Now, as I've mentioned before, the Vietnamese have a very awkward fixation on preserving vivid images of atrocities and documenting the full extent of murder, war crimes, and general animosity. No judgement about it or anything, they've gone through a lot and it's their history, but man, if you're a westerner being told about all the ways they brutally killed American and French soldiers then after a while you can't help but feel like they're sort of just saying shit to gauge your reaction. It was actually sort of funny in a dark way and it was a very unique cultural experience having your tour guide explain things to you while all the while possibly imagining your gruesome death at the hands of his grandfather. I didn't take any pictures because it felt really surreal seeing a bunch of tourists gathering around taking photos to show their families of death traps and the remnants of destroyed American military vehicles with labels indicating how many soldiers were killed inside of them. It's one of those moments where reality and the social conventions of tourism reach a particularly uncanny gap.
So to start out they grouped us all into this sunken bunker so we could watch a video on the history of the tunnels and of how the villagers in the area spent their days farming and their nights ambushing and executing American soldiers. It was so fucking awkward. You could feel the collective tension between every single person on the tour as we all looked at each other as if to say, "Is this tour a front? Are they going to shut the doors after tossing in a couple grenades for good measure?", and nervously laughed every time we heard something particularly racist or propagated. The funny part was that while it sometimes felt like the guides were just messing with us, I have come to believe that they genuinely thought we'd be super impressed by how good they got at killing Americans.
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't impressed though, because the way they lived in those tunnels, the ingenuity of accessing fresh air, water, resources, and the way they used them to co-ordinate troop movements was inconceivable. Apparently if the American soldiers found a vent in the forest for the tunnels using search dogs, they loved nothing more than tossing down something poisonous that turned the tunnels into gas chambers, so the Vietcong found a way to mask the scent of their vent openings so the dogs would avoid them. The ingenuity was staggering and the accounts of how units would move in to ambush American soldiers in the night only to vanish the next moment into a tunnel system whose openings were rarely ever found makes it all too clear why Vietnam veterans were famous for coming home with particularly extreme cases of PTSD compared to previous generations of war veterans. But even today you can tell that the Vietnamese saw demons in uniform rather than scared, conscripted teenagers, so the tour was a very one-sided account of history that was very much alive and vivid in the country's memory.
I also got to fire a gun. A Vietnam War era AK-47 to be exact, using ammunition left over from the war that the government was looking to use up. A few of the rounds were duds from age, but that thing packed a kick.
So back in the city we at some point checked out a Museum dedicated to the American War (as they of course refer to it), and it was simultaneously one of the best and most depressing museums I've ever seen.
The museum was essentially dedicated to the war crimes of the Americans during the war. Naturally there was a bias present, but all in all it was done particularly well because it was far more balanced and fair than I'd expected it to be. It chose to focus on exposing the crimes of the American government and its various military contractors rather than misdirect blame onto the soldiers themselves, often even exhibiting a few who chose to refuse to obey orders or help the Vietnamese citizens by preventing war crimes rather than partaking in them. All in all I actually learned a fair bit from this particular museum that I hadn't even heard about before. Apparently there are/were a few political figures in the U.S. who'd committed some pretty horrific acts of violence from massacres to torture of civilians and Vietcong soldiers who basically got a free pass when they got back. I did some fact checking as best I could and it all seemed to have been legitimately documented. I suppose the lesson I really took with me was that facts don't make it into history if we don't like the way they make us look. It's also amazing what you can get away with if you have the right connections.
While that was all depressing enough, the main focus of the museum was the effects of all the chemical testing that took place during the war. I guess military developers used Vietnam as a consequence-free testing ground for everything horrible they could think to throw at them in irresponsible volumes. If a few ounces of a chemical could poison an entire village down to a genetic level, they'd throw down a few tonnes of it for good measure. Pictures, documentation, chemical weapons canisters, and everything was cataloged in a way that was more than just damning evidence against the American government; it was somehow compassionate toward everyone who suffered the consequences, from Vietnamese to Americans who were exposed in different ways and lived with the damage. If anything the museum was really all about the collateral damage of war, showcasing reporters, photographers, humanitarians, doctors, and everyone from everywhere around the world who gave something during the war. It was an amazing contrast. One wall might have been a condemnation of the government while the next was all about celebrating the heroics of American soldiers and citizens who took a different stand and lost something for it.
Ho Chi Minh probably won't ever make it onto my list of places to recommend people to see, but that museum probably will and there's a pretty good restaurant for wings, so there's that too.
