Agent Orange pain: the endless tragedy

The \"frozen\" pain

There are people who are frozen in both mental and physical pain at birth. Then, they themselves cannot answer the question \"who they are\" and live in silence for years, even for decades...

Victim Vu Thi Hanh lives at Dong Nam commune, Dong Son district, Thanh Hoa province who are contracted many serious diseases due to the sequeale of Agent Orange

Vu Thi Hanh’s age of 34 seems to be hiden in the body of a 10-year-old child. She hides herself in a small, close, ill-lighted room all year long. The room is occasionally opened, only when her health is good. Stooping her head, Hanh sits silently on the bed that seems to be part of her life. Not as luckly as her three brothers and sister, upon her birth, she has been infected with Agent Orange which she inherits from her father, Mr. Vu Tien Su, who used to fight in the Quang Tri battlefield for many years. Due to her congenital paralysis and her haemophila, for decades, Hanh has to stay in bed until recently, she began to practice sitting. With a senseless face and soulless eyes, she sometimes smiles innocently, but her smile is incomplete because of her cleft palate. Ignoring the conversation and questions of other people around, Hanh seems to have her own secret world which is evolving around turbidity.

We came to another victim, Mr. Nguyen Van Dua (Hai Chau ward, Nghi Son town, Thanh Hoa province) when it was getting dark. In the twilight, his dull eyes sunken deep in his eye sockets seem to be fighting fiercely with the little light at the end of the day. After years of fighting in the Binh Tri Thien battlefield, he had thought of a new life for him. But grief and pain kept coming to him. His wife suddenly passed away, leaving 6 small children, 5 of whom are mute, deaf, clubbed - the legacy of Agent Orange from their father. The hard life of a single dad seemingly keeps clinging to him without end. Luckily, he met a woman who sympathised with his grief, agreed to stay with him and help him take care of his disabled children. Fortunately, his disabled children kept growing up day by day and they are now able to work for their own living. Although life is still hard, for the 76-year-old man, it is more or less acceptable.

Trans-generation pain is not something rare in the houses of Agent Orange victims. Mr. Nguyen Xuan Thien’s family is famous all across Dong Nam commune, Dong Son district, for having 5 children among whom 3 his daughters are mentally ill, blind and cannot take care for themselves. Therefore, for nearly 40 years now, he and his wife have become their helping hands. At normal times, his three daughters, who are over 30 and nearly 40 years old, behave like sensible children. However, this is not always the case. When they have nervous attack, they become abnormally fierce, biting and beating their parents. At that time, despite their painful bodies and their tired mind, the old father dares not to give up and leave their children unattended. Thien confided that: “If I kept my negative thinking, now I don’t even have a house. For me, I have to shoulder my own family, not to rest on other”.

For the parents, maybe there is nothing worse than seeing their children pass away. Mr. Do Khanh Hoa (Linh Toai commune, Ha Trung district) understands this more than any others. His second daughter, Do Thuy Linh, who was born in 1987, died in 2020, ending her unconscious life due to severe intellectual disability. All the four people left in his family, including his wife and his two children, are victims of Agent Orange. His life is no more than a tragedy as he still has to take care of his wife and his children for dozens of years now while he himself is a victim of Agent Orange. However, he still feels happy as long as his wife and his children are alive. His only worry is that one day when he passes away, who will take care of his wife and his children.

Those are some among thousands of victims of Agent Orange, who still keep maintaining their life. Despite the pain and hardship, their existence deserves our respect.

The silent “struggle”

Perhaps, in the history of human war, there is no chemical war that is so long, large and destructive like the one that the U.S waged in Vietnam. Being coded “Operation Trail Dust”, during the 10 year time span (from 1961 to 1971), the US military sprayed as much as 80 litres of toxic chemical (most of which was Agent Orange/dioxin) onto nearly one fourth of the south of Vietnam. As a consequence, as many as 4.8 million of Vietnamese people was exposed to the toxin, including 300.000 war participants and their children who have been defined as victims of Agent Orange.

Chemical war is considered warfare of utmost barbarism which causes incredible destruction and long lasting sequelae for human and the environment. Dioxin has a very high and stable toxicity in the body, causing impaired immune system, endocrine system disorders, metabolic disorders, genetic damage... Therefore, it can cause many diseases to the victims simultaneously. Through investigations, in the period between 2000 and 2020, Thanh Hoa province had 18,933 war participants their children becoming victims of Agent Orange. Also during this period, 4,321 victims died from severe diseases. However, the victims alive are really miserable and tormented. They even can’t do the most basic functions of a human, such as eating, walking, speaking, working, etc. Many of them haven’t enjoyed the life of a true human a day.

Behind the war of bombs and chemicals is a silent \"struggle\" in everyday life. The parents, who spent half their lives for wars, now are struggling every day for the lives of their disabled children. This \"struggle\" may last 20, 30, 40 years, or even all their life. However, it is them who represent for a fact that the love of parents for their children is like no other things on earth. No rule can apply to that love which can surmount all barriers. For this reason, the children, despite their disabilities and pain, are still cared and loved by their parents so that when the dawn breaks, the hope for a miracle still sparks in the silent houses.