Magnusen: The Vietnamese people that I met. They're some of the most beautiful people that I've ever known and it pains me deeply to know that they are suffering from Agent Orange issues.
Higgins: Could you talk more about that? How were you first exposed to Agent Orange and what have been the effects on your life?
Magnusen: When I lived in that little room by the river there, the only way to get cleaned, there was a bathroom and a sink, but no shower. I did what all the other people did in that area. The river was only 20 feet behind my door. . . I just pour water over me. I soak myself down. I pour water on me to rinse. That's what all the other men have done down there. I watched them to see what they were doing, and that's how I got clean. That's also how I got infected. I found out later on, I got a hold of a book . . . . I was able to go through that book and pinpoint. It had the spray missions and the maps, the coordinates. It had enough information where you could figure out exactly what you were sprayed with. I know I was sprayed with a lot of Agent Orange. . . . I bathed in that. The rivers became a pollutant flow.
Higgins: Did you have any trouble documenting that with the VA initially?
Magnusen: No. I just copied the pages off and sent to them, but it took how many years? I don't know. It took a long time before I ever got any claim. I got a PTSD claim first. That was like 10%, later jumped up.
Dealing with the VA is the most incrediblly hard thing. Have you ever heard of DDD?...
It's capital D, capital D, capital D. It's our slogan for the VA—it's Deny, Delay, and wait until you're Dead.