Assigned as the senior medical advisor to the Army of the Republic of Vietnam in I Corps, an area close to the DMZ, James G. Van Straten traveled extensively and interacted with military officers and non-commissioned officers, peasant-class farmers, Buddhist bonzes, shopkeepers, scribes, physicians, nurses, the mentally ill, and even political operatives. He sent his wife daily letters from July 1966 through June 1967, describing in impressive detail his experiences, and those letters became the primary source for his memoir. The author is grateful that his wife retained all the letters he wrote to her and their children during the year they were apart. The author describes with great clarity and poignancy the anguish among the survivors when an American cargo plane in bad weather lands short of the Da Nang Air Base runway on Christmas Eve and crashes into a Vietnamese coastal village, killing more than 100 people and destroying their village; the heart-wrenching pleadings of a teenage girl that her shrapnel-ravaged leg not be amputated; and the anger of an American helicopter pilot who made repeated trips into a hot landing zone to evacuate the wounded, only to have the Vietnamese insist that the dead be given a …

Transcript of interview with Joseph Neal Luther, a retired professor from Kerrville, Texas. He recalls his time as an Air Rescue Medic in Vietnam and Southeast Asia, as well as his time as a professor at a few different universities, some of which were in foreign countries.

This report discusses U.S. assistance to Vietnam for the environmental and health damage attributed to a dioxin contained in Agent Orange and other herbicides sprayed over much of the southern portion of the country during the Vietnam War, which remains a major issue in bilateral relations.

Interview with Joseph Neal Luther, a retired professor from Kerrville, Texas. He recalls his time as an Air Rescue Medic in Vietnam and Southeast Asia, as well as his time as a professor at a few different universities, some of which were in foreign countries.

Interview with Joseph Neal Luther, a retired professor from Kerrville, Texas. He recalls his time as an Air Rescue Medic in Vietnam and Southeast Asia, as well as his time as a professor at a few different universities, some of which were in foreign countries.