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Essay On Agent Orange In Vietnam

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The Vietnam war, one of the most devastating conflicts in U.S history. It had more than 55,000 American casualties, a lot of pain and suffering, and it also costed over $150 billion. Decades later it still brings pain and suffering to not only the Vietnamese but also to the families of the soldiers. These are the effects of agent orange. One of the most controversial decisions made in the war was to use chemicals to fight the enemy. The most broadly used chemical was called Agent Orange. Some people agreed with the use of Agent Orange. They saw it as a very viable weapon that needed to be used in order to keep the Communist from taking control of South Vietnam and subverting their democratic government. U.S. planes sprayed 11 million to 13 …show more content…

It had a massive environmental impact along with a huge impact on families there. Due to the persistence of the chemical dioxin, the Vietnamese living in the sprayed areas continue to inhale it and ingest it in their food. ¬According to BBC News, “there is still talk of evacuating contaminated areas a quarter of a century after the spraying stopped.” But, in 2007 President Bush pledged $3 million to help fix the contaminated …show more content…

The costs of today include medical care provided to the veterans from the VA hospital. According to History.com “In 1991, President George H.W. Bush signed into law the Agent Orange Act, which mandated that some diseases associated with defoliants be treated as the result of wartime service and helped codify the VA’s response to veterans with conditions related to their exposure to Agent Orange.” Another cost after the war was the settlement that was paid by seven chemical manufacturers for compensation to the veterans or their next of kins. This settlement went from $180 million in 1979 to $240 million in

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While it did kill any plant life exposed to it, Agent Orange also destroyed the lives of many

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(Source I). In addition, B-52 bombings and Napalm bomb use in Vietnam would have detrimental effects on Vietnam, which are still being felt today (Source G). America’s stronger military strength would also escalate the Vietnam War, leading to 58202 deaths (Source F). In addition, American backing of the detested Diem and his regime (Source K) is seen to have attributed to the unrest leading to the Vietnam War.

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During the War, “U.S. planes sprayed some 11 million to 13 million gallons of Agent Orange,” a chemical used to destroy forests in Vietnam (“Agent Orange”). At the time, the side effects of the toxin remained unknown, yet veterans questioned and suspected it caused a series of physical and mental illnesses. Air force veteran, Charlie Owens “attributed his cancer to the Agent Orange sprayed by his unit in Vietnam. When Owens died ‘His wife relayed these concerns to the VA… [who] rejected the notion that Owen’s cancer was related to herbicide use” (Scott 87).

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The Tet Offensive was one of the largest military campaigns in the Vietnam War launched by the Viet Cong and North Vietnam People’s Army which killed over five thousand American soldiers. How did the Tet Offensive influence American politics, society, and the overall development of the war in Vietnam? This question plagues many historians, politicians, soldiers, and veterans. The Tet Offensive influenced American politics by forcing politicians to take a stand one way or another on the viewpoint of the war, influencing American society by causing people to see the reality of war itself, and influencing the overall development of the war by showing that the enemy was not, in fact, about to collapse in defeat as the government had told the public for years.

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The Vietnam War was a gruesome trial of war that some people think should never have happened, but why do they think this? A large amount of evidence can back up the thought of the Vietnam War being unjustified. An example of this is Agent Orange, which is a generation's worth of disabilities and deformities caused by the unredeemable toxic chemicals dropped on the Vietnamese population. A second reason is that many people— including a large number of Americans — protested against the Vietnam War, because of the terror occurring. War drafts also were happening, which sent men (even if they did not want to) to fight in the war, which was yet again met with mass protests.

