Sterling Hall Bombing 50th Anniversary Marked in Madison

Updated - Madison, Wisconsin — The 50th anniversary of the Sterling Hall bombing is being marked with wide commentary, (WMTV, UW-Madison News, On Wisconsin, WKOW, Isthmus, Wisconsin State Journal).

Anti-war protesters set off a bomb at 3:42 A.M., May 24, 1970 in a bid to destroy the Army Math Research Center housed in Sterling Hall. They wanted to highlight the American invasion of southeast Asia, state repression and operations of the Vietnam War machine at home.

The intent was to bomb an empty building, but one man was killed, others were injured.

Few here believe the bombing was not tragic, a life was inadvertently taken.

Most, it seems, also understand the state and the police are the worst purveyors of violence domestically, and that the Vietnam War was a crime against humanity. 

Vietnam veterans often say the same thing: The war was a slaughter supported by lies.

In Madison, the presence of the Army-Math Center was not a slow burn leading to an August 24, 1970 crescendo, just a constant reminder of how deeply state violence is embedded throughout society.

Writes James Huberty in UW-Madison Campus Voices today:

It was obvious to me that something was going to happen [to the Army-Math Center] because this is, I mean, where could it go? It wasn’t going anywhere, it wasn’t getting less tense or less violent or less anything. It was getting more and more and more. You know, somebody is going to do something. There was stuff being said, you know. I mean, I didn’t personally hear anything at all from anybody, but it was just that sense of, you know, it’s, you know, it’s going to happen. Something’s going to happen.

One of the four men responsible for the bombing, Leo Burt, is still at large, which is to say he has escaped state violence that some characterize as being brought to justice.

Leo Burt

Burt was a crew member at UW-Madison. 

The Rowing News ran a piece this Summer, quoting a teammate of Burt's who said, "The Leo we used to know was not the Leo who committed this crime. The war changed him tragically."

Actually, Leo Burt remained outgoing and friendly, according to Don Kosterman, a friend of Burt's. Caricatures about mad Sterling Hall bombers seem off the mark.

Kosterman, a professional photographer and retired journalist in Dane County, attended UW-Madison from 1968-1970, later obtaining a Master's in Journalism degree on police repression of Kaleidoscope, an underground newspaper. [Kaleidoscope: An underground newspaper and the law. Kosterman, Donald John (1975)]

Kosterman met Burt when they were classmates in a Photo Journalism class, and the two with other students enjoyed "close" friendships, taking a trip together to Racine as part of the Journalism School class, attending several anti-war rallies and marches, among other typical pursuits of college life.

Kosterman came home from Vietnam after two years with the Army in the mid-1960s, and transferred from UW-Milwuakee to UW-Madison.

"I was very good friends with Leo," Kosterman recalled in an interview in Fitchburg.

Kosterman recalled 1968 when the two were drinking beers at Memorial Union when a third party happened by and spoke furtively with Burt.

Moments later, Kosterman and Burt were introduced to two Weathermen fleeing Chicago after the 1968 Democratic National Convention, looking for a community to "get lost in."

Kosterman and Burt shared love interests, academic work and a general ethical sense that good works were demanded of individuals.

Asked what Burt was like, "kind-hearted," Kosterman replied without hesitation

"Oh, absolutely. Leo was a just a regular Catholic kid from Pennsylvania. He felt strongly about things," recalled Kosterman. "Put it this way, not knowing what was going to happen, Leo and I hit it off really well. Out of the whole class, he was the guy that I become friends with. It wasn't the fact that we hung around the same girlfriend."

During the Summer of 1970 in the weeks before the Sterling Hall bombing, Kosterman recalled walking out of the Journalism class, down the Henry Mall, and hearing a voice from an alley where a van was parked.

"Hey, Don, you going to the demonstration?" shouted Leo Burt from the passenger seat of the van.

"Oh, yeah. How about you," replied Kosterman.

"I'll be there," said Burt laughing, and he dangled his gas mask outside the window.

An anti-war rally on the UW-Madison campus in 1970 was planned; attendance was casually contemplated between freinds. 

Within weeks Burt and others struck at what they believed was an immoral enterprise in an act that 50 years later defies easy explanation and clear meaning.

The legacy of the Peace Movement continues. 

Wide skepticism of the type Kosterman and Burt shared towards military and police units dehumanizing populations as targets has kept a lunatic in the White House from starting wars to this point.

Domestic police remain militarized against populations raising concerns and hopes that something is going to happen, and state violence has to stop now.

That something may be a September-October surprise intended to show Trump commanding a killing machine. 

However, thanks to the modern peace movement, such crimes may not result in a beneficial electoral result for the perpetrators.

This seems an important legacy of the war at home, and recognizing history and debating it will continue to inform the American experiment.
--
The underground newspaper, Kaleidoscope, ran an exclusive statement from the New Year's Gang on the bombing some one week after the Aug 24, 1970 bombing in its Aug 31 - Sept 6 edition, (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Libraries).

Kaleidoscope cover is below:

Wisconsin Vietnam Vet Recalls Roger Staubach, Medal of Freedom Recipient

Roger Staubach - Heisman Trophy winner, Navy officer,
NFL Hall-of-Fame quarterback, and 2018 Presidential
Medal of Freedom honoree.

Madison, Wisconsin — President Donald Trump bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom to seven Americans today in the East Room of the White House, (White House).

The recipients include NFL Hall-of-Fame quarterback, Roger Staubach.

Staubach is a Heisman Trophy winner (1963), Super Bowl champ and brilliant and resilient quarterback who never gave up on a play, earning him the moniker, 'Roger the Dodger'.

What is perhaps less known is Staubach's patriotism and humanism.

After winning the Heisman Trophy in 1963 as a college junior, Staubach served four years in active-duty service in the Navy, including a year in Vietnam, before beginning his NFL career.

During Staubach's tour in Vietnam, Don Kosterman, a Vietnam Army veteran and retired journalist living in Dane County (Wisconsin), met Staubach at Chu Lai Base Area in 1965.

Kosterman served as a commanding Army officer at the sprawling complex and recalled a long conversation with Staubach at which the Navy man's character became apparent, four years before Staubach returned to civilian life for which he was recognized today.

"I saw this guy tossing some passes to some really good receivers, and someone told me he was Roger Staubach," said Kosterman, serving as an officer in the area. "Later on I was talking to Staubach, and what I remember before talking with Staubach was that he looked very upset. It was visible, something was obviously wrong."

Kosterman said, "Staubach said he had lost some men to enemy mortar fire, and I could tell he was really broken-up by it. He was Roger Staubach, and he was a guy dealing with some bad loss, and that is what more than anything sticks out — the guy really cared about his men."

Guys in a unit getting killed is something that never leaves, veterans will volunteer if you are privileged to win their trust.

In 2016, Staubach said to ESPN writer, Todd Archer: "I appreciated people cared about me and said, 'I’m a big fan of yours.' I’m really appreciative of that because we had some good teams. But I don’t think that’s quite the same feeling that you have as a veteran when somebody comes up and says, 'We appreciate your dedication to our country.'"

