will take care of her? No mother can ever forget the needs of such child. The mother will eventually die, but she can never close her eyes.

Speaker 13:

The war has slipped away into the past. However, its ongoing horrors and their painful repercussions continue to hunt.