On January 3, 1968, in an opening salvo of the Tet Offensive, North Vietnamese soldiers launched a furious attack on all three bases in the Que Son Valley. Wounded by one of the first rockets, George kept fighting through the night, and when medivac choppers arrived at dawn to pick up the dead and wounded, he refused to get on board until his commanding officer ordered him to do so.
George had seen many young men lose arms and legs or get carried away from firefights in body bags, and as the killing escalated and casualties mounted, he began to question the war.
“In the first few months, most of our battles centered around recapturing large plantations from the Vietcong. And I had no idea, none, that the United States had financial interests in Vietnam. I mean, I didn’t know anything about Vietnam before I came there. None of us did. The American people didn’t either.
“But I’d also come to realize that the Vietnamese are incredible people, very peaceful, with an ancient culture. And I couldn’t understand why we were killing the very people and destroying the country I thought I’d come over to protect.”
In spite of his doubts and serious injuries, Sergeant Mizo had insisted on remaining behind with his fellow soldiers: “I didn’t want to leave. We came together. They were more than my men. They were my friends. My brothers.”4
Yet at the height of the all-night battle, George experienced an epiphany: “For the first time I saw clearly. Everything stopped. It was like a movie. This isn’t about democracy versus communism. This isn’t about God’s will. This is bullshit. This is a horror created by men, for whatever reason—politics or greed. We were killing the people and destroying the country we’d come to save. And at that moment, I knew that I would survive.”
Later, recovering in a military hospital, George learned that the North Vietnamese had overrun his unit, killing his entire platoon.
“And that’s when I made a conscious decision to stop being a soldier, and to actively oppose the war in Vietnam.”5
In 1974, six years after he’d returned from Vietnam, George’s skin broke out in a terrible rash, his temperature soared to 105°F, and he was delirious. He did not know it at the time, but like many of his brothers-in-arms, and like many of the soldiers they’d fought against, he was at the beginning of a long struggle to survive the ravages of Agent Orange/dioxin.
George heard stories about veterans whose wives were experiencing miscarriages, giving birth to lifeless babies, and to children with serious, sometimes horrific, birth defects. These ex-soldiers, still young, were suffering from cancer, debilitating skin rashes, growths that doctors diagnosed as precancerous, loss of sex drive, low sperm count, and other illnesses. When they’d gone off to fight in Vietnam, most still in their teens, they were in superb health; now, they seemed to be locked inside of a science fiction scenario, watching themselves turn, mysteriously, into old men.
These men served in different branches of the military, in different years (1961–73), and in different regions within the southern half of Vietnam. Most know nothing about Agent Orange, but do know that when they attempt to approach the Veterans Administration for help, officials there insist that very few US soldiers were exposed to toxic chemicals in Vietnam. Moreover, those who may have spent brief periods inside of spray zones have nothing to fear. There is absolutely no evidence, the Administration insists, that Agent Orange harms human beings.
The Department of Defense (DOD) informed veterans who asked for their service records that many had been lost during the chaotic evacuation of Saigon. Other records were destroyed in a fire in St. Louis, Missouri. Not to worry, said officials at the Veterans Administration. The Air Force kept computer-generated “Herb Tapes” of Ranch Hand missions and if veterans couldn’t track their units’ movements inside these grids, then they probably weren’t exposed to Agent Orange. Soldiers who spent their tour of duty inside base camps would be fine; combat soldiers, said the DOD, did not enter jungles until six weeks after the trees were sprayed, so they had nothing to worry about.
Veterans who complained about illnesses—colon cancer, testicular cancer, liver and heart problems, and kidney disease—that normally do not affect men their age were told that they were alcoholics, drug addicts, malingerers, and suffering from combat stress.
Young women stitch beautiful scenes onto circles of white cloth. When you first see these children, you feel sad and empty, as though something true and good were turned upside down, shaken out of you. In the little shop you buy white hankies stitched with blue flowers, bookmarks with scenes from the countryside, perhaps a scarf or a tee shirt. You want to think that you are doing your part to care for these children, helping to heal the wounds of war.
According to Vietnamese officials, three million Vietnamese, including 500,000 children, are suffering from the effects of toxic chemicals used during the war. The exact number of retarded, blind, limbless, and paralyzed Vietnamese children isn’t so important. What matters is that you will find these children in hospitals, community-run centers, and poor rural homes. You will be surprised, then amazed, then shocked by the abundance of Agent Orange children.
During the war years, or after, one or both of each Agent Orange child’s parents were exposed to TCDD-dioxin, a chemical that Dr. Jacqueline Verrett of the Food and Drug Administration called “100,000 times more potent than thalidomide as a cause of birth defects in some species.”6
One or both parents carry this deadly chemical in their fatty tissues.
In the study “Genetic Damage in New Zealand Vietnam War Veterans,” researchers from Masey University in New Zealand write:
Exposure to Agent Orange also has major effects on the reproductive system of humans; TCDD is an endocrine-disrupting chemical with a highly toxic effect on the human reproductive system.
Even at low doses TCDD can seriously disrupt normal reproduction in humans; it can lower fertility, increasing antenatal mortality and the risk of endometriosis, and can also cause many birth defects.7
The New Zealand study concludes that a group of New Zealand veterans who served in Vietnam “has been exposed to harmful substance(s) (TCDD-dioxin) which can cause genetic damage.”8
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, a kind of collective, self-imposed amnesia washed over the United States. With the exception of the Civil War, Vietnam had been America’s most divisive conflict. George Mizo realized that those who fought in and those who fought against the war might never reconcile their differences. Politicians and historians would write books, soldiers would write poetry, memoirs, and novels, Hollywood would try to make the Oscar-winning film about Vietnam. The Vietnamese would be blamed for the war, demonized, and forgotten.
George believed that he’d earned the right to speak out not just against the Vietnam War, but war itself. In 1986, George Mizo, Duncan Murphy, Brian Willson, and Medal of Honor winner Charles Litkey fasted for forty-seven days upon the steps of the nation’s capitol to protest US involvement in Nicaragua. George talked about the Nuremberg Principles that, he said, obligate citizens to take direct action if and when their government violates international law. He spoke about his love and respect for the Vietnamese people; the government that sent him to kill and possibly die in Vietnam now sent him to prison for his anti-war actions.