Roger Staubach received the Presidential Medal of Freedom today, the nation’s highest civilian commendation, (New York Times).

Don Kosterman will tell you Roger Staubach as a Navy officer was already a man of mettle and exceptional courage back in 1965.

Vietnam Force Recon Vet Works for Peace on 50th Anniv of Agent Orange Use

We want peace; pass H.R. 2634

Vietnam War veteran Chuck Palazzo (1970-1971) has a lot of friends.

To a man, they love the guy. Ask Wisconsinite, Lem Genovese, sometime if you have an interest in history.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of a deadly obscenity that continues to kill and maim—Agent Orange.

Palazzo works as a man of peace now in Da Nang, putting his heart into healing and bringing attention to the horror that is still inflicted on newborn babies today 50 years later. [I'll spare you the pictures.]

In the United States there is currently a bill in Congress, H.R. 2634 [2011]—seeking broad and long delayed remedial action on behalf of all Vietnam-era victims of Agent Orange—a bill a country that cares for liberty and humanity would pass in an instant.

Palazzo works for relief from Vietnam.

I really don't know what drives Palazzo today; what demons he faces; what love he lives. Nor, will I ever understand [or ask] what he went through in the Vietnam War.

Chuck Palazzo

But we regard each other as friends, and I salute him today. It's nice to have genuine warriors for peace as friends.

By Chuck Palazzo

Dear Friends,

Fifty years ago today, the U.S. started what would become one of the most devastating military campaigns in history – the spraying of Agent Orange. On August 10th, 1961, and for 10 years thereafter, the United States sprayed this deadly poison on over 20% of the southern part of Vietnam. The result of what would soon become known as a senseless crime against humanity, affected civilians and military personnel on both sides of the Vietnam War. The effect through the years has resulted in the death and disease of over 4.8 million Vietnamese. Today, 50 years later, the genetic consequence of Agent Orange continues to kill and maim a fourth generation of victims. The toxic and destructive ecological effect remains throughout Vietnam and continues affecting the citizens of Vietnam, poisoning their food chain and causing multiple illnesses and birth defects.

I had the privilege of participating in The Second International Conference of Victims of Agent Orange/dioxin, which was held in Hanoi from August 8th to 9th, 2011. It included Agent Orange victims, victims of other toxic chemicals, scientists, lawyers and social activists from 19 countries. As an international delegate, I was also privileged to have an opportunity to affirm what the Conference developed as an International Appeal. I signed my name, not only in solidarity, but as a confirmation to the entire world that the victims of Agent Orange must be recognized by the manufacturers of this poison as well as the U.S. Government – and to provide comprehensive and meaningful assistance to the victims of Agent Orange and their families in Vietnam in a more practical and effective manner.

I ask each of you to please read and distribute the appeal which follows below. The Agent Orange problem is very real. Its victims continue to suffer. Please join with us and demand that action is finally taken. 50 years is far too long.

Thank you.

Chuck Palazzo
- Marine Combat Veteran, served with 1st and 3rd FORCERECON RVN 1970-1971. Currently living, writing and working in Da Nang, Vietnam as an Agent Orange and Unexploded Ordinance activist and researcher

APPEAL of the Second International Conference of Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin

Hanoi, Socialist Republic of Vietnam, 9th August, 2011

The Second International Conference of Victims of Agent Orange/dioxin, held in Hanoi from August 8th to 9th, 2011 included participants from around the world: Agent Orange victims, victims of other toxic chemicals, scientists, lawyers and social activists. The conference is a significant and important historic event, marking the 50th anniversary of the first spraying of the toxic chemical Agent Orange (1961-1971) by the U.S. forces in Vietnam and Indochina.

The delegates to the Conference agree that:

During the Vietnam War, from 1961 to 1971, U.S. forces through Operation Ranch Hand sprayed nearly 80 million liters of herbicides over South Vietnam, of which 61% was Agent Orange containing at least 366kg of dioxin, the most toxic substance known to science.

Since the First International Conference of Victims of Agent Orange in 2006, there has been greater public understanding and awareness of the dangers of Agent Orange/dioxin to humans and to the environment. More diseases have been officially recognized as being due to exposure to Agent Orange. Along with the Vietnamese people, many others around the world have become victims of this toxic weapon of mass destruction. Soldiers in the U.S., South Korea, Australia and New Zealand were exposed during the time they fought in Vietnam, and now their children and grandchildren are suffering as well. People in the U.S., Canada, South Korea, Puerto Rico, Australia, New Zealand and other areas were exposed because they lived near or worked in areas where the U.S. forces stored, buried, manufactured, tested or experimented with Agent Orange as part of their war in Vietnam.

Because of dioxin related damage to their endocrine, immune and reproductive systems, victims of Agent Orange suffer from multiple health conditions, some of which are quickly lethal and others which doom people to a life of horrific misery. Due to these diseases, many have been denied the most basic of human rights – especially the right to life, and the pursuit of happiness. Because of their inability to work and bearing the costs of medical treatment, most victims of Agent Orange everywhere are very poor. However, because Agent Orange was intentionally directed against the Vietnamese people, they are subject to the most onerous conditions. 4.8 million Vietnamese people directly sprayed repeatedly over extended periods of time were subject to multiple sources of exposure. The proportion of old people, women and children, who are especially susceptible to dioxin, is particularly high in Vietnam. In Vietnam, an enormous number of children continue to be born with Agent Orange-related birth defects. Now, a fourth generation of Agent Orange victims is being born. Because of this danger, in effect many women have been denied the human right to bear children. Agent Orange not only harmed human beings and devastated the environment of Vietnam during the war but also continued its devastation after the war. Dioxin dumped in the soil continues to damage the environment and sicken the people in and around several “hot spots.” Causing deforestation of nearly 3 million hectares of land, during the war, especially in coastal areas, Agent Orange has damaged not only the environment in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia but also the regional environment. It has and continues to have severe consequences for people in many areas of the world.

The use of Agent Orange in the war in Vietnam is a war crime and a crime against humanity Its consequences are passed from generation to generation. It challenges us to end, once and for all, the use of chemical weapons and any weapons of mass destruction anywhere today.

Humanity’s concern about the effects of chemical warfare, the threat of accidents at chemical manufacturing plants and the looming environmental disaster due biochemical engineering is increasing. The agony of those exposed to Agent Orange is central to this consciousness and international solidarity with Agent Orange victims’ struggle for justice is growing.

CALL TO ACTION

Therefore, the Delegates to the Conference hereby call upon:

1) Solidarity

All victims of Agent Orange, whatever their nationality or circumstances of exposure, should unite more closely and earnestly to act for our common interests. Further, to demonstrate our solidarity with victims of other weapons of mass destruction such as the atomic bomb and depleted uranium, ,All the victims and their supporters should work together in unity and coordinate actions. Only together, can we be effective, powerful and successful in achieving justice!

