By I often receives inquiries from veterans who served in Korea for advice in regards to agent orange claims. For those that don’t know agent orange was sprayed during a period of heightened tensions along the DMZ where the North Koreans increased the number of infiltrators into South Korea in an attempt to start an insurgency, ambush soldiers, attack US camps, bomb barracks, and even try to assassinate the South Korean President during a period that became known as the 2nd Korean War. The agent orange chemical kills foliage in order to more easily spot North Korean infiltrators. Agent Orange has since been proven to be the cause of a number of health defects with veterans that served in both Vietnam and Korea.
A common complaint I receive from veterans is that they were exposed to the chemical while serving in units south of the DMZ, but the Veterans Administration (VA) has a list of units all along the DMZ that they say were the only ones exposed to agent orange. Now a group of soldiers is coming forward saying that they buried up to 250 barrels of agent orange in Waegwan which is where Camp Carroll is located way down in the southern portion of South Korea:
The U.S. military has opened an investigation into the dumping of Agent Orange, after an exclusive CBS 5 investigation exposed a toxic secret. And veterans are breaking rank to tell how they were ordered to bury dangerous chemicals on a U.S. Army base.
“My whole life, this is what made me what I am and why I am like I am, because I come home, and I couldn’t live with what I had done,” said veteran Steve House.
The Valley man is referring to what he says he helped bury on a military base more than three decades ago.
“They had it in storage, and I got rid of it for them,” he said.
Agent Orange was a defoliant widely used during the Vietnam war.The initial CBS 5 investigation took our crew across the U.S. – investigating House’s story. And they found three soldiers all stationed at Camp Carroll in South Korea during 1978, saying the exact same thing.
We went and dug a big hole in the ground on the back side of the post, and then we filled it full of barrels,” said veteran Richard Cramer, who now lives in Illinois.
“On the barrels it said Chemical Type Agent Orange,” said veteran Robert Travis, of West Virginia.
“The smell, I’ll never forget that smell,” said House. “It was sick, real strong.”
These vets said they’re living with the toxic aftermath. The CBS 5 Investigation exposed that South Koreans living around the base could also be in danger, if the chemicals have seeped into the groundwater. [KPHO TV]
If this is true the US military needs to immediately conduct an excavation and locate these drums. They should be easy to find considering that in an interview with the Chosun Ilbo House even produced a picture of where the drums are located:
One of them, Steve House, who served as a heavy machinery operator at Camp Carroll in Waegwan, North Gyeongsang Province in 1978 said, “Yeah, it haunts me. We basically buried our garbage in their back yard.” The soldiers were ordered to dig a ditch almost the size of a city block. “Fifty-five gallon drums with bright yellow, some of them bright orange, writing on them,” said House. “And some of the cans said Province of Vietnam, Compound Orange.”
Robert Travis, who served at Camp Carroll with House, said, “There were approximately 250 drums, all OD green,” adding he remembers hand-wheeling each barrel out of the warehouse. Travis said he developed a red rash all over his body after accidentally touching the chemical that seeped out of the drums. Agent Orange was widely used during the Vietnam War and is an extremely toxic chemical based on the carcinogenic compound dioxin and causes trees and plants to wither and die. [Chosun Ilbo]
What I don’t understand is that if you look where Camp Carroll today, it has gone through a lot of new construction modernization and has become surrounded with Korean buildings. It seems to me that somebody would have dug these up by now?
Judging by the picture provided by the veteran it appears this whole was dug near the hill on the east side of Camp Carroll which is now covered with buildings:
The other thing I am wondering is why was the agent orange located on Camp Carroll so far south of the DMZ? You would think they would have shipped the chemical into country through Incheon which is closer to the DMZ?
Anyway if these veterans are lying the most obvious question would be, why would they? The only reasons I can think of is that it could be in order to get agent orange claims processed by the VA or maybe to get attention. We have seen this phenomenon happen before with the No Gun Ri accusations from a veteran later proven to have made his story up for the attention and VA compensation. However, if you watch this video the interview of House does seem pretty convincing. So once USFK has had time to conduct an investigation into this we will know our answer. Considering that the veterans have provided a photograph of where the drums are I would think this would be resolved fairly quickly and I doubt the South Korean government will allow the US military to sit on this for very long. I’m sure for the safety of their own citizens they would want quick answers.
If these guys aren’t lying and there is 250 gallons of agent orange buried under Camp Carroll what a mess this will turn out to be. The repercussions will likely be huge considering the amount of soldiers that have been stationed at Camp Carroll since 1978 as well as the surrounding Korean population that could have been exposed to this chemical. Just for the sake of everyone’s health that could be effected by this news, I really hope these guys are not telling the truth.
She hasn’t seen...
