OWINGS MILLS, Md. (AP) — Once again, the Baltimore Ravens were able to keep their top free agent from leaving.
Ronnie Stanley's return saves Baltimore the trouble of trying to replace its left tackle and gives the team an opportunity to bring back its offense largely intact after a record-setting 2024 season. The Ravens reached a deal with Stanley before he hit the open market, and on a video conference Monday, he said he never reached the point where he seriously had to consider joining another team.
“I don’t think we ever got that far to really feel that about it. I didn’t really feel that yet,” Stanley said. "They showed interest. We were talking, so I think just through the whole time I knew that they were interested, and we were possibly going to get something done.”
Two offseasons ago, it was star quarterback Lamar Jackson who was a free agent and eventually signed a long-term deal after the Ravens put the franchise tag on him. It was a similar, if less dramatic, scenario last year when defensive lineman Justin Madubuike returned.
The Ravens didn't have to use the franchise tag before Stanley agreed to come back. He has played all nine of his NFL seasons with Baltimore.
“I think it just goes back to the fact that they drafted me straight out of college (and) took a chance on me,” Stanley said. "So I’m always going to give them first dibs when it comes to things like that, out of respect.”
As recently as a year ago, this partnership seemed on shakier ground after Stanley had played in only 31 games in his previous four seasons. Then he started all 17 in 2024 and made the Pro Bowl for the first time in five years.
“I think part of it is luck,” Stanley said. “You have to get a little lucky to not have something bad happen in this game, but the other side of it is taking care of your body, and I feel like that’s something I always try to put an emphasis on throughout my whole career. I always try to look to get different advantages or the flexibility, hydration, whatever it is.”
The Ravens aren't returning everyone from their offensive line. The versatile Patrick Mekari moved on to Jacksonville.
“I think Pat’s one of the best examples of what a professional football player should be like,” Stanley said. "I know Jacksonville — they got a great player in him, and he’s going to be a great leader for them, and we’re definitely going to miss him here. He has been a great player for us. He’s played every single position. He’s a unicorn.”
Still, Stanley's return means Baltimore doesn't have to figure out a new plan at the crucial left tackle position — or worry about him signing with a conference rival. Baltimore won a second consecutive AFC North title behind an offense that averaged an NFL-record 5.76 yards per rush. Jackson, running back Derrick Henry and a collection of solid receiving threats helped the Ravens average a league-best 425 yards of offense per game.
In free agency, Baltimore has added veteran receiver DeAndre Hopkins, while keeping receiver Tylan Wallace and fullback Patrick Ricard.
“I had a huge smile on my face when we signed D-Hop," Stanley said. “You know what you’re getting with that guy. I think he’s a Hall of Fame-caliber wide receiver, and I still think he has a lot of good reps, years, seasons in him. And he’s a physical player, he’s a competitive player, and I think he’s going to fit into our team really well.”
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Baltimore Ravens offensive tackle Ronnie Stanley (79) walks on the field before an NFL football game against the Los Angeles Chargers, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024, in Inglewood, Calif. (AP Photo/Kyusung Gong)
HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — At a former American air base in southern Vietnam, work abruptly stopped last month on efforts to clean up tons of soil contaminated with deadly dioxin from the military’s Agent Orange defoliant.
The Trump administration’s broad cuts to USAID also halted efforts to clear unexploded American munitions and landmines, a rehabilitation program for war victims, and work on a museum exhibit detailing U.S. efforts to remediate the damage of the Vietnam War.
In addition to exposing thousands of people to health hazards, the cuts risk jeopardizing hard-won diplomatic gains with Vietnam, which is strategically increasingly important as the U.S. looks for support in its efforts to counter a growingly aggressive China.
“It doesn’t help at all,” said Chuck Searcy, an American Vietnam War veteran who has dedicated his time to humanitarian programs in the country for the last three decades. “It is just another example of what a lot of critics want to remind us of: You can’t depend on the Americans. It is not a good message.”
Funding for the cleanup at Bien Hoa Air Base was frozen for about a week and then restored, but it's unclear whether funds are fully flowing or how they’ll be disbursed with no USAID employees left to administer operations, said Tim Rieser, a senior adviser to Sen. Peter Welch, who drafted a letter to administration officials signed by Welch and more than a dozen other Democratic senators urging the continued funding of the programs.
