Vietnamese Agent Orange Victims Remain Uncompensated. Tlaib Aims to Change That.

Right now marks 50 years because the finish of the U.S. Warfare in Vietnam, which killed an estimated 3.3 million Vietnamese folks, tons of of hundreds of Cambodians, tens of hundreds of Laotians and greater than 58,000 U.S. service members. However for a lot of Vietnamese, Laotian and Cambodian folks; Vietnamese People; and U.S. Vietnam veterans and their descendants, the impacts of the battle by no means ended. They proceed to endure the devastating penalties of Agent Orange, an herbicide combination utilized by the U.S. army that contained dioxin, the deadliest chemical recognized to humankind.

The US used Agent Orange as a weapon of battle. From 1961-1971, the U.S. army sprayed toxins that contained giant portions of dioxin in an effort to destroy meals provides and enhance visibility for the U.S. army by killing broad swathes of vegetation all through southern Vietnam. In consequence, many individuals have been born with congenital anomalies within the formation of the spinal twine, limbs, coronary heart, palate, and extra. This stays the most important deployment of herbicidal warfare in historical past.

Within the 1973 Paris Peace Accords, the Nixon administration promised to contribute $3 billion for compensation and postwar reconstruction of Vietnam. However that promise stays unfulfilled. Though the U.S. has funded the cleanup of two of the most important dioxin-contaminated “hotspots” and there was some remuneration for U.S. veterans, there was none for the Vietnamese folks, the supposed victims of the lethal spraying.

Legislative Package deal Gives Compensation for Vietnamese and U.S. Veteran Victims

To be able to obtain justice for Agent Orange victims, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan) launched a legislative bundle on April 28. The Agent Orange Relief Act of 2025 supplies for medical care and associated help for Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange; supplies extra environmental remediation for hotspots; and orders a well being evaluation and help to affected Vietnamese American communities.

Tlaib additionally launched The Victims of Agent Orange Act of 2025, which supplies advantages for youngsters of male U.S. veterans who served in Vietnam affected by congenital anomalies; these youngsters are unprotected by present regulation, which solely covers congenital anomalies for youngsters of ladies veterans. The invoice additionally helps larger analysis into Agent Orange-related well being points and directs a well being evaluation and provision of help for affected Vietnamese American communities.

“Collectively, these two payments function an act of restore for the profound harms attributable to the US’ use of Agent Orange and different herbicides. Agent Orange publicity continues to negatively have an effect on the lives of American veterans, Vietnamese folks, Vietnamese People, and their youngsters,” Tlaib acknowledged in a press release. “The lives of many victims are minimize brief, and others stay with illness, disabilities, and ache, which are sometimes untreated or unrecognized. As we mark 50 years after the US’ withdrawal from Vietnam, it’s time to meet our ethical and authorized obligations to heal the injuries inflicted by these atrocities.”

The legislative bundle is co-sponsored by Representatives André Carson (D-Indiana), Sarah McBride (D-Delaware), Jerry Nadler (D-New York), Lateefah Simon (D-California) and Shri Thanedar (D-Michigan). The payments are endorsed by the Quincy Institute, Veterans For Peace, Vietnam Agent Orange Aid & Accountability Marketing campaign (VAORRC), CommonDefense.us, Minnesota Peace Mission and Motion Corps.

Tlaib informed Truthout, “For there to be any justice for the battle crimes dedicated in Vietnam, the US should dedicate itself to restore: by cleansing these ongoing Agent Orange contamination websites, investing within the medical care of these affected, and eradicating unexploded ordnance.”

VAORRC, for which I function co-coordinator, assisted Tlaib in drafting the payments. Within the congresswoman’s press release, Susan Schnall and Ngo Thanh Nhan, additionally co-coordinators of VAORRC, thanked Tlaib for introducing this essential laws.

Schnall, president of Veterans For Peace, stated:

The US authorities used Agent Orange as an instrument of battle from 1961-1971 on Vietnam, its folks, and American troopers on the bottom. As we commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the tip of the battle in Vietnam, we have fun these two items of laws that promote therapeutic for the American folks and the Vietnamese folks harmed, and cleanup of the contaminated land in Vietnam.

Ngo acknowledged: “The Southeast Asian communities have victims of Agent Orange and had been invisible to the general public to this point. These are essential acts for our communities within the U.S. to assist and it takes nice braveness for Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib to indicate this instance of solidarity.”

Between 2,100,000 and 4,800,000 Vietnamese, Lao and Cambodian folks, and tens of hundreds of People had been uncovered to Agent Orange/dioxin throughout the spraying operations. Many different Vietnamese folks had been or proceed to be uncovered to Agent Orange/dioxin via contact with the atmosphere and meals that was contaminated. Many offspring of those that had been uncovered have congenital anomalies, developmental disabilities, and different illnesses. Second, third and fourth technology victims proceed to endure.

The Division of Veterans Affairs acknowledges 19 illnesses and sicknesses to be related to the spraying and use of Agent Orange by the U.S. army in Vietnam. They embrace AL Amyloidosis, bladder most cancers, persistent B-cell leukemia, chloracne, sort 2 diabetes mellitus, hypertension (hypertension), Hodgkin’s illness, hypothyroidism, ischemic coronary heart illness, monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS), a number of myeloma, Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma, Parkinson’s illness, Parkinsonism, acute and sub-acute peripheral neuropathy, porphyria cutanea tarda, prostate most cancers, respiratory cancers and soft-tissue sarcomas.

