"WE, CANADIAN AO VICTIMS, HAVE TOO MUCH IN COMMON, TOO MANY OF THE SAME PAINS AND SORROWS, TOO MANY IDENTICAL STORIES AND TOO MANY OF THE SAME BATTLES YET TO WIN, WITH THE VIETNAMESE A0 VICTIMS."

My name is Kenneth H Young and I am here from Canada to speak about Canada\'s own dirty little secret, Agent Orange.

First I would like to thank VAVA for inviting me here and assure them that we Canadians AO Victims are behind you.

Canada started to produce, test and use Agent Orange in 1956 the year that Canadian Forces Base (CFB) Gagetown located in NB Canada, was first opened.

CFB Gagetown is 1100 mi² or 704,000 acre and according to the DNDs own documentation, only 181,000 acres were sprayed with chemicals. Because many of the sites were sprayed every two years, this is misleading and with over 3.3 million pounds and litres of chemicals used at CFB Gagetown, it means that many areas have received more than 100 pounds or litres per acre.

Late in 1972 (Recce Platoon 1 RCR) was sent to Gagetown to participate in Exercise Running Jump II, as the enemy. After a week warm up we were given a few days off in order to relocate the Division.

A few friends and I wished to go fishing and were given permission and a 3/4 ton truck to get us there. After having no luck in some lakes, we decided to go to yet another location and to our surprise found ourselves in the middle of Division HQ.

Although it was an honest mistake they couldn\'t very well leave their HQ and surrounding regiments where we (the enemy) knew about, and I am sure as every soldier here knows if you make a General unhappy, it won\'t be long before he returns the favour as we were soon to find out.

That night my whole platoon was transported to a location in the dark, given compass reading and told to follow them until we came out the other side, where we would be picked up in the morning. We were in a tangle of dead and cut hardwood trees, which were left lying where they fell. We crawled, stumbled and scrambled over branches, stumps often six feet above the ground only to tumble bouncing off branches to the dusty dead ground below, you see there was no moon that night and we had no lights.

It wasn\'t long before we began to have an awful taste in our mouths but only having a slight bit of water we swallowed rather than rinse and spit out. It took US close to ten hours to make our way through. When we emerged we were covered with dust, our faces, clothes and even our hair were all the same colour and it stunk, but we were happy to get back to camp and wash up.

About two weeks later I experienced flu like symptoms, diarrhea, cramps, nausea and so on and now that I checked my military medical documentation it was a twice or three time a year thing, until 1974 when the cramps became so bad that I could no longer stand and was placed in the Hospital where I stayed for six months.

Six months, hundreds of tests, two operations later and down to 63 pounds weight I was sent home to die, because the hospital could not do anything more for me. I was missing my spleen and a number of swollen glands for reasons unknown. I have to this day never been told what I had, why I was sick or why I had lost so much weight.

1974 spleen removed- immune problem

1977 left the military for medical reasons.

1. diagnosed colon Cancer- half colon removed.
2. diagnosed diabetes.

In 2005 the first clue Of AO was finally released to the public when a General who served in CFB Gagetown was awarded the first Agent Orange disability pension.

Shortly thereafter A few friends and I formed the AOAC the Agent Orange Association Of Canada, got ourselves educated about the Rainbow Chemicals, started a law suit against the government of Canada and tried to get properly organized.

Our Class Action Law suit has in effect been rejected, because as the court put it, it happened too long ago, too many chemicals are in question, to many people are involved, and too many medical conditions are involved for the courts to sort out.

The Canadian Government spent over $8 million and I would think that both Monsanto and Dow Chemical spent at least the same for a total of at least $24 million to prevent US from ever getting to court.

One of the lawyer\'s final arguments to the courts as reported to me was, \"How can they possibly prove that Dioxin was the cause of their medical conditions, when we also sprayed them with 26 other chemicals,\" which is in my opinion a very sad commentary for our legal system.

Our Government instead chooses to fine the smallest chemical use which could be successfully segregated from all of the rest and gave these people an ex-gratia payment of $20,000. This happened to be for a two and one half barrels spraying, done by the US Military, in Gagetown, in 1966 /67, for all of seven days.

This allowed them to compensate around 4,000 victims, without ever saying that they were sorry or accepting any guilt or responsibility for any of the harm done, and allowed the Government of Canada to publically claim to have finally dealt with the Gagetown Agent Orange Issue.

The actual amount of Canadian soldiers to have trained during the 29 year defoliation program was 415,000.

The Canadian Government sprayed over 5,500 barrels plus 2.2 million pounds of dry chemicals for a total of 3.3 million pounds or litres of the very same chemicals Canada was shipping to the US for use in Vietnam.

But there were a further 2 or 3 hundred thousand US military, 200,000 British military and many more from other countries who also trained there.

In Closing, if I may; I am not sure how things work here in Vietnam but in Canada or at least with the Veterans, we call each other Brothers and Sisters, which many have extended to Civilian AO Victims.

We Canadian AO Victims have too much in common, too many of the same pains and sorrows, too many identical stories and too many of the same battles yet to win, with the Vietnamese AO Victims to be anything but your Brothers and Sisters.

Thank you.