Other programs remain cut.
“They have reversed a number of these arbitrary decisions, but we’re far from out of the woods and we don’t know how this is going to end,” said Rieser, who was retired Sen. Patrick Leahy’s foreign policy aide when the Vermont Democrat secured the original funding for Vietnam War remediation projects.
The interruptions to aid comes as the two countries prepare to mark the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War and the 30th anniversary of the normalization of relations between Washington and Hanoi.
The two countries have since been increasing defense and security cooperation as China has become increasingly aggressive in the region. In 2023, Vietnam elevated relations with the U.S. to a comprehensive strategic partnership, the highest level of cooperation and the same as its traditional partners Russia and China.
On Inauguration Day, Trump issued an executive order directing a freeze of foreign assistance funding and a review of all U.S. aid and development work abroad, charging that much of foreign assistance was wasteful and advanced a liberal agenda.
But Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Feb. 7 “underscored the department’s support for ongoing efforts to collaborate on the legacy of war issues,” in his introductory call with his Vietnamese counterpart, according to the Defense Department.
Just 20 days later, the administration ordered all but a fraction of the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, staffers off the job and terminated at least 83% of its contracts and cut programs globally, including in Vietnam.
At Bien Hoa, that halted work to clean up 500,000 cubic meters (650,000 cubic yards) of soil contaminated with Agent Orange, a wartime herbicide that was later found to cause a wide range of health problems including cancer and birth defects.
The U.S. Embassy in Hanoi and USAID referred all questions on the war legacy projects to the State Department in Washington.
In a one-line email, the State Department said that “USAID has three contracts conducting dioxin remediation at Bien Hoa in Vietnam that are active and running.”
Asked to elaborate on how long the Bien Hoa project was shut down and what operations had resumed, as well as the status of other war legacy programs, the State Department said “we have nothing to share on the details of these programs at this time.”
Vietnam’s Defense Ministry referred questions to the Foreign Ministry, which did not respond to requests for comment.
But in a Feb. 13 press conference, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Pham Thu Hang expressed concern about what could happen if American funding for war legacy projects, which amounts to some $200 million per year, were to end.
It’s too early to say exactly how the abrupt decision to then end the funding will affect relations, but it is likely to call into question whether Washington is still a reliable partner in other dealings, said Nguyen Khac Giang, visiting fellow in the Vietnam Studies Program at Singapore’s ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute.
“The level of trust gradually increased and it is very easy to dismantle,” the political scientist said.
Leahy, who retired from the Senate in 2023, told The Associated Press that it had been a lengthy process over the last 35 years to build the relationship by working hand-in-hand with the Vietnamese to address the problems left behind.
“People in the Trump administration who know nothing and care less about these programs are arbitrarily jeopardizing relations with a strategic partner in one of the most challenging regions of the world,” he said in an email.
Rising reported from Bangkok.
FILE -A woman walks next to a highly contaminated pond around the grounds of the Danang airbase in Danang, Vietnam, May 21, 2007. (AP Photo/David Guttenfelder, File)
FILE- A warning sign stands in a field contaminated with dioxin near Danang airport, during a ceremony marking the start of a project to clean up dioxin left over from the Vietnam War, at a former U.S. military base in Danang, Vietnam, Aug. 9, 2012. The sign reads; "Dioxin contamination zone - livestock, poultry and fishery operations not permitted." (AP Photo/Maika Elan, File)
FILE- A Vietnamese worker sprays water over stones to be used in the construction of a silo for storing soil contaminated with Agent Orange dioxide at the site of a former American airbase in Danang, Vietnam on April 24, 2013. (AP Photo/Hau Dinh)
FILE- A detail of South Vietnamese Air Force men load up a tractor-train of 500-pound bombs from the Bien Hoa Air Base ammunition depot, Dec. 29, 1964. (AP Photo/Horst Faas, File)
FILE- A Vietnamese soldier stands guard in front of military aircraft near a dioxin contaminated area while U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis visits Bien Hoa air base in Bien Hoa, outside Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Oct. 17, 2018. (Kham/Pool Photo via AP, File)
FILE- Attendants sit next to a field contaminated with dioxin before a ceremony marking the start of a project to clean up dioxin left over from the Vietnam War, at a former U.S. military base in Danang, Vietnam, Aug. 9, 2012. (AP Photo/Maika Elan, File)