2) Organize

We ask all of humanity, all governments, organizations and individuals, whatever their social or political position, to take immediate action to support all victims of Agent Orange, with particular emphasis on those in Vietnam. In every country, and in every region, we should set up organizations and develop specific programs for mobilizing material resources in whatever form and for making our voices heard in all available forums in support of the struggle of the Vietnamese Agent Orange victims for justice.

3) Study and Remediate

Scientists, public health and environmental experts, especially from the United States, should focus on studying the specific health and environmental dangers of Agent Orange/dioxin and possibilities for remediation. This is very urgent in order to help victims whose time is running out, and in order to avoid similar disasters for future generations.

4) U.N. Ban on Weapons and War Crimes

The world community in general, the United Nations and each government in particular should rapidly promulgate new measures to more effectively prevent all acts in violation of international laws prohibiting war crimes and crimes against humanity.

5) U.S. Government and Chemical Manufacturers to Accept Responsibility

The U.S. government and chemical manufacturers of Agent Orange, particularly Monsanto and Dow Chemical should accept their responsibility and engage in greater and fuller efforts to work with the Vietnamese people and government to clean up the existing 'hot spots,' and to provide comprehensive and meaningful assistance to the victims of Agent Orange and their families in Vietnam in a more practical and effective manner. Because little of the monies appropriated by the U.S. Congress has actually reached the victims, funds intended for the victims should be given to Vietnamese NGOs like VAVA so that they actually go to those who need assistance most. The need for hospitals, clinics and respite homes for the victims and their parents, is overwhelming – many of the victims require 24 hour care and their elderly parents who are doing the caring also need help.

6) Disclose Locations of Agent Orange Sites

The U.S. government and all governments that have allowed the use of Agent Orange for any purpose during the Vietnam war years, should publicly disclose all the locations where Agent Orange was used, buried or dumped.

7) Partner with VAVA

The Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange/dioxin is the legal and moral representative of Vietnam’s Agent Orange victims and acts as a non-governmental organization representing the interests of these victims throughout Vietnam. To hear their voices and to help Vietnamese victims effectively and specifically, people of good will and compassion should partner with VAVA and assist it programatically and materially, contacting VAVA through its website.

NOW, fifty years since the first use of Agent Orange in Vietnam, the delegates of the conference declare again that the needs of the victims are urgent, requiring immediate action! Half a century is too long to wait for justice!

We pledge to work together to make sure that justice delayed will no longer be justice denied!

Martin Luther King, Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam

"Now, I've chosen to preach about the war in Vietnam because I agree with Dante, that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality. There comes a time when silence becomes betrayal," said Dr. King.

Sermon was delivered at the Ebenezer Baptist Church on April 30, 1967. Less than a year later, Dr. King was assassinated.

Many Americans today believe King's resistance against the Vietnam War led to his assassination by forces who were vested in war, and who opposed his message of peace. I can't attempt to evaluate such claims; but the fact that killing a man of peace is a thought that can be entertained tells us something by the greatest purveyor of violence in the world.

The sermon which I am preaching this morning in a sense is not the usual kind of sermon, but it is a sermon and an important subject, nevertheless, because the issue that I will be discussing today is one of the most controversial issues confronting our nation. I'm using as a subject from which to preach, "Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam."

Now, let me make it clear in the beginning, that I see this war as an unjust, evil, and futile war. I preach to you today on the war in Vietnam because my conscience leaves me with no other choice. The time has come for America to hear the truth about this tragic war. In international conflicts, the truth is hard to come by because most nations are deceived about themselves. Rationalizations and the incessant search for scapegoats are the psychological cataracts that blind us to our sins. But the day has passed for superficial patriotism. He who lives with untruth lives in spiritual slavery. Freedom is still the bonus we receive for knowing the truth. "Ye shall know the truth," says Jesus, "and the truth shall set you free." Now, I've chosen to preach about the war in Vietnam because I agree with Dante, that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality. There comes a time when silence becomes betrayal.

The truth of these words is beyond doubt, but the mission to which they call us is a most difficult one. Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government's policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world. Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexing, as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict, we're always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty. But we must move on. Some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony. But we must speak. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak. And we must rejoice as well, for in all our history there has never been such a monumental dissent during a war, by the American people.

Polls reveal that almost fifteen million Americans explicitly oppose the war in Vietnam. Additional millions cannot bring themselves around to support it. And even those millions who do support the war [are] half-hearted, confused, and doubt-ridden. This reveals that millions have chosen to move beyond the prophesying of smooth patriotism, to the high grounds of firm dissent, based upon the mandates of conscience and the reading of history. Now, of course, one of the difficulties in speaking out today grows the fact that there are those who are seeking to equate dissent with disloyalty. It's a dark day in our nation when high-level authorities will seek to use every method to silence dissent. But something is happening, and people are not going to be silenced. The truth must be told, and I say that those who are seeking to make it appear that anyone who opposes the war in Vietnam is a fool or a traitor or an enemy of our soldiers is a person that has taken a stand against the best in our tradition.

Yes, we must stand, and we must speak. [tape skip]...have moved to break the betrayal of my own silences and to speak from the burnings of my own heart, as I have called for radical departures from the destruction of Vietnam. Many persons have questioned me about the wisdom of my path. At the heart of their concerns, this query has often loomed large and loud: "Why are you speaking about the war, Dr. King? Why are you joining the voices of dissent?" Peace and civil rights don't mix, they say. And so this morning, I speak to you on this issue, because I am determined to take the Gospel seriously. And I come this morning to my pulpit to make a passionate plea to my beloved nation.

This sermon is not addressed to Hanoi, or to the National Liberation Front. It is not addressed to China or to Russia. Nor is it an attempt to overlook the ambiguity of the total situation and the need for a collective solution to the tragedy of Vietnam. Nor is it an attempt to make North Vietnam or the National Liberation Front paragons of virtue, nor to overlook the role they must play in a successful resolution of the problem. This morning, however, I wish not to speak with Hanoi and the National Liberation Front, but rather to my fellow Americans, who bear the greatest responsibility, and entered a conflict that has exacted a heavy price on both continents.

Now, since I am a preacher by calling, I suppose it is not surprising that I have seven major reasons for bringing Vietnam into the field of my moral vision. There is...a very obvious and almost facile connection between the war in Vietnam and the struggle I and others have been waging in America. A few years ago there was a shining moment in that struggle. It seemed that there was a real promise of hope for the poor, both black and white, through the Poverty Program. There were experiments, hopes, and new beginnings. Then came the build-up in Vietnam. And I watched the program broken as if it was some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war. And I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money, like some demonic, destructive suction tube. And you may not know it, my friends, but it is estimated that we spend $500,000 to kill each enemy soldier, while we spend only fifty-three dollars for each person classified as poor, and much of that fifty-three dollars goes for salaries to people that are not poor. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor, and attack it as such.

Perhaps the more tragic recognition of reality took place when it became clear to me that the war was doing far more than devastating the hope of the poor at home. It was sending their sons, and their brothers, and their husbands to fight and die in extraordinarily high proportion relative to the rest of the population. We were taking the black young men who had been crippled by society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in Southwest Georgia and East Harlem. So we have been repeatedly faced with a cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same school room. So we watch them in brutal solidarity, burning the huts of a poor village. But we realize that they would hardly live on the same block in Chicago or Atlanta. Now, I could not be silent in the face of such cruel manipulation of the poor.

