APRIL 15, 2004
Smoke Signals 7
Vietnam: Agent Orange Is A Silent Killer
LENO continued
from front page
from the orange bands that marked
the fifty-five gallon drums it was
stored in.
The idea was that the V.C.
wouldn't be so hard to kill if they
could see them better by killing the
jungle canopy that protected them.
"It made everything dead and
dry," said Leno. "You could see the
heat waves coming up off the defo
liated areas. It was like a logging
clear cut on a hot summer day, with
the waves just coming up."
Leno, a Tribal Elder, still vividly
remembers his year-long tour in
Vietnam.
The first time he ever came un
der fire was during a routine drop
off at a jungle LZ (landing zone.)
"We were coming in on an LZ be
hind the first lift of choppers," Leno
recalled. "Each lift had 5 choppers.
Our lift came down and the V.C.
opened fire. An R.P.G. (rocket pro
pelled grenade) round went right
in front of our helicopter. We were
still about six feet in the air and I
just jumped out. I didn't want to be
in that big of a target."
The shooting was coming from a
bunker behind a tree line. Leno and
his unit took cover and popped col
ored smoke on their position. Then
Cobra attack helicopters came in,
two at a time and opened up with
mini guns and M79 grenade
launchers, blasting the bunker to
pieces.
Afterwards, the soldiers went to
search, but the bunker, and it's oc
cupants, were blown to bits.
"It was the first time anyone had
ever shot at me," said Leno.
It would not be the last.
A few months later, as the pla
toon was getting ready to be flown
out, the VC fired a harassment gre
nade launcher round into the base.
Harassment rounds are fired at
random, to unnerve the enemy and
keep his head down. Only this one
landed right in front of where Leno
was standing.
"I had just walked up to answer
this guy's question..." Leno said.
"...And kaboom!... if you've ever
had a camera flash go off in your
eyes, it was like that, just a bright,
bright, white light. I woke up and
saw a puddle of blood and thought:
somebody's been hit. It was me."
After coming to, Leno discovered
he had shrapnel in his chest, stom
ach, legs and one splinter in his
right eye, 9 pieces in all. The med
ics came and hauled him away.
Later, his buddies from the com
pany came and saw him at Cam
Rahn Bay hospital; wounds heal
ing and his head covered in ban
dages. They told him he looked "like hell."
Undaunted, Leno recovered from
his wounds and immediately re
joined his unit.
During his tour in Vietnam, Leno
was in several firefights and am
bushes, earning him his Combat
Infantryman's Badge, which is
awarded for spending at least sixty
days under fire, and his Air Medal,
for participating in more than 25
aerial missions over hostile territory.
He received two commendation
medals for Distinguished Service
and a Purple Heart, for wounds suf
fered during the grenade attack. I Ie
served his country dutifully, never
thinking that the Army would do
anything to knowingly harm him.
Which is why he felt betrayed
when he began to learn, years later,
about the grim facts surrounding
the Army's use of Agent Orange.
Agent Orange was created in a
laboratory at the University of Chi
cago during WWII. Working on ex
perimental plant growth, Professor
E.J. Kraus, chairman of the schools
botany department, discovered that
causing the plants to experience
sudden uncontrolled growth could
kill certain broadleaf
vegetation. It was
similar to giving the
plants cancer. Think
ing that this discovery
might be of some use
to the war effort,
Kraus contacted the
War Department.
Army scientists tested
the plant hormones
but found no use for
them before the war
ended.
After minimal ex
perimentation in
1961, a variety of
chemical agents were
shipped to Vietnam to
aid in anti-guerilla
efforts. The chemicals
were to be used to de
stroy food sources and
eliminate foliage that
concealed enemy
troop movements.
The military, how
ever, sprayed herbi
cides at six to 25 times
the strength sug
gested by the manu
facturer, Dow Chemi
cals. Leno and the troops
on the ground lived
in a chemical mist of
herbicides. They slept
with it, drank it in
their water, ate it in their food and
breathed it when it dropped out of
the air in a fine, white mist.
"They sprayed it everywhere,"
said Leno. "It was everywhere
in the air, in the water. If your were
in-country, you were exposed to it."
