When I went to look for an image for this post Google found for me the most horrific images of children and people with birth defects from Agent Orange. I can’t bring myself to post them but if you google Agent Orange, selecting images, I am sure you will find them too. You will need a strong stomach.

The Image: A light plane sprays some of the 19 million gallons of defoliant used in Viet Nam. Each plane could destroy 350 acres of forest per run. A spray run took less than 4 minutes, used 1,000 gallons of Agent Orange and was often sprayed by 3 planes flying side by side. That meant 1 run equalled 1,000 acres of jungle destroyed.

I would like to dedicate this post to all those who have had their lives ruined by Agent Orange. Kia Kaha.

The war in Vietnam lasted from 1959 to 1975. In Vietnam it is often referred to as the American War. It was fought between the communist Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) and their allies, and the US-backed Republic of Vietnam in the south. It ended with the defeat of South Vietnam in April 1975. By then nearly one and a half million soldiers and at least two million civilians had died during the war.

Of course I write about these things from a New Zealand perspective.

The Vietnam War was the first war for New Zealand in which we were not fighting alongside what had previously been our traditional ally, Great Britain. Instead, our participation was a  reflection of the then increasing defence ties with the United States and Australia via the ANZUS Treaty (this treaty is now defunct following our Nuclear Free policy of the eighties). New Zealand's involvement in Vietnam was highly controversial here, attracting protest and condemnation, and by the end of the sixties thousands were marching against the war. Following the 1972 election of the Norman Kirk-led Labour government all remaining New Zealand troops in Vietnam were withdrawn.

The war might have been over but the effects are not.

Agent Orange Spraying In Vietnam

From 1962 until 1970 in Quang Tri and throughout much of South Vietnam, going from the far south and the Mekong Delta region right through the Central Highlands to the DMZ, the United States sprayed nearly twenty million gallons of herbicides, including 11.2 million gallons of Agent Orange, onto forests, jungles, and farmland in order to deny cover and food to the enemy forces. U.S. Air Force C-123s pumped out the deadly poison - each plane was capable of spreading up to three gallons per acre in 240-foot-wide swaths, killing all vegetation beneath. Further, American soldiers sprayed riverbanks from boats and used handheld sprayers and trucks to treat areas surrounding hundreds of U.S. bases. As we all know, American, Australian and New Zealand veterans and their families have lived with the effects of Agent orange contamination which include cancers and birth defects ever since.

Throughout it all, the Pentagon kept meticulous records of spray missions, which, when mapped now, create crisscrossed patterns of thousands of intersecting lines that blacken province after province.

According to Vietnam Ministry of Foreign Affairs, there are still 4.8 million Vietnamese people thought to be victims of Agent Orange. They live mainly in mountainous area along Truong Son (Long Mountains) and border between Vietnam and Cambodia. These people together with their affected descendants are living in sub-standard conditions and with many genetic diseases. The deadly mark left by Agent Orange on the natural environment of Vietnam includes the destruction of mangrove forests and the long-term poisoning of soil and crops. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has listed prostate cancer, respiratory cancers, multiple myeloma, type II diabetes, Hodgkin’s disease, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, soft tissue sarcoma, chloracne, porphyria cutanea tarda, peripheral neuropathy, and spina bifida in children of veterans exposed to Agent Orange as side effects of the herbicide.

And in another twist...

Agent Orange: "We've buried it under New Plymouth"

In 2001 a former top official from lvon Watkins Dow chemical factory has confirmed the worst fears of residents - part of the town may be sitting on a secret toxic waste dump containing the deadly Vietnam War defoliant Agent Orange. He stated that the company owned a large piece of land "very close to the chemical plant, which we called 'the Experimental Farm'. We bulldozed big pits and dumped thousands of tonnes of chemicals there."

"There have been rumours circulating for some time, never proven, that IWD was supplying the defoliant Agent Orange to be used in the Vietnam War. The allegation is true. I was on the management committee of Ivon Watkins Dow, and I supported the plan to export Agent Orange. In fact, it went ahead on my casting vote", he said. "People who'd served in the armed forces made a strong case for the need to defoliate the jungle, because of the risk to servicemen from ambush or sniper fire from the undergrowth. Our scientists relied on assurances and technical data provided to them by Dow Chemicals in the USA. We were led to believe it was safe. The whole reason I supported Agent Orange is because we thought we were giving our boys on the ground a hand. To avoid detection, we shipped the Agent Orange to South America - Mexico if I recall correctly - and it was onshipped to its final destination from there."

“Agent Orange was made from two chemicals, "2,4-D and 2,4,5,T. When they're apart, they're herbicides. Mixed together, they become Agent Orange. Now at this time, in the late 1960s and early seventies, the Government had given IWD the exclusive licence to manufacture those chemicals. We made all of the 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T that was produced in New Zealand. No one else was allowed to. Technically, we shipped the chemicals unmixed, so technically they weren't Agent Orange until somebody mixed them at the final destination."