My third reason moves to an even deeper level of awareness, for it grows out of my experience in the ghettos of the North over the last three years--especially the last three summers. As I have walked among the desperate, rejected, and angry young men, I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems. I have tried to offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that social change comes most meaningfully through non-violent action; for they ask and write me, "So what about Vietnam?" They ask if our nation wasn't using massive doses of violence to solve its problems to bring about the changes it wanted. Their questions hit home, and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without first having spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today: my own government. For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence I cannot be silent. Been a lot of applauding over the last few years. They applauded our total movement; they've applauded me. America and most of its newspapers applauded me in Montgomery. And I stood before thousands of Negroes getting ready to riot when my home was bombed and said, we can't do it this way. They applauded us in the sit-in movement--we non-violently decided to sit in at lunch counters. The applauded us on the Freedom Rides when we accepted blows without retaliation. They praised us in Albany and Birmingham and Selma, Alabama. Oh, the press was so noble in its applause, and so noble in its praise when I was saying, Be non-violent toward Bull Connor;when I was saying, Be non-violent toward [Selma, Alabama segregationist sheriff] Jim Clark. There's something strangely inconsistent about a nation and a press that will praise you when you say, Be non-violent toward Jim Clark, but will curse and damn you when you say, "Be non-violent toward little brown Vietnamese children. There's something wrong with that press!

As if the weight of such a commitment to the life and health of America were not enough, another burden of responsibility was placed upon me in 1964. And I cannot forget that the Nobel Peace Prize was not just something taking place, but it was a commission--a commission to work harder than I had ever worked before for the brotherhood of Man. This is a calling that takes me beyond national allegiances. But even if it were not present, I would yet have to live with the meaning of my commitment to the ministry of Jesus Christ. To me, the relationship of this ministry to the making of peace is so obvious that I sometimes marvel at those who ask me why I am speaking against the war. Could it be that they do not know that the Good News was meant for all men, for communists and capitalists, for their children and ours, for black and white, for revolutionary and conservative. Have they forgotten that my ministry is in obedience to the One who loved His enemies so fully that he died for them? What, then, can I say to the Vietcong, or to Castro, or to Mao, as a faithful minister to Jesus Christ? Can I threaten them with death, or must I not share with them my life? Finally, I must be true to my conviction that I share with all men the calling to be the son of the Living God. Beyond the calling of race or nation or creed is this vocation of sonship and brotherhood. And because I believe that the Father is deeply concerned, especially for His suffering and helpless and outcast children, I come today to speak for them. And as I ponder the madness of Vietnam and search within myself for ways to understand and respond in compassion, my mind goes constantly to the people of that peninsula. I speak not now of the soldiers of each side, not of the military government of Saigon, but simply of the people who have been under the curse of war for almost three continuous decades now. I think of them, too, because it is clear to me that there will be no meaningful solution until some attempt is made to know these people and hear their broken cries.

Now, let me tell you the truth about it. They must see Americans as strange liberators. Do you realize that the Vietnamese people proclaimed their own independence in 1945 after a combined French and Japanese occupation. And incidentally, this was before the Communist revolution in China. They were led by Ho Chi Minh. And this is a little-known fact, and these people declared themselves independent in 1945. They quoted our Declaration of Independence in their document of freedom, and yet our government refused to recognize them. President Truman said they were not ready for independence. So we fell victim as a nation at that time of the same deadly arrogance that has poisoned the international situation for all of these years. France then set out to reconquer its former colony. And they fought eight long, hard, brutal years trying to re-conquer Vietnam. You know who helped France? It was the United States of America. It came to the point that we were meeting more than eighty percent of the war costs. And even when France started despairing of its reckless action, we did not. And in 1954, a conference was called at Geneva, and an agreement was reached, because France had been defeated at Dien Bien Phu. But even after that, and after the Geneva Accord, we did not stop. We must face the sad fact that our government sought, in a real sense, to sabotage the Geneva Accord. Well, after the French were defeated, it looked as if independence and land reform would come through the Geneva agreement. But instead the United States came and started supporting a man named Diem who turned out to be one of the most ruthless dictators in the history of the world. He set out to silence all opposition. People were brutally murdered because they raised their voices against the brutal policies of Diem. And the peasants watched and cringed as Diem ruthlessly rooted out all opposition. The peasants watched as all this was presided over by United States influence and by increasing numbers of United States troops who came to help quell the insurgency that Diem's methods had aroused. When Diem was overthrown, they may have been happy, but the long line of military dictatorships seemed to offer no real change, especially in terms of their need for land and peace. And who are we supporting in Vietnam today? It's a man by the name of general Ky [Air Vice Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky] who fought with the French against his own people, and who said on one occasion that the greatest hero of his life is Hitler. This is who we are supporting in Vietnam today. Oh, our government and the press generally won't tell us these things, but God told me to tell you this morning. The truth must be told.

The only change came from America as we increased our troop commitments in support of governments which were singularly corrupt, inept, and without popular support and all the while the people read our leaflets and received regular promises of peace and democracy and land reform. Now they languish under our bombs and consider us, not their fellow Vietnamese, the real enemy. They move sadly and apathetically as we herd them off the land of their fathers into concentration camps, where minimal social needs are rarely met. They know they must move or be destroyed by our bombs. So they go, primarily women, and children and the aged. They watch as we poison their water, as we kill a million acres of their crops. They must weep as the bulldozers roar through their areas preparing to destroy the precious trees. They wander into the towns and see thousands of thousands of the children, homeless, without clothes, running in packs on the streets like animals. They see the children degraded by our soldiers as they beg for food. They see the children selling their sisters to our soldiers, soliciting for their mothers. We have destroyed their two most cherished institutions: the family and the village. We have destroyed their land and their crops. We have cooperated in the crushing of the nation's only noncommunist revolutionary political force, the United Buddhist Church. This is a role our nation has taken, the role of those who make peaceful revolutions impossible but refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that comes from the immense profits of overseas investments. I'm convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, militarism and economic exploitation are incapable of being conquered.

A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our present policies. On the one hand, we are called to play the Good Samaritan on life's roadside, but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho Road must be changed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth with righteous indignation. It will look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa, and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries, and say, "This is not just." It will look at our alliance with the landed gentry of Latin America and say, "This is not just." The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just. A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war, "This way of settling differences is not just." This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into the veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

Oh, my friends, if there is any one thing that we must see today is that these are revolutionary times. All over the globe men are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression, and out of the wounds of a frail world, new systems of justice and equality are being born. The shirtless and barefoot people of the land are rising up as never before. The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light. They are saying, unconsciously, as we say in one of our freedom songs, "Ain't gonna let nobody turn me around!" It is a sad fact that because of comfort, complacency, a morbid fear of communism, our proneness to adjust to injustice, the Western nations that initiated so much of the revolutionary spirit of the modern world have now become the arch anti-revolutionaries. This has driven many to feel that only Marxism has a revolutionary spirit. Therefore, communism is a judgment against our failure to make democracy real and follow through on the revolutions that we initiated. Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo, we shall boldly challenge unjust mores, and thereby speed up the day when "every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the rough places shall be made plain, and the crooked places straight. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together."

