Author: Paul F. Cecil
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 312
Get Book Here
Book Description
In 1961, the United States Air Force began using chemical herbicides as a weapon in South-east Asia. The tactic lasted only ten years, but the controversy it provoked continues to this day. Criticisms range from the charge that the herbicides did irreparable damage to the Asian environment to the recent "Agent Orange" lawsuits claiming that the chemicals have caused U.S. servicemen and their children physical and mental impairments. While much attention has been given to these claims, little light has been cast on the actual history of the herbicidal operation, code-named RANCH HAND. This book is the history of this unique aviation mission, from its conception to its termination. It describes how the operation dispensed over 11 million gallons of chemicals over Southeast Asian jungles and croplands while flying unarmed, obsolescent aircraft at tree-top level. Based on the author's own experiences, hundreds of interviews with RANCH HAND veterans, and careful research of declassified primary sources, this book provides a comprehensive and in-depth view of the men who flew the missions and their role in the events in Southeast Asia. It also reviews the scientific reaction to herbicidal warfare and hoe the controversy that ensued eventually caused the cancellation of the operation. -- from Book Jacket.
Author: Paul Frederick Cecil
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780030017544
Category : Herbicides
Languages : en
Pages : 289
Get Book Here
Book Description
Author: Phuong-Lan Thi Bui
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Agent Orange
Languages : en
Pages : 318
Get Book Here
Book Description
Author: David Zierler
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820339784
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 260
Get Book Here
Book Description
As the public increasingly questioned the war in Vietnam, a group of American scientists deeply concerned about the use of Agent Orange and other herbicides started a movement to ban what they called “ecocide.” David Zierler traces this movement, starting in the 1940s, when weed killer was developed in agricultural circles and theories of counterinsurgency were studied by the military. These two trajectories converged in 1961 with Operation Ranch Hand, the joint U.S.-South Vietnamese mission to use herbicidal warfare as a means to defoliate large areas of enemy territory. Driven by the idea that humans were altering the world’s ecology for the worse, a group of scientists relentlessly challenged Pentagon assurances of safety, citing possible long-term environmental and health effects. It wasn’t until 1970 that the scientists gained access to sprayed zones confirming that a major ecological disaster had occurred. Their findings convinced the U.S. government to renounce first use of herbicides in future wars and, Zierler argues, fundamentally reoriented thinking about warfare and environmental security in the next forty years. Incorporating in-depth interviews, unique archival collections, and recently declassified national security documents, Zierler examines the movement to ban ecocide as it played out amid the rise of a global environmental consciousness and growing disillusionment with the containment policies of the cold war era.
Author: David Zierler
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820338273
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 262
Get Book Here
Book Description
As the public increasingly questioned the war in Vietnam, a group of American scientists deeply concerned about the use of Agent Orange and other herbicides started a movement to ban what they called “ecocide.” David Zierler traces this movement, starting in the 1940s, when weed killer was developed in agricultural circles and theories of counterinsurgency were studied by the military. These two trajectories converged in 1961 with Operation Ranch Hand, the joint U.S.-South Vietnamese mission to use herbicidal warfare as a means to defoliate large areas of enemy territory. Driven by the idea that humans were altering the world's ecology for the worse, a group of scientists relentlessly challenged Pentagon assurances of safety, citing possible long-term environmental and health effects. It wasn't until 1970 that the scientists gained access to sprayed zones confirming that a major ecological disaster had occurred. Their findings convinced the U.S. government to renounce first use of herbicides in future wars and, Zierler argues, fundamentally reoriented thinking about warfare and environmental security in the next forty years. Incorporating in-depth interviews, unique archival collections, and recently declassified national security documents, Zierler examines the movement to ban ecocide as it played out amid the rise of a global environmental consciousness and growing disillusionment with the containment policies of the cold war era.
Author: Gaku Ito
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Get Book Here
Book Description
We investigate the legacies of herbicide warfare on population size and growth in Vietnam, 2001-2020. The identification strategy exploits the flight-level military records and the plausibly exogenous hamlet-level variation in herbicide exposure around the spray-on, direction-change, and spray-off points of fixed-wing aircraft missions, combined with a fuzzy regression kink design. The elasticity estimate suggests that a 5% increase in herbicide exposure in the Vietnam War is associated with a decrease in population size of 0.8-0.99% in 2001 and 1.24-1.43% in 2020. We also find negative associations between herbicide exposure and overall and annual population growth rates, 2001-2020.
Author: Thomas Whiteside
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 232
Get Book Here
Book Description
Author: Peter Sills
Publisher: Vanderbilt University Press
ISBN: 0826519644
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 297
Get Book Here
Book Description
The war in Vietnam, spanning more than twenty years, was one of the most divisive conflicts ever to envelop the United States, and its complexity and consequences did not end with the fall of Saigon in 1975. As Peter Sills demonstrates in Toxic War, veterans faced a new enemy beyond post-traumatic stress disorder or debilitating battle injuries. Many of them faced a new, more pernicious, slow-killing enemy: the cancerous effects of Agent Orange. Originally introduced by Dow and other chemical companies as a herbicide in the United States and adopted by the military as a method of deforesting the war zone of Vietnam, in order to deny the enemy cover, Agent Orange also found its way into the systems of numerous active-duty soldiers. Sills argues that manufacturers understood the dangers of this compound and did nothing to protect American soldiers. Toxic War takes the reader behind the scenes into the halls of political power and industry, where the debates about the use of Agent Orange and its potential side effects raged. In the end, the only way these veterans could seek justice was in the court of law and public opinion. Unprecedented in its access to legal, medical, and government documentation, as well as to the personal testimonies of veterans, Toxic War endeavors to explore all sides of this epic battle.
Author: Edward M. Spiers
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1349198811
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 236
Get Book Here
Book Description
Chemical weapons are still a viable military option. This book assesses their appeal by examining how the agents, munitions and protective equipment of chemical warfare have evolved since 1915; how technological innovations and refinements in weaponry have altered tactical assumptions; and how these weapons have been employed in conflicts from the First World War to the Gulf War. The author argues that the weapon technology has proved inherently dynamic, that a new generation of biochemical agents may soon be available, and that arms control may not be able to curb these developments.
Author: William A. Buckingham
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Government publications
Languages : en
Pages : 272
Get Book Here
Book Description