According to this man, IWD's role in manufacturing the deadly herbicide had resulted from a US approach to the New Zealand Government, and the Defence Ministry had sounded out whether IWD could provide 500,000 gallons of it, quickly. Although news of the plan later leaked out, the National Government tried to distance itself and the impression was left that the Agent Orange deal never went ahead. Given that official US reports record that around 9 million gallons of Agent Orange were dumped on Vietnam, the size of the NZ contract was reasonably substantial. It turns out that leftover Agent Orange chemicals, complete with “excess nasties” were re-worked into the 2,4,5-T herbicide for use on farms within New Zealand, and surplus chemicals were dumped at the Experimental Farm, which is now believed to lie underneath the New Plymouth suburb of Paritutu.

There have been many people who have done great things in our world and they are not always remembered or even known. This powerful post by one of my contacts is one of these and well worth taking time to read.

This book is about one of the very dark chapters of Australian Aboriginal history. The "Aboriginal Protection Act" of 1897 allowed the authorities "to cause every Aboriginal within any district [...] to be removed to, and kept within the limits of, any reserve". In addition, article 31 allowed them to provide "for the care, custody, and education of the children of Aboriginals" and prescribed "the conditions on which any Aboriginal or half-caste children may be apprenticed to, or placed in service with, suitable persons".

Children as young as babies were forcibly taken from their families to be placed in girls and boys homes, foster families or missions. At the age of 18 they were 'released' into white society, often scarred for life by their experiences.

Today these Aboriginal people are collectively known as the 'Stolen Generations' because it was not just one generation which was affected by children being taken away. Many of these people are still searching for their families even today.

This is the true story of three girls, Molly, Gracie and Daisy, written years later by one of their daughters, Doris Pilkington. Molly, Gracie and Daisy are "half-caste", (actually I really dislike that term), mixed-race Aboriginal children living together with their family of the Mardu people at Jigalong, Western Australia until a constable, a "Protector" in the sense of the Act, comes to take the three girls away with him. The girls are placed in the Moore River Native Settlement north of Perth, some 1,600 kilometres away from their home. Most children this was done to never saw their parents again. Thousands are still trying to find them.

This story is different. The three girls manage to escape from the torturing and authoritarian rule of the settlement's head. Guided by the rabbit-proof fence, which, at that time ran from north to south through Western Australia, they walk the long distance back to their family.

The book was made into a film "Rabbit Proof Fence" in 2002, and directed by Philip Noyce.

In February of this year the new Labour Prime Minister of Australia made a public apology to the Aboriginal people.

Judith Bell and her husband Nelson Bell had a young family, a promising manufacturing business, and a passionate determination to get ahead. When The Warehouse came calling with a big order, they thought their dreams had come true but within four years they had lost almost everything.

This book is Judith's story about her battle to save her family and business. This is a deeply disturbing story, because what she writes about is not just the story of her factory closing due to the pressure of the cheap imported competition, but is in fact the story of the deliberate manoeuvres by The Warehouse to destroy the local competition of their cheap overseas suppliers. Judith and Nelson Bell were manufacturing LPG cylinders and were in fact supplying them at the same price as the imported cylinders.

This story is also an in-depth scrutiny at the power of The Warehouse and other big-box retailers over local businesses, councils, the media, the government, the New Zealand economy and people who go shopping. As well, Judith has written searingly on the human cost of cheap foreign imports into our country and about why free-trade agreements will continue to destroy New Zealand jobs.

The Warehouse is New Zealand's largest retailer with approximately 130 stores throughout our country and a huge annual sales revenue. It came into being following the nineteen-eighties deregulating and liberalising of our economy. The chain probably has strong similarities with the American Walmart, and in fact the original owner of The Warehouse visited with directors of Walmart and learnt from them before he opened his first Warehouse store.

For people not so familiar with New Zealand, the title of this book "I See Red" is a play on the classic Split Enz song "I See Red" and on the fact that all of the large barn-like Warehouse stores are painted bright red.

Corporations carry out some of the most horrific human rights abuses of modern times, but it is increasingly difficult to hold them to account. Economic globalization and the rise of transnational corporate power have created a favorable climate for corporate human rights abusers, which are governed principally by the codes of supply and demand and show genuine loyalty only to their stockholders.

Though it isn't easy, we can check the power of corporations—and citizens around the world are stepping up to do it. Global Exchange developed this list of some of the world's worst corporate abusers to illustrate that on issues as diverse as assassination, torture, kidnapping, environmental degradation, abusing public funds, violently repressing political rights, releasing toxins into pristine environments, destroying homes, discrimination, and causing widespread health problems, familiar companies like Dow Chemical, Coca Cola, Caterpillar, Lockheed, Philip Morris, and Wal-Mart play a big role. Now we need you to take action!

Please check this link to Flavour's site and read...