In 1999, I visited Vietnam with my brother-in-law John Manchester and our families. John had served as a helicopter pilot during the war while I had been student protesting against the war. The journey was a way for all of us to better understand a place that had been so important to our young adult lives but now wanted to be thought of as a country, not a war. During the Vietnam war, the US military built major facilities at Cam Ranh Bay. The extensive mangrove forests that once surrounded the Bay have been partly replaced by commercial activity including shrimp farms. Losses of mangroves release large amounts of carbon dioxide greatly contributing to global warming. In addition, loss of the forests removes their natural protection of the region from tropical storms blowing in from the South China Sea. There has been a postwar program of replanting to try and revive mangrove habitats, especially areas destroyed by US defoliants such as Agent Orange.