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My husband wrote this letter to his congressman and senator for the passage of HR2254 and S. 1939 in the next legislative session to be considered ... they need a push to finally make all veterans of Vietnam equal in treatment after 40 years of time. Please send your congressman and senator a similar letter ... google on the web to find the name and address of you representatives in Washington DC.
Dear Congressman or Senator
I know of one former sailor that was aboard the USS Intrepid over in Vietnam who was awarded Agent Orange Exposure by the VA for having drunk the water, bathing in the water and eating meals prepared in the water because everything in Vietnam, even the Gulf of Tonkin, was exposed to Agent Orange. The water that all sailors drank were processed through the same desalination processors that the Australian Navy had processed their salt water from the Gulf of Tonkin.
Apparently the ruling has changed over the years and it apparently has been kept quiet from the media for this unfair and unequal treatment for the thousands of Vietnam Blue Water Navy Veterans who have applied for Agent Orange Exposure for being on the Cruisers, Destroyers, Battleships, Aircraft Carriers and other support ships in Vietnamese waters and fought in the same war as those who were “boots on the ground” soldiers and Navy vets.
For Congress and the Senate living on the belief that Agent Orange miraculously was stopped by a barrier of untold height and untold depth at the beach of Vietnam is not only ridiculous but a major slap in the face to every sailor onboard ship in the Gulf of Tonkin. It is also an insult to all Navy veterans who have spent a tour or two onboard ships while being much less than the arbitrary 30 miles off the coast of Vietnam as defined by our government. It is very well documented that Agent Orange drifted to jungles hundreds of miles away purely on the winds. It would be also presumed that the same Agent Orange, taking the predominant wind direction from land to gulf, would also drift into the gulf and expose all the ships within hundreds of miles from the spraying. Why would anyone in their right mind consider that the rivers of Vietnam did not flow into the Gulf of Tonkin is beyond us. Vietnam would be the only place on Earth where the rivers do not flow into the offshore body of water. All the dioxins and toxins from every spray, not only Agent Orange, drifted down the rivers and into the Gulf of Tonkin. Logic and science does not stop in Vietnam just because members of the US government say so. Here it is 40 years later and we have not been given the same treatment as others of the Vietnam War and with all the same diseases that they have encountered. Yet they are recognized with their disabilities by the VA and WE are not. Only, because they had “boots of the ground” and we had “boots on the deck”.
The navies of Australia and New Zealand have recognized the effects of Agent Orange Exposure through scientific studies and have given their Blue Water Navy sailors the claim for disability. But not our government. That would make the Navy of Down Under even more American than the government of United States of America. They honor their vets and our government just spits on us like so many hippies did to our vets of Vietnam at the time for being “baby killers”.
This fight, between the sailors and the government we went to defend, has been going on for over 40 years? What are the Congressmen and Senators waiting for? All of us to die off from AO exposure related diseases to and then admit they were WRONG after the LAST sailor dies? What a shame!
If our government will not support equally the veterans of these government run wars than it is advised this same government stop entering these wars that cost billions of dollars over the life time of the war only to hear complaints from our government on how much it will cost them to support the veteran when they come home. In the private world it is called “the cost of doing business”.
Don’t let this disgrace by our government last any longer and do the honorable thing. Sponsor HR 2254 and S. 1939 when it appears before you in the future.
Very Truly Yours
