I don't know if there are any other Nam Vets here besides me but I just received a letter of another Vet from that era that died from causes that could be attributed to Agent Orange.
My first Captain from there also just died in his fiftees from this cancer.
It seems that III Corps was the heaviest sprayed, I built and lived on 14 LZs and they were all in III Corps.
As soon as I can I am going to schedule a CT scan. All Vets that were in Nam should get tested. They stopped spraying in 1971 but even if you were there later, the stuff stays around forever.
Here is the letter I just received along with a map which I don't know how to put here.


I am asking all Vietnam Veterans to talk to their doctors about getting a CT scan to check for this potentially dangerous life threatening disease. Being asymptomatic, most people will not show any signs of being ill however, about 40% of the cancer patients had some pain in their lower back on either their left or right side, just over the kidney. If the belt that you are wearing is hurting your back have your doctor order a CT scan for you immediately.

Renal Cancer is one of the health problems that the VA has listed as "Inadequate/Insufficient Evidence to Determine Whether an Association Exists" for Agent Orange.

The Government paid for a 20 year study (Operation Ranch Hand) and now some experts are saying this study was seriously flawed from the beginning. I am not an expert on this subject but you can check it out on the internet and make your own informed opinion. I just wonder why they didn't study any infantry units in III Corps. Infantry soldiers did not change their clothes every day or take a daily shower. It would be weeks before they would get a change of clothes and a month for a shower. III Corps was the heaviest sprayed area in Vietnam, especially in 1969. Agent Orange II (Super Orange which had double the dioxin) was used in 1968 and1969 in South Vietnam.

Below is a map illustrating the heaviest areas sprayed in Vietnam by the United States Air Force. The color orange represents the heaviest concentrations. The map is not drawn to scale, but is to give a person a general understanding where the heaviest spraying took place. This map does not indicate areas that were sprayed by helicopters or by other means of distributing Agent Orange and other chemical defoliants .

My wife's grandfather has developed lukemia from AG fall out during his time in nam. He truly is all messed up from that, outside of the obvious mental health issues that came along with that form of combat.

So far I don't seem to have any problems that I know of even though I spent a year in the bush. I never was in a place with a building or roof or anything like that.
Just jungle.
The combat, I think, made me better. I don't seem to have all the petty problems many people seem to think they have.
I still don't like camping though.

Yeah, he doesnt either, he gets really defensive when its mentioned. A guy I used to work with recently has skin cancer from the AG. Most people put into life/death situations dont have petty problems.

I used to take everything for granted, since the army I find myself living off little still. I need one basics anymore to live but I am married with toddlers now and petty is as petty does. Ive been out for 9 years now and I still keep the same schedule as I did wearing the uniform.

Unfortunately a lot of Vets from Nam are really in bad shape. When I go to a Veterans hospital it is very depressing. Many of these guys hardly have any mind left.
It is a shame that Veterans in this country get very little, if anything for their service.
I really don't know what it was that ruined it for so many of these guys.
I guess we are all built different and we were very young, right out of high school.
I don't think today's youth would fare any better.
Combat is not something you can get used to or train for. You can learn how to operate all sorts of weapons and simulate it stateside but when it comes down to actually killing someone, there is no training suitable.
My first real firefight lasted for 6 hours. It is not something I wish to repeat.
It did change me forever, but I think it changed me for the better.

have a good friend with ageng orange syndrom 59 and wont see 60 I spent 13 mo. at or around Red Rock 7th cav door gunner medivac support got to see a lot more than I wanted to 1969-1970

I'm a viet nam vet but never actually served in viet nam. entered Air force in 72 and was only outside the US for 6 months in 90 for Just Cause.

I hope everything comes out clean for you and thanks for posting.

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Chevy, I was First Cav, Welcome home.

Same to you Beaslbob

It was one hell of a senior trip

Yes but you survived, lets be thankful for that, alot of our kin wasnt so fortunate and paid the ultimate price. I couldnt fathom a jungle drop on a hot LZ. I think id mess myself before I got the first round off.

I enjoy talking with older vets, gives a whole new perspective on what really happened and what they want you to think happened. Thanks guys, if it wasnt for you alot of people wouldnt live the life they do, here and abroad.

who said we didn't the first hot run we made I almost melted my barrel they had to knock it out of my hands I froze with the trigger down

I agree, after my first two weeks in country 79 of us were attacked by 400 NVA.
I think I threw a case of grenades and forgot to pull the pin out. The NVA were probably catching them and throwing them back.

Seems the NVA is back at it again, didnt they learn the first time.


Paul understandable, desperate situations call for desperate measures. Guy I served with went to iraq, got smoked his 3rd time out, froze up and his reload was empty, forgot to grab his FMJ clip off the other side of his belt.

my wifes grandfather was in a makeshift camp, NVA came in and took out nearly the entire platoon while they slept. sneaky little buggers. IDK though in my opinions I think we blazed in too fast and wernt aware of the NVA capabilities and thousands of years of warfare training.

I guess so, Americans are used to going in the service for a few years and then getting out to do other things. The NVA, Talaban etc. live for this stuff. It's hard to fight people who don't care to live anyway.

Yep, death before dishonor. We all fight for what we believe in.

I work at a training site for the Missouri Guard I get to see the guys before they deploy and when they get back Heard some real storys A lot of them tell me that they get one clip and have to account for every shell If they made us do that I would still be doing paperwork

Thats wierd, I could have fired rounds all day and night if I wanted to. We even used to do target practice with artillery by looking through the barrel or see how many M 16 rounds it takes to knock down a tree. Every few days or weeks we would leave the LZ and fly over to a new clearing to build a new LZ and we used to have to fire off all the rounds so we did not have to carry it on the helocopter, then we would get new ammo.

We did not have much but we did not have to account for anything.
I could also fly anywhere I wanted to. (my friend had a LOH helocopter) It was all jungle but I had friends on different LZs or firebases and we would trade things.
Sometimes someone would get a block of ice from the airforce in some rear area and we would share it by rolling it. You would take a can of hot 3.2 beer that we sometimes had and roll the can on a piece of ice. In a minute it would get cool them you gave the piece of ice to someone else.
If the piece was big enough we packed it in a mortor can with some styrofoam that some rounds came packed in and we would fly the ice to a different LZ to share it with them.
This is a typical LZ. Those are not tents, we had no tents, they are poncho's that you are suposed to wear. In the rainy season, it never stopped raining as you can see by the mud.
That was as good as it got.




And this is me in my skinnier days

you know the old saying learn to live with what you got . still won't let spam in my house

If I recall right there was a point in the war I want to say 68ish maybe 69 that the M16A1 went to the A2 semi auto version to conserve ammunition, and with it came all the BS of pinching pennies. I want an A1 bad, I got a 90 round drum mag for my AR-15(A2 model civi use) but something about pre-ban full auto and a 90 FMJ rounds in the weeeeeeeee....

The service turned me into a bit of a gun nut.

Bivy's! I love bivy cities.