Testimony of Agent Orange Victims

In 2009, I served as one in every of seven judges from three continents on the International Peoples’ Tribunal of Conscience in Support of the Vietnamese Victims of Agent Orange in Paris. The panel heard two days of testimony from 27 witnesses, together with Vietnamese and U.S. veteran victims, journalists and scientists. Some had seen disabilities as a consequence of their publicity to Agent Orange/dioxin.

Mai Giang Vu, who was uncovered to Agent Orange whereas serving within the Military of South Vietnam, carried barrels of the chemical compounds within the jungle. His sons had been unable to stroll or perform usually. Their limbs “curled up” and so they might solely crawl. By the age of 18, they had been bedridden. One died at age 23, the opposite at 25.

Nga Tran is a French Vietnamese lady who labored in Vietnam as a battle correspondent. She was there when the U.S. army started spraying chemical defoliants and a big cloud of the agent enveloped her. Shortly after her daughter was born, the kid’s pores and skin started shedding. She couldn’t tolerate bodily contact with anybody. The kid by no means grew. She remained 6.6 kilos – her delivery weight – till she died at age 17 months. Tran’s second daughter suffers from alpha thalassemia, a genetic blood dysfunction hardly ever seen in Asia. Tran noticed a girl who gave delivery to a “ball” with no human kind. Many youngsters are born with out brains; others make inhuman sounds. There are victims who’ve by no means stood up. They creep and barely carry their heads.

Rosemarie Hohn Mizo is the widow of George Mizo who served within the U.S. Military in Vietnam. After refusing to serve a 3rd tour, Mizo was court-martialed, obtained a dishonorable discharge and spent two-and-a-half years in jail. Earlier than his loss of life from Agent Orange-related maladies, Mizo helped discovered the Friendship Village the place Vietnamese victims stay in a supportive atmosphere.

Jeanne Stellman, who wrote the seminal Agent Orange article in Nature, testified that “That is the most important unstudied [unnatural] environmental catastrophe on the planet.”

Though a Biometrics examine from 1965 confirmed that dioxin induced many congenital anomalies in animal experiments, the U.S. army suppressed these findings. The outcomes of the examine had been leaked in 1969 however the spraying of Agent Orange continued till 1971.

The tribunal discovered that “The damages induced to the land and forests, water provide, and communities and the ecosystems can legitimately be known as an ecocide, because the forests and jungles in giant elements of southern Vietnam have been devastated and denuded, and will both by no means develop again or take 50 to 200 years to regenerate.”

The Unfulfilled U.S. Promise

In 2004, U.S. veteran and Vietnamese victims sued the chemical corporations that knowingly manufactured Agent Orange and different herbicides, which they knew contained a deadly quantity of dioxin. The victims had been prohibited from suing the U.S. authorities due to sovereign immunity. Regardless of agreeing to compensate U.S. veterans in an earlier lawsuit for some sicknesses attributable to their publicity to Agent Orange and different herbicides, the U.S. authorities and the chemical corporations claimed earlier than the courts, and to today, that no proof helps a connection between publicity and illness.

Efforts by veterans’ teams and others to handle U.S. vets produced a compensation scheme administered by the Veterans Administration. It yearly pays out billions of {dollars} to veterans who can show that they had been in a contaminated a part of Vietnam and have an sickness related to Agent Orange publicity.

Shamefully, the Vietnamese individuals who had been uncovered to Agent Orange on a scale exceptional in trendy warfare have been denied recompense.

After the 2009 Paris tribunal, whereas I used to be president of the Nationwide Attorneys Guild, I participated in a delegation to Vietnam to current our findings to President Nguyen Minh Triet. I informed him I used to be baffled that at the same time as U.S. bombs had been falling on the Vietnamese folks, they made a distinction between the U.S. authorities and the American folks. The president responded, “We fought the forces of aggression, however we all the time reserved our love for the folks of America … as a result of we knew they all the time supported us.” He was referring to the highly effective U.S. antiwar motion wherein I used to be a proud participant.

The US and Vietnam normalized relations 30 years in the past following a 19-year commerce embargo on the latter. “It’s taken a long time to construct the present degree of mutual belief and cooperation between the US and Vietnam,” George Black, writer of The Lengthy Reckoning, an examination of U.S.-Vietnam relations because the battle, told The New York Instances. “And the entire course of has been underpinned by our willingness to take care of the worst humanitarian legacies.”

However Donald Trump has began a brand new battle on Vietnam, a tariff battle, imposing a 46 p.c tariff fee (briefly on maintain as the 2 international locations “negotiate”). The U.S. and Vietnam conduct $160 billion in annual commerce. And whereas the Vietnamese folks commemorate 50 years because the finish of the American battle of their nation, the Trump administration has ordered its senior diplomats in Vietnam to keep away from participation within the commemoration occasions.

Simply compensation for victims of Agent Orange is an ethical crucial. Individuals who assist Tlaib’s laws ought to contact their congressional representatives and urge them to signal on as extra co-sponsors.