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PDF versionVietnamese still dying from U.S. artillery shells
by Thomas C. Fox on Aug. 01, 2011
Remember the effects of our wars linger for many, many years. Just saw this AP story from Haonoi:
A Vietnam War-era artillery shell has exploded, killing three farmers who were cutting it up for scrap metal in central Vietnam.
Police say two of the men died at the scene and another died on the way to a hospital following the incident Saturday.
Tieu Viet Thanh, police chief in Binh Chau village in Quang Ngai province, said Monday that the men, who were aged 52 to 55, had collected the 105-millimeter shell near a beach in the village. The village, a former stronghold of North Vietnamese communist forces, suffered bombardment and artillery fire from American and South Vietnamese forces during the war.
Vietnamese government figures show unexploded ordnance has killed more than 42,000 people and wounded some 62,000 since the war ended in 1975.
My question: What is our moral responsibility?
One of the things that most
One of the things that most people do no understand about ordnance, such as artillery shells, bombs, etc, is that a lot of them don't explode and while appearding inert, are armed and very dangerous. After the First World War, many French farmers will killed plowing fields that contained unexploded ordnance from the war. Mines are just as bad if not worse. War leaves a lot of very bad and dangerous residue, which can maim and kill decades after the war is supposidly over.
we remain about the only
we remain about the only nation producing and stockpiling tons of cluster bombs, including in Australia which has banned them but permits them to our stockpiles and transfer stations
The AP article doesn't say it
The AP article doesn't say it was a US shell, although your title makes that claim. The North Vietnamese used 105mm ammunition, too, especially when they captured US weapons and ordnance.
bob blames the victim
bob blames the victim
When I saw a picture of the
When I saw a picture of the US "first lady" and kid wearing AoDai, I knew the war was over. We are officially friends now, and our moral whatever is pretty simple community of nations stuff. I'm sure there are lots of US soldiers who would respond gladly to a request to go over and give lectures on EOD, including many Vietnam war vets.
As for WWII, we definately took too damn long to get over that. US soldiers chose to stay there after the war to help Germans, and there was lots of love for them in the '50's culture, but the racist propaganda kept going well through the '60's, and I didn't consider that one over until we made the movie "Valkyrie".
Nils K. Hammer
I mentioned this to an old
I mentioned this to an old soldier, and he told me the he is in an organization of US Veterans who go to Vietnam to build infrastructure and talk to people. He had lots of stories about how the local veterans were much like the US veterans.
http://www.friendsofdanang.org/
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