Picking up the pieces

Wednesday, 14 April

Yesterday was the most difficult day of my journey thus far. We left Nha Trang on a night train and arrived in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) at 5am. After getting to the hotel, taking a shower, and taking an hour and a half nap, I was off again on a day trip to the Cu Chi tunnels a two hour drive outside the city. Then the difficult part began.

I am just starting to put the pieces together of what the Vietnam War did to this country's people. I will never be able to fully understand it. My last post seems almost embarrassing in its simplicity. The Vietnamese government takes every liberty in turning the Cu Chi tunnels and the War Remembrance Museum (which I visited in the afternoon) into tools of propaganda, but the devastation caused by the war is undeniable. A war by definition is destructive, though, so it is really difficult for me to reconcile what could be par for the course or what could be, as the Vietnamese government puts it, an unpunished crime against humanity. The answer is likely to be somewhere in between. Saigon and its surrounding areas in particular were quite literally bombed back into the Stone Age and seemingly kept there for the next several decades until the U.S. lifted its trade embargo in 1995. I do not really have an opinion on the use of embargoes. I can understand, though, why that action was taken and supported for so many years. It was the ultimate retaliation.

The tunnels of Cu Chi so infamous to soldiers and to the world are in an area just outside of Saigon that was once know for its beautiful orchards and lush landscape. The napalm blanketed across the countryside by US planes not only shrivelled up the vegetation, it infiltrated the waterways and insidiously crept into the soil. Only recently have the rubber and bamboo trees typical of the area started to grow again. The orchards won't be back for years. In addition to the soil deprivation, it seems the locals would rather focus their resources on catering to the tourists that flock to the tunnels by the bus load.

American sized mannequins provide ridiculously over-sized re-creations of the Vietnamese farmers turned soldiers and are posed in various spots along an area of the forest that has long ago been trampled down by tourists' feet into a smooth dirt pathway from entry to entry of the underground tunnel system. A group of Chinese tourists ahead of our group gamely climb onto the remnants of a bombed out US tank to pose for pictures. In white English lettering, it describes how the Cu Chi farmers used leftover pieces of enemy artillery to re-craft into booby traps to attack the tank. They proudly boost how many American soldiers were killed in the process.

Later we watch a film honoring the fighters - one a teenage girl. They were awarded military metals based on the number of US soldiers they could kill. I suppose it sends shock waves similar to those experienced by Vietnamese upon hearing of the US military's policy at one point in the war that "a dead Vietnamese is a dead VC," thus implicitly giving troops the green light to kill innocent civilians. As we look at replicas of the booby traps created using converted ditches, some originally created to catch wildlife, lined with sharpened and treated bamboo sticks, the commentary takes on that of a hunting expedition fueled by rage and revenge. I lost count of how many times terms like "American devils" and "American imperialists" were thrown out throughout the day.

The tunnel system was originally three levels deep. Sections of the first level just a few meters below the ground have been widened for tourists. Nevertheless, I still had to fold myself in half and bend my knees almost completely to be able to walk through the tunnel. I took the first exit available, but had I chose to continue, I could have walked for several minutes to one of the many submerged bunkers before exiting. I just can't begin to imagine what surviving in those tunnels would do to a person physically and mentally. And, after hearing my guide brag about how successful the fighters were in infiltrating nearby American posts, I can only imagine how paranoid it must have made GIs.

The War Remnants Museum was originally called The House for Displaying War Crimes of American Imperialism and the Puppet Government of South Vietnam and was later renamed the Museum of American War Crimes until relations between the U.S. and Vietnam improved in the 1990s. There is some blatant misinformation inside, for instance, a timeline of major world conflicts that states that World War II lasted for only a few years which is really unnecessary. The message that the U.S. led a very dirty and unpopular war that targeted innocent civilians and that maimed the country and its people for decades really does not need exaggeration to get across the point. Frankly, it just left me skeptical about how the Vietnamese government was able to get authentic pictures of U.S. soldiers in the act of such heinous activities as throwing a prisoner from a helicopter and carrying the charred remains of a VC soldier killed by a Napalm bomb.

In addition to dozens of pictures depicting the effects of Agent Orange to both civilians and the later genetic mutations suffered by offspring, the museum goes even further and displays jars of still born infants killed by the toxins. It just crosses a line from education into the bizarre and vulgar. They even recreated a section of the museum grounds into the torture chambers and guillotine used by the South Vietnamese soldiers on their northern countrymen. It is not a memorial and it does not encourage any of us to take a step forward and move on. I felt afraid to admit I am American.

There were reconstructed US helicopters and fighter planes in the front lawn of the museum. I do not understand why the government went to all that expense, but leaves the top floor of the museum unfinished and has not thought to install air conditioning in the building. After a few minutes in "The World Supports Vietnam in its Resistance" and "Historic Truths" Rooms in the stifling heat, I was sweating far too much to concentrate on reading the captions under the displays. The gift shop was even worse and, anyway, what could one possibly want to buy as a souvenir?

I am not going to post pictures for this entry, but I have provided links to the Wikipedia entries which provide pictures.