A genuine revolution of values means in the final analysis that our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. Every nation must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in their individual societies. This call for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond one's tribe, race, class, and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing, unconditional love for all men. This oft misunderstood and misinterpreted concept, so readily dismissed by the Nietzsches of the world as a weak and cowardly force, has now become an absolute necessity for the survival of mankind. And when I speak of love I'm not speaking of some sentimental and weak response. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. This Hindu-Muslim-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the first epistle of John: "Let us love one another, for God is love. And every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us and his love is perfected in us."

Let me say finally that I oppose the war in Vietnam because I love America. I speak out against this war, not in anger, but with anxiety and sorrow in my heart, and, above all, with a passionate desire to see our beloved country stand as the moral example of the world. I speak out against this war because I am disappointed with America. And there can be no great disappointment where there is not great love. I am disappointed with our failure to deal positively and forthrightly with the triple evils of racism, economic exploitation, and militarism. We are presently moving down a dead-end road that can lead to national disaster. America has strayed to the far country of racism and militarism. The home that all too many Americans left was solidly structured idealistically; its pillars were solidly grounded in the insights of our Judeo-Christian heritage. All men are made in the image of God. All men are bothers. All men are created equal. Every man is an heir to a legacy of dignity and worth. Every man has rights that are neither conferred by, nor derived from the State--they are God-given. Out of one blood, God made all men to dwell upon the face of the earth. What a marvelous foundation for any home! What a glorious and healthy place to inhabit. But America's strayed away, and this unnatural excursion has brought only confusion and bewilderment. It has left hearts aching with guilt and minds distorted with irrationality.

It is time for all people of conscience to call upon America to come back home. Come home, America. Omar Khayyam is right: "The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on." I call on Washington today. I call on every man and woman of good will all over America today. I call on the young men of America who must make a choice today to take a stand on this issue. Tomorrow may be too late. The book may close. And don't let anybody make you think that God chose America as his divine, messianic force to be a sort of policeman of the whole world. God has a way of standing before the nations with judgment, and it seems that I can hear God saying to America, "You're too arrogant! And if you don't change your ways, I will rise up and break the backbone of your power, and I'll place it in the hands of a nation that doesn't even know my name. Be still and know that I'm God."

Now it isn't easy to stand up for truth and for justice. Sometimes it means being frustrated. When you tell the truth and take a stand, sometimes it means that you will walk the streets with a burdened heart. Sometimes it means losing a job...means being abused and scorned. It may mean having a seven, eight year old child asking a daddy, "Why do you have to go to jail so much?" And I've long since learned that to be a follower to the Jesus Christ means taking up the cross. And my bible tells me that Good Friday comes before Easter. Before the crown we wear, there is the cross that we must bear. Let us bear it--bear it for truth, bear it for justice, and bear it for peace. Let us go out this morning with that determination. And I have not lost faith. I'm not in despair, because I know that there is a moral order. I haven't lost faith, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. I can still sing "We Shall Overcome" because Carlyle was right: "No lie can live forever." We shall overcome because William Cullen Bryant was right: "Truth pressed to earth will rise again." We shall overcome because James Russell Lowell was right: "Truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne." Yet, that scaffold sways the future. We shall overcome because the bible is right: "You shall reap what you sow." With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our world into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to speed up the day when justice will roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream. With this faith we will be able to speed up the day when the lion and the lamb will lie down together, and every man will sit under his own vine and fig tree, and none shall be afraid because the words of the Lord have spoken it. With this faith we will be able to speed up the day when all over the world we will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we're free at last!" With this faith, we'll sing it as we're getting ready to sing it now. Men will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. And nations will not rise up against nations, neither shall they study war anymore. And I don't know about you, I ain't gonna study war no more.

Text from Pacifica Radio/KPFA/UC Berkeley Library's Media Resource Center's site. The sermon was at the Ebenezer Baptist Church. Thanks to Sam Husseini.

Push-back Against Veteran Initiatives Launched, Critics Say Benefits Are 'Quite Extreme'

- Vietnam-era veterans are treated by neocons and their allies are lazy, shifty malingerers who do not deserve the disability benefits pertaining to PTSD and Agent Orange, areas of concern that to this day the rightwing fights with the message: Get over it, and no free rides for you. Shocking disrespect for a generation still suffering. -

By Michael Leon

Vietnam-era veterans are accustomed to American hostility across society enduring for decades.

The American culture has changed, the Wall and Vietnam veteran popular Welcome back events stand as monuments of respect and empathy for what servicemembers endured in an unpopular war begun by lies.

But a lasting enmity persists in an ideological right-wing cabal opposed to the idea that Vietnam-era veterans receive disability benefits.

Their efforts are cold slaps in the face of veterans.

The Obama administration has politically allied itself with veterans in a flurry of pro-veterans initiatives, including the implementation of new PTSD regulations for disability claims and an extended Agent Orange presumptive illness rules published today, both of which affect Vietnam-era veterans profoundly in addressing severe health problems.

Amid rumors of a coming housecleaning of benefits-hostile neocons in the VA and Veteran Benefits Administration (VBA), including mid-level VA managers, the neocon anti-veteran PR project has begun.

A national AP August 30 piece, ostensibly about diabetes and how it has not been proven to be caused by Agent Orange, is the latest in a line of reports asserting that veterans have it too easy in the VA, VBA claims system.

This could have been written by the American Enterprise Institute: It was written by Mike Baker, evidently the new anti-benefits writer, Allen G. Breed has been taken off the veterans' AP hit-pieces duty.

The Politico, a neocon journal used as an entree into the mainstream is in the anti-veteran game. Old age and Agent Orange are "closing in on Vietnam veterans, a legacy of hurt for those who served -- and a very big bill for American taxpayers," reads the Politico.

This vets-cost-too-much is a meme coursing through the Internet, taking the tract of Sally Satel who has made a career of knocking Vietnam-era vets.

Satel is part of a network, a "cabal," as veterans' advocate Paul Sullivan calls them, of anti-benefits ideologues in the media, the Congress [believe Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) has been brought off] and of course in the VA.

It's not war that is costly, about which lawmakers have no reservations about spending. No, it's those damn veterans who should go away or at least die.

We can expect more Associated Press writer Mike Baker anti-veteran talking points coming from politicians, pencil-neck thin tank residents and of course the remaining hacks at the VA and VBA.

Here is some the language Baker uses in his piece asserting that the VA and VBA bend over backwards to be fair to veterans:

- even though decades of research into the defoliant have failed to find more than a possibility that it causes the disease, diabetes

- Because of worries about Agent Orange, about 270,000 Vietnam veterans — more than one-quarter of the 1 million receiving disability checks — are getting compensation for diabetes, according to Department of Veterans Affairs records obtained by The Associated Press through the Freedom of Information Act.

