Ecological Disaster Is Known To Be Dreadful Not Only In

Agent Orange was a strong and powerful herbicide used by the United States during the Vietnam War. Agent Orange was used to eliminate forest cover for the North Vietnam Army, and kill crops to try and starve them. It was very effective in its job and was used for 10 years during the Vietnam War. Agent Orange not oly kills the plants that it was targeting, but it also had a amjor affect on the people that were exposed to it. Agent Orange is a very deadly weapon, and people are still facing the consequences of it today.

The first chemical to be discussed is Agent Orange; Agent Orange has been identified as a human carcinogen; this chemical was introduced during the Vietnam war as a defoliant for the thick Vietnamese jungle. Although Agent Orange contained a variety of herbicides, most of the pesticide contained Phenoxyacetic acid – based herbicide 2,4-D and 2,4, 5-T. The most common mixture of the Agent Orange used during

“We were told, ‘it’s totally safe and it won’t hurt you at all,” he added. “We were told you can drink it, you can brush your teeth with it, or you can bathe in it. It won’t hurt you. Those were lies.” (“U.S. Soldiers Sprayed Agent Orange across Korea” 1) Agent Orange was an herbicide used by the United States military forces in Vietnam between 1962 and 1971 to destroy their enemies’ food supply, land, and protection. Twelve million gallons of this toxin were sprayed. (Department of Preventive Medicine 1) It affected the Vietnamese and the American troops who were fighting in the same jungle. Little did the United States military know the effects of this dangerous herbicide. It caused many long-term complications, including health problems

Agent orange was used in the vietnam war from 1961-1971 and it is a mixture of 2 herbicides.

In the beginning of this essay I would like to present some facts and figures related to our topic. On December 3, 1984, at the Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India there was a deadly leak of methyl isocyanate. It caused thousands of people to die and affected generations to come. The leak happened due to a series of human and mechanical failures. The local health officials were neither knowledgeable about the deadly chemical that was being stored there nor were they equipped to handle the tragedy. Another incident happened at the Union Carbide plant in West Virginia. A toxic cloud of the same chemical was leaked into the atmosphere and it was a shocking reminder that such accidents could happen in the both developed and developing countries. The statistics prove that chemical spills occur on a regular basis in different parts of the world. In 1976 there were

The war in Vietnam was, and continues to be, one of the most controversial hot button topics in American history. The military’s use of dangerous pesticides, like Agent Orange, is a major part of this controversy. Agent Orange is a defoliant that was widely used to deforest dense jungle areas to reduce both hiding places and food sources for the Vietnamese. During the war, American B-52 bombers released over nineteen million gallons of Agent Orange over the Vietnamese countryside. After ten years of continuous dumping, 1971 finally marked the end of America’s use of Agent Orange and other herbicides. In 1974, the United States government, headed by Richard Nixon, swore the country would never again use chemical weapons in a first strike. (Levy and Scott-Clark)

created to try to deprive North Vietnamese soldiers, or guerillas, of food, cover, and other resources during the war. The U.S. sprayed nearly 20 million gallons in all from 1962 to 1971 in Vietnam, eastern Laos, and parts of Cambodia as part of Operation Ranch Hand. Unfortunately, the effects of Agent Orange did not just hurt the Viet Cong soldiers and the environment, but also many South Vietnam soldiers and U.S. soldiers who had to go through the pesticide infested area. The entire environment that it covered was harmed very substantially and nearly every person who came in contact with it now suffers from an illness or has a very increased risk of nerve, digestive, skin, and respiratory disorders, as well as numerous cancers. The ruminants from the chemical have also had effects on the offspring of veterans with it in their system; anywhere from birth defects to cancers have been reported from the chemical

Today, the Agent Orange case is a serious threat to public health as veterans and generations affected up onto today are still suffering. A large amount "Herbicide Orange" was used in Vietnam has been of major belief to many that contributed to the most tragic environmental and public health problems. Scenarios such as a U.S. troop who was just an electrician said he saw "no action" in the war, decades later this veteran developed Type 2 diabetes. A lot of others experience their scars from this exposure right away, especially the troops who were in the first line of exposure. The newly releases troops complained about skin rashes such as chloracne, cancer of all sorts, other health issues, but one devastating of them all, birth defects in their children. They all believed the spraying of AO have contributed to the root of the issues. Although, the spray was normally diluted with oil and waterways, it is also believed to have long-term effects on rivers and lakes. Also causing the civilians of the affected areas to be a long lasting effect upon them. Agent Orange herbicide was not just an ordinary herbicide. It was mixed with a unique amount of two different components, 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T. The U.S. introduced this chemical as a design to destroy plant life in the war in 1961. It was commonly used to destroy or defoliate dense, forest broad leaf plants, trees, shrubs and food crops. Because the North Vietnamese had a war advantage from heavy jungles and camouflage hiding