The spraying continued un
abated for most of the war, even
though, according to military
records, it was having minimal ef
fect on the enemy. A series of
memorandums uncovered in the
National Archives and now de
classified indicate that defoliation
killed a lot of plants, but had little
real effect on military operations.
As soldiers who had served in
Vietnam attempted to settle back
into civilian life following their
tours, some of them began to de
velop unusual health problems.
There were skin and liver diseases
and an abnormal number of can
cers to soft tissue organs such as the
lungs and stomach.
And in a recently released report,
the National Academy of Sciences'
Institute of Medicine found "sug
gestive" evidence of a link between
Type-2 diabetes and Agent Orange
and other herbicides used in Viet
nam. There also seemed to be an
unusually high number of birth
defects and learning disorders
among children born to Vietnam
Veterans who had been exposed to
Agent Orange.
Some Veterans developed a pain
ful skin rash know as chloracne.
Similarly, Leno has had an un
explained rash on his hands and
forearms for years.
Leno has also experienced the
wild mood swings that are symp
tomatic of exposure. "As anyone can
tell you, I was pretty crazy," he said.
"I had a terrible temper. I used to
drink and get into fights, and I
wasn't out to just hurt the other guy;
fTTTfr K-"s-x -I
i A:;2 in f-J T I
s m "
Yesterday And Today Tribal Elder Tom Leno holds a photo
of himself taken on his graduation from Advanced Infantry Training in
1 968. Leno has been diagnosed with Type-2 Adult Onset Diabetes,
which he believes is linked to his exposure to the defoliant Agent
Orange during his tour in Vietnam. Photo by Peta Tinda
you know, a couple punches and
he's had enough. I wanted to de
stroy him . . . and it didn't take much
to set me off."
Many of these Veterans were
found to have high levels of diox
ins in their blood, but scientists and
the U.S. government insisted that
there was no link between their ill
nesses and Agent Orange.
Even though the VA now ac
knowledges the effects of Agent
Orange on soldiers and families,
and treats Vets like Leno, more Vet
erans and their children continue
to suffer from the effects.
One of Leno's daughters has dys
lexia and he fears there may be
more unidentified, long-term effects.
"I don't really care about me, but
knowing that it could affect my kids
it ain't right," he said.
Leno knows that he can expect
his life to be shortened by diabetes.
He lives with the daily insulin
injections and poor health from
having high blood sugar.
He has been diagnosed with Post
Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD),
which he says has been getting
worse since the Iraq war began.
This is a common occurrence
among Veterans, said Mike Max
well, Coordinator for the Portland
Veterans Administration Medical
Center's PTSD Program. Many Vet
erans find that they can't stop
watching the war coverage on TV
and watch constantly. Others find
themselves more nervous, anxious
and agitated. Many have trouble
sleeping.
"We see a lot more of
this whenever there's
more than a few days of
conflict on TV. A lot of
Vets have been coming
in this last year, since
the start of the Iraq
war," said Maxwell.
"We've been seeing a
steady stream of Vets
seeking treatment for
PTSD since the war
broke out."
Leno has had diffi
culty sleeping soundly
since the start of the
war.
"I have nightmares,
and whenever I hear a
loud noise, like a car
backfiring, I jump, like I
did when I first got back."
Leno's 16-year-old
daughter, Lisa, has also
noticed changes in her
father since the Iraq
war began.
"He used to not jump
when he wakes up. Now
when he wakes up he's
all shaky... it's not
right," she said. "He
served his country and
he has a lot of medals.
I'm really proud of him.
But I think they (the
Army) should have known the ef
fects," she said.
Leno has also noted the numbers
of Veterans returning home from
today's conflicts with Gulf War
Syndrome and other illnesses. He
encourages them to seek help as
soon as possible.
"Veteran's who are returning
should try to go get checked out. If
not for themselves, then for their
kids," said Leno.
What Leno would really like to
see is closure. Every day he lives
with the uncertainty of the un
known side effects of Agent Orange.
It is closure he knows he may
never see. Despite this, Leno re
mains dedicated to his homeland.
"I believe that this is the greatest
country in the world," he said. "I'm
still very proud of the job we did."