Defence analysis

with

Ross Eastgate is a military historian, writer and journalist specialising in defence. A graduate of Duntroon and the Army Command and Staff College, he has served in the Middle East, PNG and East Timor.

employed by British forces in the Malayan Emergency.

Agent Orange, used by the US and allies in Vietnam as a defoliant to deny cover and food to their enemy, was an equal mixture of the chemicals 2,4,5-T and 2,4-D in which dioxins were major components, mixed with diesel or kerosene to aid delivery.

Both chemicals were also commonly used in Australian agriculture.

But the long-term effects of their widespread use in Vietnam has led to claims of adverse consequences by exposed veterans.

Residual dioxin enters the food chain and is easily absorbed by humans through physical contact or ingestion.

Some estimates suggest 76 million litres of Agent Orange were sprayed over Vietnam,

Cambodia and Laos. RAAF Iroquois helicopters were also equipped with boom sprays to deliver Agent Orange, so named for the orange band on the 210 litre drums in which it was delivered from the US.

Concerns about the use of chemical sprays and their effect on people soon emerged in Australia and elsewhere.

Veterans began reporting high incidences of various cancers, while abnormalities in their post-vietnam offspring were also attributed to Agent Orange.

The Australian Government through DVA initially denied any links, despite a royal commission which, in a nine-volume report, admitted the existence of health problems, but found no causal link to the use of defoliants in Vietnam.

Instead it suggested exposure to a range of chemicals, which it claimed veterans generically described as “Agent Orange” may have contributed.

Last year Tim Fischer attributed his various cancers to his exposure to Agent Orange.

“At least one specialist suggested my immunity broke down a lot more quickly as a direct consequence,” he said.

He may have unsuccessfully argued similarly as a Vietnam veteran while holding senior government office.

However it would be now hard for heartless bureaucrats to argue he didn’t know what he was talking about, when his own personal health circumstances suggest otherwise.

It may result in his most successful posthumous victory.