The Agent Orange Song

Intro E B A E

Verse 1

E                B
I was 17, just a teenage kid,
A                 E
The year that I enlisted.
                 B
I can’t remember why I did,
   A                   E
My mom said that I insisted.
  A                 E
I had some strange idea then,
  (walk down to)    B
That Uncle Sam was right.
    E                   B
Oh momma cried, but she signed
                   A              E
the card, And then I went off to fight.

Verse 2

                     B
Got off the plane in Vietnam,
   A                E
It didn’t seem like war.
                 B
With all I saw I started to wonder
     A                E
what I had come there for.
     A            E
Some officers got drunk at night,
     A         F#m   B
and cheated on their wife’s.
        E               B
And the peasants on the other side,
           A                    E
where just struggling for their lives.

Verse 3

                       B
Oh the army tried some fancy stuff,
                        E
to bring them to their knees.
                  B
Like Agent Orange defoliant,
   A                  E
to kill the brush and tress.
     A                E
We’d hike all day on jungle trails,
        A         F#m    B
through clouds of poison spray.
         E              B
And they never told me then,
        A                    E
that it would hurt my health today.

Chorus 1

A                       E
But I got the news this morning,
          A  G#m          B
yeah, the doctors told me so.
     E             B
They killed me in Vietnam,
    A              E
and I didn’t even know.


Verse 4
                     B
Now I tried hard to forget the war
     A         E
like everybody did.
                  B
Settled down, got married
     A               E
even had a of couple kids.
        A                 E
Well my children both had birth defects,
        A           F#m   B
and the doctors had their doubts.
     E           B
They never could understand it,
      A                  E
but I think I figured it out.


Chorus 2

        A                 E
cause I got the news this morning,
                          B
yeah, the doctors told me so.
     E              B
They killed me in Vietnam,
      A           E
and I didn’t even know.

Verse 5

                       B
This Agent Orange from Vietnam,
                     E
we carry it with us still.
                     B
It stays inside for years and years
A           F#m     E
before it starts to kill.
              A             E
You might get cancer of the liver;
              F#m           B
you might get cancer of the skin.
        E             B
You can file for disability,
        A                 E
but you might not live to win.

Chorus 3

     A        F#m       E
Oh I got the news this morning yeah,
    A       F#m     B
the doctors told me so.
     E             B
They killed me in Vietnam,
       A          E
and I didn’t even know.


Verse 6
                     B
Oh the doctor said I got some time,
A            E
trying to be kind.
                  B
I’ve never been a radical,
                        E
but this has changed my mind.

Outro

       A     F#m      E
Oh I’d be so proud to hear my kids
    B
say hell no I won’t go,
            E                B
Because you killed my dad in Vietnam,
       A           E
and he didn’t even know.
        A              E
Yes I’d be so proud to hear my kid
                    B
say hell no I won’t go,
            E                B
Because you killed my dad in Vietnam
        A          E
and he didn’t even know.