7:02 am on May 20th, 2011 1
I’m wondering what you’re basing your assumption on that this stuff might be buried under that hill on the east side of post (called BEQ Hill)? Granted, my assumption, based off the Chinook landing in the first picture, that it might be near the heavy lift pad and 25m ranges on the south side of post, could be equally off course, considering how much development has taken place in the intervening years. In any case, I think both areas could have stuff buried under them and undiscovered since only 2 and 3 story barracks exist on BEQ Hill and the heavy lift pad is only a concrete pad with the range facilities having minimal construction. I’ll have to keep an eye around post for strange things going on…
7:38 am on May 20th, 2011 2
What I’m wondering is why wait so long to say something? Why now?
8:48 am on May 20th, 2011 3
More guys trying to get VA compensation.
OMG I woke up in the middle of the night!!! I got sleep APNEA, give me 50% VA.
Everyone thinks they are entitled, but who is going to pay for it?
9:51 am on May 20th, 2011 4
Clean your shit up usa god damn.
11:27 am on May 20th, 2011 5
This is interesting in that two different activist groups will have two different reasons for making this into a big deal, if it is true. US veterans will be turning it into VA claims, while chinboista groups might enthusiastically be running this up to the flagpole to see if it can rally the troops and see if this is ‘the one’ that will resonate with the wider Korean populace.
OP:
Assuming your location is correct, it appears that the buildings there are small structures (two or three stories) built a while ago.
That means their foundations may not have gone deep enough to discover something buried. It also means that if something had turned up, a less-than-savvy construction crew might not have known they were dealing with such a hazardous item.
It’s also possible that this stuff was in fact discovered by Korean construction crews but that it never made it into the English-language media, especially if it was discovered when certain government administrations were less concerned about green issues and there were few if any NGOs to push the issue at the time (especially prior to the Naktong River phenol incident). That area is heavily rightist and hence they have often had a support-USFK attitude, so discovery of a bunch of barrels of Agent Orange, prior to 1993 or 1994, might deliberately have been kept low-key.
At any rate, I’d start checking Korean-language archives to see if there was such news.
Were there ROK military units nearby and did the ROK military use Agent Orange themselves? If so, was it also produced in the US and would its containers have looked the same as those of USFK? If that is the case, a construction crew that discovered this, or the ROK government that looked into it if they were called, might not have made the automatic USFK connection. Not saying this is likely, only a possibility.
12:19 pm on May 20th, 2011 6
Yes Kushibo, it was all Korea’s fault… once again. USFK cannot make any mistakes and it’s infallible. Korea made those former US soldiers to come forth and admit they had buried their poisons. USFK is omnipotent and perfect, we should never ever criticize them.
12:19 pm on May 20th, 2011 7
12:24 pm on May 20th, 2011 8
Tom, you’re an idiot if that’s what you got from my comment.
3:44 pm on May 20th, 2011 9
In spite of years and years of ESL training in English speaking countries – Tom still struggles with English reading comprehension.
We should show him pity.
4:45 pm on May 20th, 2011 10
I know for a fact that a large catche of stuff was uncovered, samples taken and a big investigation was done by US 8th Army in 1979-80. I hope that it was all recovered and properly disposed of then. The Photo looks like the area of the 1979 removal.
5:24 pm on May 20th, 2011 11
Matt, if you click the news video link in the posting you will see that they pin point where the stuff was dumped where the buildings are at the base of the hill on the east side of Camp Carroll.
6:13 pm on May 20th, 2011 12
@ GI-ah, I had trouble getting the video to load from your link. I’ll have try to get to it on my own. @ SFC JKS-let’s hope so…good to hear the military self corrected on this one.
6:37 pm on May 20th, 2011 13
That is the site that was dug up in 1979. If anyone wants to known. there was testing donein 79-80 after the dig. what happened to the stuff I don’t know but it was ready for disposal in a correct way. Also there was an investigation of hte command over that. It went to the General Officer level. I have no idea of what the results were on that.
8:32 pm on May 20th, 2011 14
So this might all be for nothing…maybe we need to get SFC and SFC JKS in to see the investigators on this…:) Looks like ol’ boys’ consciences might have been bothering them for nothing…:)
11:01 pm on May 20th, 2011 15
#13,
So, it’s possible that their memory is failing them, that they were digging them up, not burying them? Maybe. I don’t recall participating in an archeological dig back in 1978, but there I am in the pictures and my mother still owns the amazing fossils I found.
3:38 pm on May 21st, 2011 16
right on time USFK Good neighbor program is going on!
11:29 am on May 22nd, 2011 17
Hey! I stopped there a a couple times for lunch in the early 80s.
Give me some money too!!
4:27 pm on May 24th, 2011 18
[...] US & South Korea have officially decided to begin and investigation into the claims that the toxic defoliant agent orange was buried underneath Camp [...]