- Tens of thousands of other claims for common ailments of age — erectile dysfunction among them — are getting paid as well because of a possible link, direct or indirect, to Agent Orange.

- And the taxpayers may soon be responsible for even more: The VA said Monday that it will add heart disease, Parkinson's disease and certain types of leukemia to the list of conditions that might be connected to Agent Orange. The agency estimates that the new rules, which will go into effect in two months unless Congress intervenes, will cost $42 billion over the next 10 years.

- Lawmakers and federal officials who have reservations about the spending are loath to criticize a program that helps servicemen. They have largely ignored a 2008 report in which a group of scientists said the decision to grant benefits to so many on such little evidence was "quite extreme."

- "There needs to be a discussion about the costs, about how to avoid false positives while also trying to be sure the system bends over backwards to be fair to the veterans," said Jonathan M. Samet, a public health expert who led that study and now serves as director of the Institute for Global Health at the University of Southern California.

Vietnam War Still Kills

This following piece was written in 1998.

In sum, Agents Orange, Blue, White, and Purple, suicide, PTSD and other ailments continue today to kill Vietnam-era veterans whe remain unpopular with those who advocate war, leaving others to clean up the human mess.

So the next time you hear the chickenhawks, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and other war cheerleaders explain that Vietnam was a long time ago, please think again.

[Pictured above is a troop who manages a laugh, no doubt thinking at some point 'we gotta get out of this place,' into which the country was lied and a generation shredded.]

Via Col. Dan Cedusky (Ret):

Memorandum: Accelerated Mortality Rates of Vietnam Veterans

by: S. Brian Willson

Introduction

During the early 1980s, while first living in Franklin County, Massachusetts, I became active with other Vietnam veterans in response to the myriad physical, psychological, and social problems we seemed to be experiencing. I was active in a local Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA) chapter, and subsequently became director of the state-funded Western Massachusetts Agent Orange Information Project, and later, executive director of a veterans outreach center.

Through numerous conversations and formal interviews with hundreds of veterans I began to establish an empirical substantiation of the syndrome of problems that certainly is one of the tragic legacies of the Vietnam War (i.e., the war against the Vietnamese which the Vietnamese call "the American War"). Grasping the depth of the prevailing sense of shame, malaise, and deteriorating physical and mental health, I began to understand more deeply both the burden and incredible potential wisdom of the war, not just for veterans, but for the entire American society. Both the syndrome known as PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), often delayed for a decade or more enabling the psyche time to integrate the horrible realities that the Vietnam experience possesses for many, and exposure to the most intensive application of chemical warfare in history by the Pentagon (in cahoots with seven chemical companies, including Monsanto and Dow), directly contributed to a myriad of symptoms, physical, emotional, and psychic. A pattern of extraordinary sickness and depression for this age group of young males (age 30-45 in 1984-85) is believed unprecedented in the United States.

Nineteen million gallons of Agents Orange, Blue, White, and Purple were sprayed over an area the size of Rhode Island and Massachusetts combined (over 6 million acres), applied up to 14 times the recommended domestic agricultural application rate. Subsequently, these chemicals have been banned in the U.S. due to their intense toxicity, being considered, perhaps, the most potent cancer-causing substance ever studied by the Environmental Protection Agency. It should be noted that the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, based on studies conducted by the National Academy of Sciences ' Institute of Medicine, now presumes the following conditions as service-connected for Vietnam veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange or other herbicides:

Chloracne (this is VA propaganda on this one)
Non-Hodgkin' s lymphoma
Soft tissue sarcoma
Hodgkin's disease
Porphyria cutanea tarda (this is VA propaganda on this one)
Multiple myeloma
Respiratory cancers (including cancers of the lung, larynx, trachea and bronchus)
Prostate cancer
Peripheral neuropathy (acute or subacute) (this is VA propaganda on this one)
Spina bifida in children of Vietnam veterans

Mortality Rates for Vietnam Veterans

There have been a number of representations and claims over the years that more Vietnam veterans have died from suicide since returning from the war than the 58,000-plus who died in the war. There is no certain way for determining precise data on veterans' suicides. My involvement with many physically and mentally troubled veterans, and search of "scientific" data about the subject of mortality rates of Vietnam veterans, produced the following information by mid-1986.

When first conversing with local veterans in rural Franklin County, Massachusetts in mid-1983, they informed me that there had been four suicides of local Vietnam veterans between 1981 and June 1983.

Phil Girard, in 1982 the Senior Vice President, Agent Orange Victims International, reported at a public meeting at Greenfield, Massachusetts Community College (April 17) that their organizational research indicated that "from the end of the war to 1981 there have been 109,000 veterans who have died."

An unpublished manuscript, Vietnam Veterans, by Tom Williams, University of Denver School of Professional Psychology, April 1979, concluded that "More Vietnam veterans have died since the war by their own hand than were actually killed in Vietnam."

Testimony presented to the Massachusetts Commission on the Concerns of Vietnam veterans in Greenfield, Massachusetts on May 4, 1982, declared that "Vietnam veterans have nationally averaged 28 suicides a day since 1975, amounting to over 70,000."
"Suicide rates 33% higher than the national average rate" were reported in The Forgotten Warrior Project by John P. Wilson, Cleveland State University, 1978. This definitive study was originally titled, Identity, Ideology and Crisis: The Vietnam Veteran in Transition.

A classified VA memo dated 6/30/82 identified a total of approximately 300,000 deaths occurring among Vietnam-era veterans from 1965-1981 calculated by adding together deaths in-service with an actuarial estimate of the number of Vietnam-era veterans who have died since returning to civilian life, a much higher figure than estimated by the VA in previous reports. Research conducted by the U.S. Center for Disease Control in the early 1980s had found a number of illnesses and suicides contributing to elevated death rates for Vietnam veterans than for non-veterans in the same age group.

An alarming disparity in official VA figures reporting a dramatic decrease in the estimated number of Vietnam Era Veterans in Civilian Life from September 30, 1981 to March 31, 1983, reveals a loss of 793,000 Vietnam-era veterans in that 18-month period. The disparity was never explained. I suggest four possible explanations: (1) changed, inconsistent, and/or mistaken reporting and estimation procedures; (2) a large emigration of Vietnam-era veterans out of the U.S.; (3) a high mortality rate for Vietnam-era veterans; or (4) a combination of any and/or all of the above explanations.

On Monday, January 28, 1985, the Massachusetts Agent Orange Program of the State Office of Commissioner of Veterans' Services released results of its study, Mortality Among Vietnam Veterans in Massachusetts, 1972-1983. The one-year study revealed that deaths due to suicides and motor vehicle accidents, along with kidney cancer, were "significantly elevated" among Vietnam veterans compared to non-veteran Massachusetts males for the study period 1972-1983.

