35 Years ago (well, 35 years last Friday), Saigon, the capital of the Republic of Vietnam, fell. The North Vietnamese rolled in on their tanks triumphantly, the “leader” of the Republic of Vietnam surrendered unconditionally (in truth, he was the leader by chance), the last of the Americans left on their helicopters, and thousands of Vietnamese civilians came out to cheer on the North Vietnamese as they proceeded to “liberate” all of Vietnam from the American imperialists. Or at least that’s what was shown on TV.
Meanwhile, millions of Vietnamese were preparing to run, to flee their country. The country that they were born in, grew up in, got married in, started a family in. The country they fought for, the country that they lost their brothers, their fathers, and their sons for. Where were they running to? They didn’t really know. Some tried to latch on to the American helicopters that were leaving (usually unsuccessfully), others prepared boats or bought places on boats so that they could go out to the sea and get picked up by whatever country they run into first.
Meanwhile in America, middle class kids were getting high on marijuana, tripping out on LSD, experimenting with their sexuality, playing shitty folk rock, bastardizing ancient religions to fit their needs, and supposedly, they brought on some positive social change, but that’s questionable. Oh yeah, protesting some war in a far off land. What was that country again?
Today, amongst protesters of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, it’s rare to see the protesters cheer for the Taliban or Al Qaeda (unless they’re radicals), but always in the history books, I remember seeing pictures of those hippies waving the flag of North Vietnam proudly as if it were their own, and seeing pictures of Jane Fonda visiting those misunderstood souls of North Vietnam (she now claims that the event was blown out of proportion by right wing extremists). I wonder how my parents felt at that time, hearing how the people of a country that was their ally, cheering on for the side that was trying to kill them?
As a Vietnamese-American, I’ve always felt a little uncomfortable talking about the war with my fellow Americans. A lot of liberals would like you to believe that the Vietnam war was a mistake, and that it was against the will of the Vietnamese people (supposedly, like Castro was the will of the people of Cuba). Some of the conservatives would have you believe that it was solely the United States that fought the war, and that the reason Vietnam was lost was because the South Vietnamese didn’t fight hard enough. No doubt many American blood was spilled on this foreign land, but so was the blood of the Vietnamese who fought so that their land could be free.
So never
