Socialist Republic of Vietnam

Wednesday, June 11, 2003

QUANG TRI — Nearly three decades after the end of the American War, bombs, mines and other stray ordnance still injure more than 2,000 people a year in Viet Nam, especially in former DMZ Quang Tri Province, one of the country’s worst-affected areas.

Nguyen Than Son, a 30-year-old resident of Hai Lang District in Quang Tri Province was a victim of unexploded ordnance (UXO). Last year, a bomb exploded when he was cutting wires for scrap, killing him and seriously injuring his 27-year-old wife and two-year-old daughter.

A farmer from Cam Tuyen Commune, Cam Lo District, had a narrow escape riding home with a heavy steel bar, which he hoped to sell for scrap, strapped to his bicycle.

Soon after passing a pot-hole, he heard a noise behind him and was terrified to see the steel bar in flames. The man abandoned his bicycle and made a quick escape, only to learn later that the fire had saved him from a napalm bomb.

Vietnamese veterans said the phosphor in napalm bombs, used by US forces to destroy the shelters of liberation forces, caused severe burns on humans.

Doi Mau (Blood Hill), a former battlefield in Cam Tuyen Commune, Cam Lo District, is scattered with UXO, including napalm bombs, buried deep in the forest. During the early rainy season, fast-rushing waters wash down layers of mud and soil before uncovering the bombs.

Aside from human injuries and casualties, the high economic cost of leftover napalm bombs is another problem for Quang Tri. Forests and jungles burned and damaged during the war continue to be threatened by napalm.

Director of the State’s Afforestation Farm on the Highway No.9 Le Lu said live napalm bombs were left everywhere in the dense forests and jungles of Quang Tri Province, in particular the districts of Cam Lo and Gio Linh.

"The unexploded bombs cause so much trouble during the dry season. They blow up anytime, causing widespread forest fires," Lu said.

The Quang Tri Forestry Department reports that at least eight fires a year are caused by napalm, destroying tens of hectares of trees in Quang Tri.

Lu said 3,000ha of pines being planted by the farm’s Song Hieu Division are threatened daily by napalm-related fires.

On May 20, the farm asked the Cam Lo District’s People’s Committee to help collect 22 napalm bombs in a 1,000sq.m area in Section 605B.

"No one knows when the bombs could explode. No one knows how many hectares of forest could be destroyed by napalm bombs," Lu said.

Le Van Quy, deputy chief of the Quang Tri Forestry Department, said some 20 per cent of the bombs deployed by the Americans remain unexploded. Most lie in the areas under the Highway No. 9 Afforestation Farm.

"Napalm bombs could cause fires at any time during the dry season. What we could do is to send fire-fighters to contain blasts caused by the bombs," Quy said.

Managers of the farm said the job of detecting and clearing UXO could take years under its management.

Viet Nam Veterans Memorial Fund figures show that 10 years before the 1975’s liberation, US forces had deployed more than 15 million tonnes of bombs, mines and other ordnance – three times the amount used in World War II and 12 times the tonnage Americans used in the Korean War.

Vietnamese Defence officials estimate between 350,000 and 850,000 tonnes of land mines and ordnance are still buried in 61 provinces and cities of Viet Nam.

The Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs reported that between 1975 and 1998, UXO killed 38,248 people and injured more than 64,000. — VNS