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Anniversary of a War


Used with permission.Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam's largest and most sophisticated urban area has never been able to shake the name Saigon. Even Vietnam's national airline uses that name on baggage tags. Saigon, as the locals still call it, cradles in its yellowed palm the elegance of the French colonies and the brashness of the Americans who fought there during the Vietnam War years.

When North Vietnamese forces captured Saigon in 1975, it reunified a country torn apart after more than 30 years of continuous warfare with the French, the Japanese and the Americans. From then until 1994, Vietnam was effectively isolated from the outside world. The country still sits in a time warp that draws historians and adventurers to its shores in record numbers.

The photos you are about to see were taken in Ho Chi Minh City's Exhibition House of Aggressive War Crimes. A pamphlet distributed at the Exhibition House is titled "U.S. Imperialist’s Aggressive War Crimes in Viet Nam." Although the pictures are fuzzy, horrific and totally anti-American in their depiction of U.S. brutality, the first page ends with the sentence: "We – Vietnamese people – are sincerely grateful to world peoples, including progressive Americans for their precious support of our just struggle for Independence, Freedom and Happiness."

A Little History

In 1954, the Geneva Agreement divided Vietnam at the 17th parallel into North and South. South Vietnam was placed under a government ruled by President Ngo Dinh Diem, a fervent Catholic and a fierce anti-Communist. (His brother had been killed by Ho Chi Minh's Viet Minh.) Ho's North Vietnam government was given control of the territory north of the 17th parallel. Immediately, they took repressive measures against all that seemed to threaten Hanoi's power. Ten thousand Vietnamese were executed and an estimated 50,000 to 100,000 imprisoned, many without trial. A radical land reform act was also implemented. The Saigonese and the people in the South suffered. This repression, plus the American fear of the spread of communism in areas where the U.S. had political and economic interests resulted in the American backing of President Diem's South Vietnam and the ensuing Vietnam War.

Used with permission. Mounting antiwar protests in the United States, culminating in the shooting deaths of several student demonstrators at Kent State University by the Ohio National Guard in May 1970, prompted the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Vietnam. In 1973, President Richard Nixon called for the complete withdrawal of all armed forces personnel and the return of all prisoners of war. Fifty-eight thousand out of the 3.14 million Americans that served in Vietnam were killed or missing in action. The number of South Vietnamese soldiers killed had reached 223,748 by 1973. Hundreds of thousands of North Vietnamese and Viet Cong were killed. Statistics say 10 percent of the 4 million civilians in Vietnam lost their lives. Approximately 300,000 Vietnamese and 1,800 Americans are still listed as missing in action. On April 30, 1975, Ho Chi Minh's communist forces took Saigon. On July 2, 1976, the formation of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam was declared and Vietnam was cut off from the rest of the world.

Copyright Victoria Brooks.

Statue of Ho Chi Minh with child. Reunification Hall. Copyright Victoria Brooks.

Copyright Victoria Brooks.

Copyright Victoria Brooks.Please note: The following text is copied from the Exhibition House photo at right.

"The American soldier laughed satisfactorily while carrying a part of a body of a liberation soldier just being hit by shells from a grenade-launcher. In my feelings I wondered whether he could have been a monster or a human being? In 1967, Infantry Division 25. In Tây Ninh."

(Ishikawa Bunyo – The war for the liberation of Vietnam)

 

Used with permission.

Used with permission.

Please note: The following text has been copied from below the Exhibition House photo located above.

"The above picture shows exactly what the brass want you to do in the Nam. The reason for printing this picture is not to put down G.I.'s but rather to illustrate that the Army can really fuck over your mind if you let it.

It's up to you, you can out in your time just trying to make it back in one piece or you can become a psycho like the Lifer (…) in the picture who really digs this kind of shit. It's your choice."

Used with permission.

Used with permission.

 

Please note: The following text has been copied from the Exhibition House photo located above.

 

" – The US policy gradually strongly supports Diem regime, eliminates French influence, and changes South Vietnam into a bunker against communism."