Agent Orange was a powerful herbicide used in the Vietnam war. It was used to kill off the jungle and crops. The jungle allowed the Vietcong to hide and the crops feed the enemy. Agent Orange got its name from the Orange label on the drums of herbicide.   Agent Orange was two herbicides combined 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T. It was mixed at 50 times the concentration that would have been by used US farmers. The herbicide 2,4,5-T contained dioxin.

Throughout the Vietnam War, American soldiers faced a problem. Thick foliage covering Vietnamese soil hid Vietnamese soldiers, causing difficulty for the Americans, but advantages for the Vietnamese. This foliage also allowed Vietnamese soldiers access to essential crops. Both of these advantages from plant growth allowed Vietnamese soldiers to fight efficiently and allowed them success. According to the book Agent Orange: History, Science, and the Politics of Uncertainty by Edward Martini (2012), the vegetation of Vietnam “retains its leaves year round; consequently it afforded ideal concealment to guerilla terrorists who sporadically attacked the free people of Vietnam.” (p. 24). The original problem the American soldiers faced in the war was a local problem, as it only affected the people in the local radius of plant growth-heavy areas in Vietnam.

War causes a myriad of effects in varying degrees of severity on the land and consequently among humankind. In the scenario of Vietnam with Agent Orange, no one anticipated the birth defects, cancer, and brain damage that would affect the lives of our nation’s veterans, the people of Vietnam, and thousands of unborn children for years to follow. Despite the evidence linking the Agent Orange to these injustices, there has been little done to right these wrongs. There should be more policy protecting the environment and its inhabitants, especially when detrimental effects are exacerbated by war. As mentioned previously, most of society may not even be aware of the effects war has on our environment. This piece is aiming to serve as a bridge for the gap between what science knows and what the people know about war’s effect on the land we

Agent orange was sprayed in over 4.5 million acres in Vietnam forests and farms as a tactic to exterminate the foliage that Vietnamese soldiers used to camouflage and sneak attack the American troops (Silverman, 2008.) As well as eliminate crops that the Vietnamese people used as a

During the war about 19 million gallons of herbicides and over 4.5 million acres of land were sprayed in Vietnam from 1961 to 1972. This chemical contains the chemical dioxin. This was later revealed to cause serious health problems including tumors, birth defects, rashes, psychological symptoms and cancer. Many of the men that came home from war and

Agent Orange is a herbicide that was used to defoliate the jungles, meaning the United States military was trying to kill off the trees in Vietnam in order to take away places for North Vietnamese military men could hide (1). The Viet Cong did not fight conventionally against the American military, they could not do so and expect to win. This caused them to resort to guerilla warfare in order to strike and weaken parts of a division or unit. The Americans used Agent Orange as a defense strategy in order to take away hiding places for the Viet Cong to run to after hitting the American units (2). What is especially harmful to those who were around Agent Orange and where it was sprayed was the dioxin, which is a byproduct of one of the chemicals components. People still worked and breathed even with the residue of the toxin still in the air and in the soil, civilians and military personnel alike. The toxin carried in it a carcinogen that got its way into the water and in the soil. Slowly as the years have passed and Vietnam has been hit with a lot of monsoons clean water has washed away the toxic water, but not before it entered into the food chain and then started to accumulate into body fat and tissue in humans that was able to passed from a mother to their child threw breast milk. The American military, by word of the American government, dumped millions of gallons of Agent Orange onto the southern half of

Hazardous Chemical Project: Agent Orange and the Environment Agent Orange; a chemical that stopped the Vietnamese military’s advantage and improved the chances of the American soldiers fighting in the Vietnam War. For the Americans, it was a way to destroy the foliage that allowed the Vietnamese soldiers to move secretly through the brush and plot attacks. As it became increasingly difficult to find Vietnamese soldiers who used the environment to their advantage, the new chemical was developed and prepared to allow the Americans to catch up and destroy one of the most potent sources of power for the Vietnamese. While the use of this chemical caused a negative impact on many factors, the focus of this essay will be on the environmental impact of the chemical. The environmental factor of Agent Orange directly impacted other factors which had economic, political and health consequences.