Adm. Elmo R. Zumwalt Jr.: Asbestos Wasn't On The Agenda For Navy's Top Admiral

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By BILL BURKE, The Virginian-Pilot

© May 8, 2001

Adm. Elmo ''Bud'' Zumwalt Jr. took the helm of the U.S. Navy in July 1970. For the next four years, the wake he created swamped one tradition after another in the venerable sea service.

As the youngest chief of naval operations in history, the 49-year-old Zumwalt strove to reshape a stodgy, even aristocratic Navy into an egalitarian institution, often to the consternation of old salts. His directives -- 121 issued during his career as CNO -- came to be known as "Z-Grams.''

He championed racial and gender parity; pushed for junior officers' assuming ship commands; and condoned neatly trimmed beards and mustaches for sailors who for decades had been required to use the razor daily, and beer for men and women in enlisted quarters.

His wide-ranging Z-Grams dealt with cryptographic policies and procedures, created an ombudsman program for Navy wives, and addressed drug abuse in the service.

He also tried to reform the thinking of those comfortable with the concept of a shrinking Navy. The American naval fleet was 769 strong when Zumwalt took command, but had fallen to 508 when he departed in June 1974. Zumwalt fretted that the United States was losing its supremacy on the seas to the Soviet Union.

An advocate on Agent Orange

This full agenda for the progressive young CNO left little time for an issue that, after years of government apathy, finally began getting attention: By the 1970s, asbestos disease among the men and women who built and repaired Navy ships and those who sailed aboard them had escalated into an epidemic.

Between 1970 and 1979, asbestos-related deaths of shipyard workers in the United States grew by 47 percent, from about 1,650 to 2,420 per year, according to researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York.

During the decade, some 20,350 tradesmen died of asbestos exposure. Many times that number developed symptoms of the debilitating disease asbestosis, and large numbers of those workers were forced into early retirement. An unknown number of sailors also were stricken -- all on Zumwalt's watch.

Before being named CNO, Zumwalt had served as commander of American naval forces in Vietnam from 1968 to 1970, where he had ordered the spraying of the defoliant Agent Orange in the Mekong Delta in an effort to deny cover to snipers on the river banks. One of the Navy boats patrolling the river was commanded by his son, Lt. Elmo Zumwalt III.

The younger Zumwalt later contracted cancer, which both father and son attributed to exposure to a toxic chemical called dioxin, a byproduct of Agent Orange. The cancer claimed the younger Zumwalt at age 42 in August 1988, three months after a television movie about the family ordeal aired.

As a result of the Agent Orange tragedy, the elder Zumwalt later became an advocate for health and safety for the men and women of the fleet. He lobbied politicians to appropriate funds to help treat the thousands of Vietnam vets who were suffering from Agent Orange-related diseases.

So fervent was his advocacy that Robert O. Muller, president of the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation in Washington, D.C., said of Zumwalt: "No one has done more to face the consequences of Agent Orange and provide benefits to sick vets.''

In his latter years, Zumwalt also spoke on behalf of other perils sailors faced. Writing in the 1997 Congressional Record, he urged the United States to sign a treaty banning chemical weapons.

"Every man and woman who puts on a U.S. military uniform faces possible injury or death in the national interest,'' he wrote. "They don't complain; risk is part of their job description. But it is also part of the job description of every U.S. senator to see that this risk not be increased unnecessarily.''

Zumwalt's crusade and the death of his son were two great ironies in the admiral's life. A third would be the cause of his own death.

Betrayed once again

On July 31, 1999, at the age of 78, Zumwalt competed in a 5-kilometer race in Washington. The competition was a benefit for the Marrow Foundation, a cancer-research charity he helped oversee.

After finishing first in his age division, he experienced an uncharacteristic shortness of breath and visited his doctor, recalls his surviving son, Jim Zumwalt, a Northern Virginia-based business consultant.

The doctor suspected that the elder Zumwalt had suffered an asthma attack.

But his breathing problems persisted, and a chest X-ray showed a large tumor on his left lung. The diagnosis: mesothelioma.

In October, a medical team removed his left lung. A series of complications ensued, Jim Zumwalt says, and by the end of the year his father was bedridden and unable to speak because of a tracheotomy.

The younger Zumwalt says his father had received assurances from industry that dioxin was safe before ordering the use of Agent Orange. "He had checked with the companies, and they told him dioxin was safe,'' Jim Zumwalt says.

When his father learned of his diagnosis, he once again felt betrayed by industry -- this time by asbestos manufacturers.

"The asbestos companies had known of the problems for more than half a century. They exposed thousands and thousands of people,'' Jim Zumwalt says. "It was absolutely inexcusable.''

The younger Zumwalt says of his father: "He really was somebody who devoted his life to doing things for others. He believed that a wartime commander's dedication to his people does not end with the signing of a treaty or end of the conflict.''

It may never be known where or when the admiral inhaled the asbestos that struck him down.

It may have been during his heroics in the battle of Leyte Gulf, or while he commanded the guided missile destroyer Dewey out of Norfolk, or even during his tenure as boss of the fleet.

It may have happened while he was serving aboard or visiting one of the ships insulated with asbestos, or in a shipyard, or even during a Pentagon renovation.

He inhaled a tiny fiber. It worked its way through the bronchi and the lung's alveoli and into the organ's lining, called the pleura, where it started a chain reaction of mutant cells.

On Jan. 2, 2000, Zumwalt died of complications from mesothelioma at Duke University Medical Center. He was 79.

*** POSTED MAY 11, 2001 ***