Vietnam War > THEN THE AMERICANS CAME > Mr. Dich

I WANT TO KNOW if the American veterans were affected by defoliants and toxic chemicals, because during all the years we marched south, the American army used them to clear the forests. The soldiers who fought at the front, south of Quang Tri, suffered sperm damage. If you go to Dac Lac and Pleiku, the people there can show you exactly where the Americans dropped the stuff. You can still find containers full of toxic chemicals. These "bitter mines," as we called them, since they leave a bitter taste, were very dangerous. After the war, my second child was born and died right away. My wife was strong, but the child was deformed. With the third child, the same thing, but the Swedish Hospital in hanoi saved him. He is only four years old but he has intestinal problems. Doctors think his intestines are shrinking. They say when he grows up they can fix it. Now they give him medication.

The worst time was the bombing in 1972. It destroyed Kham Tien Street in Hanoi, and Bach Mai Hospital. But a lot of people were killed in the South, too, in battle. We would draw a map to remember where we buried our comrades.

The Americans came to Vietnam to conduct a war, and to kill Vietnamese people. That means they were the aggressors. The puppet soldiers were also Vietnamese but they were Americanized, meaning they listened to the Americans and took up arms against their own people. For those soldiers we have more sympathy than hatred. To this day we think of the Americans as the enemy. Our children have no fathers. The Americans killed a generation. They owe us, for the next generation.

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