Dwight Bunn easily becomes breathless and says he has lung scarring from exposure during chemical tests conducted in secrecy on troops while he was stationed at the Army's Dugway Proving Ground in Tooele County from 1962 to 1963.

David W. Davidson tried to hold his breath while being gassed at Dugway back in 1961. But he now has a laundry list of health maladies, any one of which may be connected to that day 47 years ago.

A doctor told Samuel Waller Anderson Jr. that the peripheral neuropathy in his feet and numbness in his hands was caused by some kind of exposure to chemicals. Anderson was stationed at Dugway from 1952 to 1956 and also was a guinea pig during tests at the isolated 1,300-square-mile Army base.

Government records show there may be hundreds, possibly thousands, more veterans like Anderson and Bunn — soldiers who were told shadowy military tests at Dugway and elsewhere wouldn't hurt them but who decades later can't explain what's happening to their bodies.

The claims made by Bunn, Davidson and Anderson are also the type of stories that the Department of Defense and Department of Veterans Affairs want to hear. Both departments in September set up a Web site, fhp.osd.mil/CBexposures, which is partly intended to jog the memories of former soldiers, most of whom are now in their 60s and 70s.

The Web site details what types of chemical and biological agents were used in myriad tests at Dugway and other military bases and even at sea. The tests all took place toward the end of World War II and during the Cold War from the 1950s to the 1970s.

Back then, subjects used in the tests were told to keep quiet, and for decades, most stayed true to their government's heavy-handed request. In some tests, soldiers simply weren't told what was happening at the time, and to this day, they still don't know much about what went on.

As of this month, the Defense Department had received e-mails from 119 individuals who had visited the Web site. Department officials had responded to 107 of the inquiries, in some cases directing vets to VA sources for help with filing claims.

A telephone hotline listed at the site has drawn 43 calls. Out of 614 benefit claims filed with the VA attempting to link old military tests with current health issues, 39 have been granted, according to a Defense Department official over health affairs.

Washington-based VA spokesman Jim Benson said that vets need to be patient as the VA works with the Defense Department, which has the records on all those old tests.