Agent Orange recovery in jeopardy 50 years after the fall of Saigon

Yahoo

30-04-2025

It was an aggressive mission that turned the lush green landscape a desolate brown.
For almost a decade, as America tried to stamp out enemy fighters lurking in the jungle, US aircraft doused Vietnam with 20 million gallons of herbicides in a campaign codenamed Operation Ranch Hand. Forests were stripped bare; rice paddies left barren.
In the end, the toxic mission could not halt the Northern Vietnamese communists – who, exactly 50 years ago, delivered a final, humiliating blow to the US and its allies, bursting through the gates of South Vietnam's presidential palace in T-54 tanks.
Saigon fell on April 30, 1975, bringing an end to decades of war and triggering the country's reunification. Now one of the world's fastest-growing economies and a popular tourist hotspot, Vietnam is this week marking 50 years of peace with military parades, a drone light show and picnics on streets lined with red and gold flags.
But for millions of people, the struggle against Operation Ranch Hand never ended.
Herbicidal warfare – especially the use of Agent Orange – has left a toxic legacy of environmental damage and severe health issues, from cancer to birth defects. Estimates suggest as many as three million people have been affected, including roughly 150,000 children born with serious developmental problems.
Yet efforts to clean up contamination and help those affected are now in jeopardy, another victim of the chaos caused by the Trump administration's sweeping aid cuts. According to a Washington Post tally, at least 34 of 43 USAID contracts in Vietnam were axed.
'This has been gut-wrenching in so many ways, especially the uncertainty,' said Susan Hammond, executive director of the War Legacies Project, which works on the long-term consequences of conflict in the region.
'We're been advocating for so long to reach this point. To now see programmes… so abruptly cut – it's [a] huge setback,' she told the Telegraph from Vietnam.
When the war ended, the US was eager to move on and largely turned its back on Vietnam. It was 20 years before diplomatic relations were normalised, and another decade before the governments overcame a deadlock to collaborate on the continued issues posed by Agent Orange.
Roughly 12 million gallons of the defoliant were sprayed in Vietnam and in parts of Laos and Cambodia, as America sought to wipe out enemy cover. Amid the herbicide mix was a highly toxic substance: dioxin.
While some of the health implications of dioxin exposure have proved hard to scientifically confirm – for instance, birth defects – there's a broad consensus that it poses serious health risks. A 2018 US National Academies report found 'sufficient' or 'suggestive' evidence linking it to 19 conditions including cancer, strokes and Parkinson's disease.
In the immediate aftermath of the conflict the Vietnamese provided some support to impacted families, while fencing off the heavily contaminated sites where Agent Orange was still seeping into the environment, such as Da Nang airport.
With US backing, these projects expanded in the last 15 years. In 2024 the US Congress had an annual budget of $30 million for victims of Agent Orange and unexploded ordnance, funding everything from training for physiotherapists and specialist nurses, to speech therapy and education programmes. Another $35 million was allocated to clean up the final dioxin hotspot – a former US airbase in Bien Hoa.
But when Donald Trump, the US President, issued a stop-work order for all foreign assistance in January, these efforts were paused overnight and their future thrown into turmoil.
In Bien Hoa, bulldozers that were cleaning up more than 280,000 cubic metres of highly contaminated soil suddenly stopped. Although this work has been resumed, niggling doubts have been introduced about a previously steadfast commitment to the complex process.
'It's an enormous volume of soil – even the most heavily contaminated portion would fill over 47,000 dump trucks,' said Charles Bailey, co-author of the book 'From Enemies to Partners: Vietnam, the US and Agent Orange'.
Less than half of the soil has so far been cleaned, he added, and the most heavily contaminated material will need to be put in an incinerator set to 300 degrees for one month. The furnace has not yet been built and Washington is yet to approve a contractor.
'The government of Vietnam does work on this, but it lacks the resources to do this alone. It is a huge project… and there is a cost to stopping any super fund site when you've started. That is the cost of failing to complete it and possibly make the situation worse.'
With bipartisan support in Congress, Mr Bailey is optimistic that the Trump administration will 'see the value' and ensure the clean-up is completed. In the short term, he is more concerned about disruption to programmes supporting individuals.
'Currently, the health and disability assistance program was unterminated in eight of the ten provinces,' said Mr Bailey. 'However funding has returned in fits and starts, and for the NGO implementing the program in three of the eight [provinces], resumption came too late.
'As a result of the shut off of funds, it had to stop services and let go all its field staff – it doesn't have the wherewithal to restart its work.
'This stoppage of the program, not on paper, but in practical terms on the ground, has severe consequences for all the children and young adults with severe disabilities who until February were being reached and helped,' he said.
Humanity & Inclusion, which operated two USAID-funded rehabilitation programmes in Vietnam, is one of the NGOs affected. Its experience also suggests it is not always as simple as turning a tap back on.
While the organisation received a letter to restart activities on March 5, a spokesperson told the Telegraph they have not received the next round of funding. They have also had to re-apply for approval from the Vietnamese government, which is yet to arrive.
War Legacies' Ms Hammond said the turmoil is feeding into a wider uncertainty about what will happen to work for Agent Orange survivors in the future.
Many of the programmes had contracts due to end this year or next but, given the Trump administration's 'America First' agenda, it's not clear if their work will continue to be a priority.
NGOs on the ground are also unsure how to apply for more funds, as Vietnam's USAID office has closed, and some 100 USAID officials working on projects in the country have been fired.
'The uncertainty makes it really hard to know what the future is going to be,' Ms Hammond said, warning that there is no obvious alternative to step into the gap. 'It's not clear who else can provide the scale of the support – and the US is morally responsible.'
Half a century on from the fall of Saigon, Ms Hammond is in the city – long since renamed Ho Chi Minh City – as events aimed at celebrating peace and unity unfold.
She said the atmosphere in the streets is electric. But in government circles, there's also an undercurrent of 'shock' at the possibility of a new shift in US-Vietnam relations as US aid cuts bite – and President Trump threatens a 46 per cent tariff on Vietnamese goods.
'The last 10 years has shown that the [US and Vietnam] can work together on a really divisive issue,' said Ms Hammond.
'You still can't prove who's an Agent Orange victim precisely,' she said. 'But to get to this point where the US was acknowledging through their actions that these people exist and these people need help, and now to have that taken away, potentially, and the funding not reinstated fully – it is painful. Really painful. Particularly for people affected.'
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