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The immediate effects of the war was that thousands of Americans died and the funding became increasingly costly as the war progressed. The long term effect was the destruction was widespread, and most of the agricultural land in Vietnam was destroyed. This lead to the formation of many protests including the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and Students for a Democratic Society. These groups supported that through the philosophical and religious ideals of nonviolence that peace would dominate war and

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In its initial years, the Vietnam War had huge amounts of help originating from US citizens. We thought that the war would not take long at all and would make new American Casualties. Their thoughts started to change once they understood that the legislature had sugar coated how "well" the war was going when in actuality, it wasn't looking good. Major offensive attacks were launched by the Viet Cong on major bases. It was a decision of good or bad for the administration, their decision was constantly awful.

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The Vietnam War was fought between the North and South Vietnamese over Communism. The North pushed for a communist regime while the South favored a more democratic government. During the time of this war, the U.S. was pushing towards containing Communism, and vowed to support any nation resisting communism. Although America’s policy of containment had good intentions, this often led to the support of corrupt leaders and governments. President Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam was Catholic and did not lead well.

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One of the most controversial wars in history and a turning point in American foreign policy, the emotions and events surrounding the Vietnam War capture the essence of the era. The rise of rebellious youth culture and anti-war and anti-draft movements were key social aspects of American life leading up to and during the fighting. (Doc 2, 3) On the political side, Congress aimed to control the Chief-Executive with legislation such as the War Powers Act of 1973, requiring the president to remove all unreported troops in Vietnam and report any further sent. (Doc 7) To say the country was divided would be a massive understatement.

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It was 1965 and the first U.S. troops were landing in South Vietnam, there were 3,500 U.S. Marines added to the already 25,000 advisers in the country. This war would define how we view life for decades and generations. Most people thought it was a mistaken war with no purpose other than to stop the flow of communism in Asia and the fear of others would follow, and add to the strength of the Soviet Union during the height of the cold war. Some people turned the war into a racist battle ground to justify the uprising and protest against the war. The troops were poorly armed and on average fought 240 days a year when compared to WW2 with only 40 days a year for infantrymen.

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With communism on the rise, America is forced to contain communism to stop the domino effect of communism from taking over. With communism taking over the united states is forced to join the war in Vietnam. This war was one of many, but controversy strikes this one hard. The Vietnam War was controversial for a variety of reasons. While the Vietnam War was originally supported due to the containment of communism and the domino effect it sparked controversy due to the credibility gap and the united states army draft.

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For those that witnessed these deaths, the mental effects were long-lasting. In the Vietnam War, approximately 388,000 tons of Napalm bombs were dropped between 1963 and 1973. This figure is nearly six times the amount of Napalm bombs that were used in both the Korean War and in Japan. While the use of Napalm bombs resulted in some of the most successful United States attacks during this war, it was one of the first occasions that Napalm was criticized on a large, public scale. While some media outlets hailed Napalm as the number one weapon of the war, Winston Churchill spoke out against its use.

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Vietnam War was the most controversial, divisive and one of the longest wars that was fought in the era of the Cold War, for 20 years from 1944 to 1973. The mass defoliation of the forest cover in South Vietnam to paralyze the Vietnamese of performing Guerrilla Warfare by the use of a toxic herbicide called Agent Orange, affecting the land and water resources and disrupting the forest and marine ecosystems. The toxic dioxin blends with a component, naturally present in every cell, the aryl-hydrocarbon receptor and enters the cellular nucleus as a hormone thereby rising through the food chains by bioaccumulation. The affected genes got transferred from one generation to another and brought about a positive death-rate in the war era. However,

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According to WorldAtlas.com, the use of these chemicals in the Vietnam War created the second worst chemical warfare event in history, second only to an event in 600 BCE. In an article stating the top 10 worst chemical warfare events in history World Atlas justifies the Vietnam War being the second worst with, “Agent Orange itself breaks down within a week, as a result producing a compound called dioxin. Dioxin lingers in some conditions for up to 100 years and is estimated by the Vietnamese government to have caused up to 400,000 deaths, and 1.5 million birth defects.” The backlash to the use of these chemicals was huge, and the U.S. government was the main target for supporting the production and use of these disliked weapons. After they were exposed for using these chemicals, even more people opposed the war and the US’ decisions.

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