"Inspired by tactics of the British in Malaya, the U.S. military developed an expansive spray-system (comprising aircraft, hand sprayers, trucks, helicopters, and boats) aimed at the defoliation of mangroves and forests, and destruction of crops and their distribution so as to remove aerial cover and food supplies to the North Vietnamese and Allied Forces."
-Excerpt from Contemporary Southeast Asia, 1979
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"Soon after my arrival, one advisory role I participated in directly was what was then a small, tentative, experimental program of chemically defoliating tropical vegetation and crops, dubbed “Ranch Hand.” Only a few experimental defoliation missions had until then been flown in the delta southwest of Saigon along canals and roadways and around base areas to clear fields of fire and to reduce the risk of Viet Cong ambush." |
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"The Republic of Vietnam today announced plans to conduct an experiment to rid certain key communications routes of thick, tropical vegetation. U.S. assistance has been sought to aid Vietnamese personnel in this undertaking.
The purpose of this operation is to improve the country's economy by permitting free communications along these routes and by making additional land available for cultivation and other uses. In addition, it will facilitate the Vietnamese Army's task of keeping these avenues of communication free of Viet Cong harassments.
Commercial weed-killing chemicals will be used in experiments...The Government emphasized that neither of the two chemicals is toxic and that neither will harm wildlife, domestic animals, human beings, or the soil...."
-Government notification printed in all South Vietnamese newspapers, January 10th, 1962
“We thought it was like a hydraulic fluid or something..."
-John Kraft, Vietnam War veteran, 2016
"Over the proposed target area, we descended to a relatively low altitude for better viewing of the rice or vegetable plots that were our tentative targets, in order to make better judgments as to their suitability for chemical defoliation."
-Robert Hopkins Miller, former deputy chief of the Political Section at Embassy Saigon, 1996
"We expected bombs, but a fine yellow mist descended, covering absolutely everything. We were soaked in it, but it didn't worry us, as it smelled good. We continued to crawl through the jungle. The next day the leaves wilted and within a weak the jungle was bald. We felt fine at the time." "We were told it was a defoliant and you know it was used all around our area and it was still used occasionally. It seemed like a good idea because the ambushes and the loss of American lives and we're losing guys by the dozen. They'd spray all the foliage, the greenery, all the stuff would be destroyed...." |
“I knew something was wrong because when the planes flew over to spray for mosquitoes and (the foliage) there was a different smell to it. ...So I had a taste of the Agent Orange."
-Billy Milan, Vietnam Veteran, circa 1970