
The mental and physical wounds that emanate from the Vietnam War run very deep for the American and Vietnamese generation that fought. Today, countless veterans who were sent to Southeast Asia still suffer from their experiences. “Between 1962 and 1971, the U.S. sprayed an estimated 20 million gallons of herbicides in Vietnam, eastern Laos, and parts of Cambodia, usually from helicopters or low-flying aircraft, but sometimes from backpacks, boats, and trucks. Agent Orange alone accounted for more than half of the total volume of herbicides deployed. One of its key ingredients, dioxin, is highly toxic even in tiny quantities. Operation Ranch Hand deployed about 375 pounds of dioxin over an area about the size of Massachusetts, contaminating the entire ecosystem and exposing millions of people — on both sides of the conflict — to horrifying long-term effects, including skin diseases and cancers among those exposed, and birth defects in their…
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