" – Diem has launched a large campaign to hunt leaders of Viet Minh and those who have remained in the South after the 1954 Geneva Agreement. When the campaign ended, countless innocent people had been killed or detained and others' houses had been destroyed due to savage clear operations of the enemy."

Excerpt from "The United States and Indo-China from FDR to Nixon" published in Washington in 1973.

Copyright Victoria Brooks.

"We – Vietnamese people – are sincerely grateful to world peoples, including progressive Americans for their precious support of our just struggle for Independence, Freedom and Happiness."

The war is now a fading memory with time softening the hard edges of pain. Vietnam, like a slowly opening blossom, awaits those ready to revel in its potent and heady perfume.

Suggested reading on Vietnam:

Buckley, Michael. Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos Handbook, 2nd ed. Published in 1998 by Moon Publications.

Martin, Paul. Land of The Ascending Dragon – Rediscovering Vietnam. Published in 1997 by Hastings House.

This title is available in the GreatestEscapes department store at www.greatestescapesstore.com/

Airlines flying to Hanoi and Saigon include:

Cathay Pacific: www.cathaypacific.com/

Malaysia Airlines: www.malaysiaairlines.com/

Singapore Airlines: www.singaporeair.com/

Thai Airways International: www.thaiair.com/home.htm

Vietnam Airlines: www.vietnamair.com.vn/vnhome.htm

Statue of Ho Chi Minh with child. Reunification Hall. Copyright Victoria Brooks.

Copyright Victoria Brooks.

Copyright Victoria Brooks.Please note: The following text is copied from the Exhibition House photo at right.

"The American soldier laughed satisfactorily while carrying a part of a body of a liberation soldier just being hit by shells from a grenade-launcher. In my feelings I wondered whether he could have been a monster or a human being? In 1967, Infantry Division 25. In Tây Ninh."

(Ishikawa Bunyo – The war for the liberation of Vietnam)

Used with permission.

Used with permission.

Please note: The following text has been copied from below the Exhibition House photo located above.

"The above picture shows exactly what the brass want you to do in the Nam. The reason for printing this picture is not to put down G.I.'s but rather to illustrate that the Army can really fuck over your mind if you let it.

It's up to you, you can out in your time just trying to make it back in one piece or you can become a psycho like the Lifer (…) in the picture who really digs this kind of shit. It's your choice."

Used with permission.

Used with permission.

Please note: The following text has been copied from the Exhibition House photo located above.

" – The US policy gradually strongly supports Diem regime, eliminates French influence, and changes South Vietnam into a bunker against communism."

" – Diem has launched a large campaign to hunt leaders of Viet Minh and those who have remained in the South after the 1954 Geneva Agreement. When the campaign ended, countless innocent people had been killed or detained and others' houses had been destroyed due to savage clear operations of the enemy."

Excerpt from "The United States and Indo-China from FDR to Nixon" published in Washington in 1973.

Copyright Victoria Brooks.

"We – Vietnamese people – are sincerely grateful to world peoples, including progressive Americans for their precious support of our just struggle for Independence, Freedom and Happiness."

The war is now a fading memory with time softening the hard edges of pain. Vietnam, like a slowly opening blossom, awaits those ready to revel in its potent and heady perfume.

Suggested reading on Vietnam:

Buckley, Michael. Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos Handbook, 2nd ed. Published in 1998 by Moon Publications.

Martin, Paul. Land of The Ascending Dragon – Rediscovering Vietnam. Published in 1997 by Hastings House.

This title is available in the GreatestEscapes department store at www.greatestescapesstore.com/

Airlines flying to Hanoi and Saigon include:

Cathay Pacific: www.cathaypacific.com/

Malaysia Airlines: www.malaysiaairlines.com/

Singapore Airlines: www.singaporeair.com/

Thai Airways International: www.thaiair.com/home.htm

Vietnam Airlines: www.vietnamair.com.vn/vnhome.htm