by Don Hynes
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| Vantage Point | Culture and Politics by Don Hynes |
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"No man is prejudiced in favor of a thing, knowing it to be wrong.
He is attached to it on the belief of its being right; and when he sees it is not so,
the prejudice will be gone." - Tom Paine
March 06, 2005 Where Forgiveness is the Lesson An article in the Times caught my attention this week: "The U.S. Justice Department is urging a federal judge in New York to dismiss a lawsuit involving one of the most contentious issues of the Vietnam War: the use of the defoliant, Agent Orange." The chemical companies involved in the suit argue that "they had produced Agent Orange following government specifications and that its use in Vietnam was necessary to protect American soldiers." That doesn't jive with eyewitness reports nor excuse what thousands still suffer in Vietnam today. They also argued that "there is no clear link between exposure to Agent Orange and the health problems attributed to it" although in 1984, after years of court battles "seven American chemical companies paid $180 million to settle a class action suit by American Vietnam War veterans, who claimed that Agent Orange caused cancer, birth defects and other health problems." Having worked with Vietnam veterans for years I’ve often come face to face with this assessment "thousands who served in Vietnam do not realize that their prostate cancer; Type 2 diabetes; non-Hodgkin's lymphoma; soft tissue sarcoma; Hodgkin's disease; multiple myeloma; many respiratory cancers, including cancers of the lung, larynx, trachea, and bronchus are service connected disabilities" many of which trace back to Agent Orange exposure. Today's Iraq War veterans aren't in for an easier ride. Exposure to depleted uranium is causing high rates of malignancies among returning vets and catastrophic environmentally related health problems in Iraq. War veterans are suffering a high proportion of PTSD; brain trauma and the resultant damage have become the “signature wound of the Iraq War” and many returning veterans are already showing up in homeless shelters. The unacknowledged reasons for the invasion of Iraq have gotten worse, with a continuing mis-calculation of the insurgency and military strategy incongruent with conditions on the ground. The sons and daughters of the U.S. Congress are not fighting their fathers’ war nor are they among the innocent whose lives are irrevocably damaged. What but compassion can rise from these photos of the wounded and the hope that one day we will evolve beyond the tragedy WWI poet Wilfrid Owen captured: 'My Love!' one moaned. Love-languid seemed his mood, Till slowly lowered, his whole face kissed the mud. on this planet once Eden where forgiveness is the lesson. *** |
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