VA denies Vietnam Blue Water Navy Pt 2, Rebuttal

LITTLETON, Colo. - Sept. 12, 2015 - PRLog -- This is in response to Mr. Murphy's letter  as written in VA still denies Vietnam Blue Water Navy Pt 1.  Mr. McDonald has never responded.

Mr. Thomas Murphy 1/23/2014

Dear Mr. Murphy:

Thank you for responding to my request to Mr. McDonald, Secretary of the Veterans Affairs Administration regarding the Vietnam Blue Water Navy and presumption of exposure to herbicides, aka Agent Orange. Let me say that your version of the facts are misleading, and that is why we are in this dilemma today.

Referring to your second paragraph, you make mention of the US Court of Appeals ruling. Your words are "This fact-based rationale for excluding Blue Water Navy Veterans from the presumption of exposure has been upheld by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit." As a clarification I offer this: The United States Court of Appeals did not rule on the question of whether or not the Blue Water Navy exposure to toxins was attributed to herbicides. The ruling by this court simply overturned a decision by a lower court dealing with the Blue Water Navy issue. However, what was brought before the Federal Circuit Court strictly involved the legality of the DVA to make a determination of who would be eligible for presumptive status. The Court ruled that regardless of the intent of Congress, the DVA was given Chevron Deference and found to be within its jurisdiction to limit the coverage of presumptive status as it saw fit. It did not rule on the merits of the action that the DVA took regarding the Blue Water Navy nor was the Blue Water Navy mentioned in the Court’s decision. In other words, DVA could have limited the presumptive status to only soldiers that were served dry fish during the Vietnam War. Although equally as illogical, the DVA would have been within its rights, per the Federal Circuit ruling, to make that determination.

You go on to say in the next paragraph, "VA's concern for the equitable treatment of all Vietnam Veterans led to tasking the National Academy of Sciences' institute of Medicine (lOM) with determining whether there were any alternative potential routes….[for herbicide exposure to the Blue Water Navy]" I really don’t believe the VA had any "concern for equitable treatment of all Vietnam Veterans". If it had, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. The VA was directed by Congress, through the Agent Orange Act of 1991, to initiate studies to track the assessment of various diseases caused by exposure to toxins. aka, Agent Orange.

Citation from IOM report Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans and Agent Orange Exposure (2011)


After examining a wealth of information on possible routes of exposure, the committee concluded that it would not be possible to determine Agent Orange–associated TCDD concentrations in the Vietnamese environment. This lack of information makes it impossible to quantify exposures for Blue Water and Brown Water Navy sailors and, so far, for ground troops as well. Thus, the committee was unable to state with certainty whether Blue Water Navy personnel were or were not exposed to Agent Orange and its associated TCDD. Moreover, the committee concluded that it could not state with certainty that exposures to Blue Water Navy personnel, taken as a group, were qualitatively different from their Brown Water Navy and ground troop counterparts.

The Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans and Agent Orange Exposure, released in May, 2011 reported there isn’t enough data to make any statement regarding ‘quantitative’ exposure amounts for not only the offshore Blue Water Navy, but for the troops with ‘boots-on-ground’ and those who patrolled the rivers and inland waterways (the ‘brown water’) of Vietnam; and There can be no statement of certainty that any group of Vietnam veterans had even experienced ‘qualitatively’ different exposures to herbicides.

That lack of knowledge, known well before the 2011 IOM Report, is the essential basis for use of Presumptive Exposure for ALL Vietnam veterans, whether on land or sea.

Citation from the IOM (Institute of Medicine). 2009. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2008.Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

"Given the available evidence, the committee recommends that members of the Blue Water Navy should not be excluded from the set of Vietnam-era veterans with presumed herbicide exposure."

Your final statement, "VA policies on presuming Agent Orange exposure are an equitable attempt to include as many Veterans as possible under existing laws and the facts of tactical herbicide use in Vietnam. I hope this information is helpful and will assist you with understanding why we do not have sufficient evidence to extend the presumption of exposure to all Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans." You use the term "under existing laws and the facts….. ". Public Law 104-2 which set up presumption of exposure to herbicide was intended to encompass all personnel in the Vietnam theater of Combat, per the VA’s own initial rules found in the M21-1 between 1992 and 2002. The DVA honored this intention until 2002, when  the Blue Water Navy was born and they were stripped of presumptive status.

In 2002, the presumptive right to service related health care and compensation was taken away from the Blue Water Navy with a stroke of the pen. The Secretary of Veterans Affairs could re institute presumption with another stroke of a pen. It does not need an act of Congress to implement. After 13 years the VA top officials still follow the road of prejudice and misinformation regarding the Blue Water Navy. It is my desire to have the new Secretary of Veterans Affairs take up and investigate why this situation even happened.
Sincerely,

Raymond Melninkaitis

USN Vietnam Blue Water Navy Veteran

Cc: R. McDonald