A comprehensive research study by the University of California at San Francisco published in the March 6, 1986 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, titled "Delayed Effects of the Military Draft on Mortality," disclosed that Vietnam veterans were 86% more likely than non-veterans to die of suicide in the years after the war, and 53% more likely to die in traffic accidents. The researchers claim that this study of California and Pennsylvania men is the first to show a cause-and-effect relationship between military service during the Vietnam War and an unusual risk of suicide.

From Summer 1983 through Summer 1985 there were seven known additional suicides of Vietnam veterans in the Franklin-Hampshire County area of Massachusetts. Because one's veteran status is often not known at time of death, whether by suicide or other cause, and because suicides are often masked under causes listed as single-car accidents, drug or alcohol overdose, etc., actual deaths by suicide remain unknown. Other veterans whom I knew in the 1982-1985 time period died of alcohol and drug abuse.

A November 1, 1984 U.S. House Report 98-1167, Diversion of Funds from Vietnam Veterans Readjustment Counseling Program, by the Committee on Government Operations, concluded that "the suicide rate among Vietnam veterans suffering from PTSD is high . . . not because of massive underlying neuroses, but as a result of the harsh treatment they received in Vietnam, and experiences upon returning to the U.S." Dr. Arnold, Chief of Psychiatry at the VA Medical Center in Phoenix, Arizona at the time, and an acknowledged expert on PTSD, explained to the Committee that the VA's most recent statistics indicate that while Vietnam veterans make up only about 14% of the veterans they treat, Vietnam veterans constitute 30% of the suicides of all veterans treated by the VA, over-contributing substantially to the total number of suicides of patients who are treated by the VA.

Conclusion

There is no certain way of knowing how many Vietnam veterans have died through suicide, motor vehicle "accidents," or illnesses. The available evidence, both anecdotal and scientific, however, suggests elevated mortality rates from suicides, motor vehicle accidents, and certain cancers for Vietnam veterans. In some cases the data suggests mortality rates are "significantly elevated."

My comments: (from my book)
From Doctor Cate Jenkins, a PHD, and toxicology expert, with our Environmental Protection Agency:(69) (See Chapter 4 for Dr. Jenkins’ “stalwart efforts” in our toxic chemical issue.)

“The controlling majority of the VACEH, in making its recommendations to compensate Vietnam veterans for peripheral neuropathy, neglected to evaluate Dioxin's central nervous system (CNS) effects. Because the available evidence for CNS damage by Dioxin outweighs that for peripheral nervous system (PNS) among Vietnam veterans, and because of the inseparable relationship between the biological mechanism by which dioxin exerts both CNS and PNS effects, this failure of the VACEH is indefensible.”

The CNS consists of the neurological apparatus of the brain and spinal cord (including motor neurons), while the peripheral nervous system (PNS) consists of those nerves in the extremities of the body (arms, legs, etc.). Peripheral neuropathies are one result of damage to the PNS.

“Central nervous system damage by fat-soluble (lipophilic) neurotoxicants such as dioxin has always been found to accompany, and usually precede, any peripheral nervous system (PNS) damage such as peripheral neuropathy. The prestigious International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) concluded as early as 1977 that human CNS damage was associated with dioxin exposures. In 1986, the IARC clearly restated it’s finding that dioxin was associated with peripheral neuropathies and personality changes, a neuropsychological consequence of CNS damage (IARC, 1986). Since the IARC evaluations, many new epidemiological investigations have established an even stronger casual relationship between dioxin and CNS damage.

“Neurotoxic substances may exert their effects by several mechanisms (Anthony and Graham, 1991). Chemical attack of whole nerve cell structures may result in cell injury or death (neuropathy) .

“Chemical attack may be specifically on the axon (long nerve fiber) (axonopathy) , or the myelin sheath of the axon (myelinopathy) . Neurotoxicants may also damage, or alter the neurotransmitter system, damage the glial cells that support the primary neurons, or damage the blood vessels supplying the nervous system.”

“The OTA found that degeneration of the axon (axonopathy) is one of the most frequently determined neurological effects from neurotoxic chemicals (OTA, 1990). If the axon of a nerve cell dies back, it no longer reaches the next nerve cell, muscle, etc., and cannot transmit any message. Because the longer axons have more targets (larger surface area) for toxic damage, it is predicted that the longer axons found in CNS are more effected by neurotoxicants (Anthony and Graham, 1991), assuming the neurotoxicants is sufficiently lipophilic to cross the blood-brain barrier.

“Although the mechanisms by which dioxin exert its neurotoxic effects, have yet to be fully elucidated, the CNS effects are consistent with destruction of the nerve axons (axonopathy) . Because of the extreme toxicity of dioxin and the wide range of biological affects, however, the mechanisms of dioxin's neurotoxicity may not be limited to axonopathies. The hypothesis that dioxin damages the CNS and PNS by destruction of axons is supported by the similarity of the neurological symptoms caused by dioxin and many other lipophilic neurotoxicants causing both CNS and PNS axonopathies, including carbon disulfide, hexane, methyl n-butyl ketone, trichloroethylene, polybrominated biphenyls, and polychlorinated biphenyls (Anthony and Graham, 1991).

“Lipophilic toxicants such as dioxin are able to cross the blood-brain barrier to affect the CNS. In addition, since the brain is 50 percent lipid (dry weight), compared to 6 to 20 percent lipid in other organs (OTA, 1990), the brain may be particularly vulnerable to accumulating dioxin into its fat content. Nervous system tissue itself, with its high lipid content, will also act as a selective repository for dioxin. In addition, the low elimination rate of dioxin from the body will contribute to its ability to reach equilibrium concentrations in lipid-rich nervous system tissues.

”Neuropsychological damage may be one of the most significant consequences of exposure to Agent Orange. The Office of Technology Assessment (OTA, 1990) concluded that neurotoxic chemicals play a significant casual role in development of psychiatric as well as neurological disorders. Even minor changes in the structure or function of the nervous system were found to have profound consequences for behavioral and other neurological functions.

“The OTA found that neurotoxic chemicals could cause or exacerbate anxiety, depression, mania, and psychosis.”

These symptoms are very close to what the government is calling PTSD and may serve to amplify any combat related experiences that normally would have been regressed.

“In addition to the biological basis for the involvement of the CNS whenever PNS damage is produced by a lipophilic neurotoxicant, there are also numerous epidemiological investigations to support the casual relationship between dioxin and CNS effects. CNS effects observed in dioxin-exposed populations include depression, anxiety, suicide, decreased cognitive function, fatigue, and poor coordination.”

Again, some of these symptoms are close to what the government calls PTSD. In addition, notice the fatigue, poor coordination, and decreased cognitive functions. These symptoms can be associated with degenerative neurological disorders.

“The most severe neuropsychological consequence of dioxin exposure is excessive suicides, which has been demonstrated among exposed Vietnam Veterans, chemical production workers in the U.S. and European countries, forestry workers, and railroad workers. Another severe consequence is the excessive death rate from accidents found among the dioxin-exposed chemical production workers and Vietnam Veterans, representing either motor neuron malfunction or suicide in disguise.

