The "Vietnam War" was one of the most infamous events of recent times. Told to us by a telling number of movies made in Hollywood, which heightened only the conflict through the eyes of the Americans. I grew up watching the films by Oliver Stone (Platoon), Francis Ford Coppola (Apocalypse Now), and Stanley Kubrick (Full Metal Jacket) of how the war besieged the innocence of young Americans drafted into the battlefields of Vietnam. Truth be told, the war was more terrifying and harrowing if looked at from the eyes and the experiences of the Vietnamese people, three million of whom (two million civilians) died in the senseless conflict brought upon by former US President Dwight Eisenhower's unfounded "domino theory" paranoia in Asia.
War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City | Vietnam
The Atrocities of Agent Orange
Visiting the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh further reinforced my prior knowledge about US atrocities during the Vietnam War. Popular culture had brought into our consciousness the existence and use of "Agent Orange"; I remembered R.E.M. having a song called "Orange Crush" which poetically discussed America's flirtation with chemical warfare.
The museum was located at 28 Vo Van Tan, in District 3. My brother and I hopped onto a motorcycle from District 1 during the afternoon we arrived from Phnom Penh. The museum was three floors big with eight themed rooms that highlighted the different aspects of the Vietnam War.
Among the themed rooms was one that showcased the amazing photographs taken by the very best war journalists of the time, many of whom, such as Larry Burrows, Robert Capa, and Henri Huet, had died either in war-related accidents or in the crossfire.
The one that stood out, though, was the Agent Orange themed room, where photographs and studies made later on showed the extent of the damage caused by "Agent Orange". Originally used by the Americans to spray on Vietnamese forests in order to burn plants and trees, thereby rendering the Viet Cong with no place to hide, it had produced not only an environmental catastrophe but a health hazard to Vietnamese civilians and future generations by causing birth defects and even death to infants born long after the war had ended.
The Cost of Conflict
The youth of America living in the 60s and into the 70s were forever changed by the war. More than 50,000 US soldiers died and many more were wounded, but it did not change the fact that the damage was far worse on the Vietnamese side, considering it was their sovereignty that was violated by the United States' commitment to enter into a war against the communist North Vietnamese forces.
While looking at the disturbing images, I saw many Western foreigners with a look of shock visible on their faces. I asked my brother what could have been the reaction of American tourists when they went inside there. They would perhaps see for themselves the extent of the damage done by the flawed foreign policy of the United States to a nation like Vietnam.
As relations with the United States eventually restored and the wounds of war healed at some point, it was important that such reminders be put on display so current and future generations would be forever reminded that such harrowing events transpired in order to attain the peace that reigned in Vietnam today. The "VCs," as the "Charlies" would refer to them, fought bravely amidst indiscriminate carpet bombing, chemical warfare, and even massacres of whole villages, as later admitted by a former US Senator and Presidential contender. Bob Kerrey admitted in 2001 his participation in leading a group of Navy SEALs into a peasant village in Thanh Phong, Vietnam—an episode that eventually spiraled into the "Thanh Phong Massacre," one of the most heinous crimes against civilians committed during the Vietnam War.
Healing the Scars of War
"This is history," I kept reminding myself, and I knew that the Vietnamese people nowadays knew that and they did not harbor any hatred toward the Americans, the same way we had forgiven the Japanese for the war they waged against us during World War II.
That was war, and this is today, where generally "Peace" reigned enough for people like me to travel without warlike prohibition in a country like Vietnam. As I keenly observed a mixed-race couple composed of a Vietnamese woman and her American boyfriend, the wounds of war had already healed, as unnerving as the museum's display had been on me. I felt a tinge of a celebratory mood for living in that period and being in Saigon without bombs dropping from the sky, but in a city that had embraced diversity and common kinships with people coming from all over the world.
With all the images registering in my head, I heard the hymn of The Rolling Stones' "Paint it Black" playing in my mind. Soldiers died from both sides in a terrible and violent death. Civilians were not spared either. While the leaders of both sides contemplated whether war was necessary, we could only look back on the history of the Vietnam War with shock and displeasure, to make sure it would not happen again, either in our own country or somewhere else.
In war, there are no victors, as the age-old adage suggests. Only suffering and grief. The War Remnants Museum was a fitting place to get oneself reminded of the painful past, while at the same time appreciating the kind of harmony most of the world experiences today. As the other tourists flocked out of the museum and the sky started to hammer a heavy downpour, I felt glad as I walked with my brother back to District 1. Amidst the rain of water from the sky, I looked up, drenched in rainwater, and muttered to myself how thankful I was that it wasn't bombs falling from the sky that day.