“In 1977, the Working Group of the International Agency for Research on Cancer found that neurological and behavioral changes were among the most frequently reported effects in studies of exposures to 2,4,5-T (IARC, 1977a). IARC identified 6 out of 7 different populations occupationally exposed to chlorinated phenolic compounds where neuropsychological symptoms such as neurasthenic or depressive syndromes were established (IARC, 1977b). IARC noted that PNS damage was also found in the same 6 dioxin-exposed populations, including polyneuropathies, lower extremity weakness, and sensorial impairments (sight, hearing, smell, taste). In 1986, the IARC clearly restated it’s finding that dioxin had been found to be associated with peripheral neuropathies and personality changes (IARC, 1986).

“The evidence from the 1990 Ranch Hand study (Thomas, et al., 1990) is particularly compelling in demonstrating CNS damage from Agent Orange exposure.

“Significant psychological deficits were found among Ranch Hand veterans in several subscales in a battery of psychological tests. In contrast, none of the typical dioxin-related psychological deficits were ever found in statistical excess among matched controls. Ranch Hand Veterans experienced a statistically significant excess of great or disabling fatigue during the day, a condition found among many other populations exposed to dioxin.

“Borderline statistically significant verified psychological disorders were found for the category "other neuroses. A series of tests found a borderline statistically significant excess of Ranch Hands experienced depression, somatization, and the severity of psychological distress. Antisocial and paranoid scores for the Ranch Hands were significantly higher, and the psychotic delusion score was marginally significantly higher for Ranch Hands.

“CNS effects, other than neuropsychological deficits, were also found among Ranch Hand veterans (Thomas, et al., 1990). When Ranch Hand veterans or controls that had known past exposures to insecticides were excluded from one analysis (so that neurological findings could be attributed solely to Agent Orange), Ranch Hand veterans exhibited significantly elevated relative risk for cranial nerve dysfunction. Analyses disclosed marginally more balance/Romberg sign (standing without swaying when eyes closed and feet together) and coordination abnormalities for Ranch Hand veterans.

“The VA proposed exclusion of peripheral neuropathies that only become evident 10 or more years after service in Vietnam, on the assumption that such a neuropathy could not be associated with Agent Orange exposure, due to the long interval from exposure.

“This assumption contradicts the findings of the OTA, which found that neurological damage is not always detectable clinically, or noticeable by, the sufferer after exposure to a neurotoxic substance such as dioxin. As time progresses or old age approaches, the rate of natural neuronal cell death accelerates, and the results of earlier neurological damage may first become evident, or unmasked (OTA, 1990). The availability of alternate neuronal pathways is reduced, which were formerly responsible for compensating for earlier toxic damage. The OTA specifically noted the importance of research showing the possibility that neurotoxic substances were important in Alzheimer's disease, the degenerative brain disease of old age.”

Here we have in 1990 the Ranch Handers, noncombatants that were primarily skin exposed, experiencing statically significant excess in - psychological disorders of depression, somatization, and severity of psychological distress. Antisocial and paranoid scores were significantly higher along with psychotic delusion.

How many of you doctors could actually tell the difference in what the government is calling PTSD and toxic chemical induced neuropsychological disorders? Be honest. How many of you doctors were aware of these toxic chemical findings?
President Clinton in 1996 as a “friend of the Veterans” announced the addition of “acute neuropathy” to our Agent Orange List. By the time the VA got through with it, this addition was now acute and sub-acute transient peripheral neuropathy, limited by a one-year removal from Vietnam, and then cured within an additional two years. At the time Doctor Jenkins was reviewing this neuropathy implementation the VA was proposing a 10-year time limit. It ended up with an even more ridiculous one-year time limit.

Perhaps the Secretary of the VA and members of NAS/IOM can tell my “three board certified neurologists” and the “75 other board certified neurologists,” just how to cure this polyneuropathy within two years or cure it at all. It seems that none of our neurological specialists know how this is accomplished. Even those neurologists who were previously head of neurology at a major research hospital do not seem to grasp this VA and NAS/IOM simple solution to our nerve damages.

At the same time President Clinton was trying to add this condition, the VA was undermining him with the additions and manipulations that in effect allowed very few to actually qualify for this new addition. What seemed like a good faith gesture on the part then President Clinton ended up doing practically nothing for Vietnam veterans.

I urge you to continue and read for yourself if neuropathy is a one-year disease, a ten-year disease, or if it can develop at any time in ones life depending on what underlying dioxin causation you develop. In addition, decide if it is indeed curable as the VA claims. If it is indeed curable, then we have a lot of “dumb doctors” in this country who are mistreating our Veterans.

Vietnam, McNamara and Veterans

Update: From Veterans Today, VA Police Hack Medical Files of Wisconsin Vet, Seek Prison for More PTSD Vets

Bob Herbert writes today in After the War Was Over that "Robert McNamara realized early on that Vietnam was a lost cause, but he kept that crucial information close to his chest. How did he ever look at himself in a mirror? ... The obscenity of war is lost on most Americans, and that drains the death of Robert McNamara of any real significance."

The obscenity continues to this day, destroying the lives of our veterans.

No matter what the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and Dr. Sally Satel say from their plush offices, veterans experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) commonly suffer for the rest of their lives.

But the U.S. Dept of Veterans Affairs (VA) needs the AEI if they are going to attack veterans for “tenaciously pursuing a claim for benefits” like what happened to Wisconsin veteran Keith Roberts.
---
Now, we hear that right now VA investigators are going after another veteran, one Robert E. Anthon of Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin.

Anthon's supporters, mostly veterans, are working to head off a prosecution for fraud against Anthon whom the VA is targeting for reasons that only warmakers and chickenhawks can fully comprehend.

First the VA goes after a veteran's benefits, leaving them destitute and still suffering from their ailments, then capriciously the Inspector General's office tries to build a case for fraud.

These VA bureaucrats and their shills are pond scum. Will keep you posted on the Anthon affair. A couple of pissed-off combat Marine veterans are on it that I know of.

Wisconsin Vietnam War Stories

Wisconsin Public Television (WPT) will present Wisconsin Vietnam War Stories in 2010.

No glory. No George W. Bush and "Mission Accomplished." War sucks and war is a lie.

That's the message from the coming documentary of the veterans who decades later live with the lie, a "sweeping look at the experiences and impact of the Vietnam War on Wisconsin soldiers and civilians with Wisconsin Vietnam War Stories. The project won't air on WPT until 2010, but work has already begun around the state to find veterans who will tell their stories."

It's not too difficult to recognize Vietnam War veterans around Wisconsin. You see them at peace rallies, drinking too much at the Rustic Tavern, and ensconced and isolated in a small house on the south side of Milwaukee. But stealing looks, they all seem to have a consistently haunted look in their eyes that you know better than to ask about.

About this clip Willie Williams of De Forest and David Kies of Verona are just two of the many veterans who are sharing their memories of Vietnam for the latest in WPT’s portrayal of war through firsthand accounts — Wisconsin Vietnam War Stories. Williams served in the 25th Infantry Division in Cu Chi in 1966 and 1967. Kies served with the 173rd Airborne Division during the same period as the ten-year war was heating up.