As my time in Vietnam is coming to a close I feel strangled
by sadness, happiness, and a sense of accomplishment. My sadness comes from
leaving a country which I have grown a strong affection for. I feel happy for
being able to reunite with Kristine and begin to the next stage of my life. My
sense of accomplishment comes from my progress with the Vietnamese language and
making numerous friends here both Vietnamese and Western.
The topic of the war in Vietnam was one that up until this
point I have hesitated to mention because of the sensitivity of the issue.
Before I came to Vietnam I expected to be confronted with bitterness and
hostility from the people of this country who suffered greatly because of an
unjust war. While I was studying Canada some of my Canadian friends used to
tell me that when I’m abroad I should pretend to be Canadian because of Canada’s
supposedly spotless foreign policy record. I think it is a bit much for
Canadians to act like Canada is the beacon of peace and friendliness opposed to
the bullying of the United States. I do give Canadians credit however for
avoiding getting involved in the tragic wars in Vietnam and Iraq and they have
led a relatively benign foreign policy in recent history.
Aside from being American I inherited three other
citizenships from my parents’ European background so I could legitimately say
that I am French, English or Swiss. I was born in America and I was raised in
America. I owe most of what I have to the United States. I would never think of
being ashamed of where I come from. I love America as my home but that doesn’t
mean I agree with all of the policies the American government has undertaken
throughout the years. It would be cowardly and disingenuous for me to pretend
to be something I’m not just to avoid an awkward conversation.
It took me a long time to broach the subject of the war with
the Vietnamese people I know. It was a subject that I didn’t try to avoid but I
didn’t try to instigate any debates with local people. I quickly discovered
that the bitterness and resentment that I expected to encounter just wasn’t
here. I’m sure there are plenty of Vietnamese people that hate the United
States but anti-Americanism is not fuming from the hot sidewalks.
One day I went with a Vietnamese friend of mine to her
grandparents’ house. Her grandfather was a decorated veteran of what he called
the American War. I didn’t have a good opportunity to really discuss with him
because of the massive language barrier but I conveyed that I was American to
him. He then pulled out his tobacco pipe and we shared a smoke which is a
Vietnamese welcoming custom among men. This situation reminded me of a time when
I was in Japan and having dinner with a Japanese friend of mine’s family in her
hometown of Hiroshima. Her parents, aunt, cousins, and most importantly her
grandmother were all there. At one point during the dinner her grandmother was
trying to explain something to me that I just couldn’t understand. After some
confusion her aunt came to my rescue and told me that she was trying to explain
to me that when she was a child she witnessed the atomic bomb dropped on
Hiroshima. I immediately regretted this rescue as the entire family went silent
and turned to me to say something. My Japanese at that point was quite poor but
I don’t think even now I would know how to respond. I humbly said that it is
very sad and unfortunate that she had to witness that. At no point did I feel
an urge to apologize but I tried to convey my sympathy. Her family was pleased
that I said something and quickly changed the subject to something more
lighthearted. Her grandmother ended giving me and my Canadian friend a nice
bottle of sake and some nice ornamental chopsticks. The whole experience was important
for me.
As I did then, I still feel no desire to apologize to
Vietnamese people for what happened during the war. The war, like the atomic
bomb took place far before I was born and I have of course have no
responsibility but the real reason why I wouldn’t apologize is that it feels
completely disingenuous. I don’t think anybody here is waiting for an apology
from me and it would mean nothing anyway. I don’t want to and cannot speak for
all American people. We can discuss the war as equals and share sympathy and
hopefully empathy.
I have made friends here with some younger Vietnamese guys
and one guy I know is an officer in the military here. He’s a friendly guy and
his English is good enough that we could discuss things like politics and
history (my vocabulary in Vietnamese isn’t good enough to have an actual
serious conversation). As with almost all Vietnamese people I’ve encountered he
expressed his antipathy for China. This is a pretty neutral subject since I don’t
have a lot good things to say about the current Chinese government and I can
understand the grievances Vietnamese people have with the Chinese. I do
frequently end up defending the Chinese however since I think we should be able
to reconcile a violent history alongside a currently aggressive government with
the fact Chinese people are people too. The average Chinese person wants the
same thing that we all want.
I liked discussing with this guy because I could voice my
honest opinion about the war. As people who know me in America, I am not a
defender of the war and America’s involvement. I think you would be
hard-pressed to find Americans who still think that that war made sense. My
friend and I discussed the politics of the Cold War and that Vietnam was the
unfortunate victim of those times. Vietnam which had been fighting almost a
thousand years to become independent became an ideological battleground turning
Vietnamese people against each other.
In one of my teenage classes I assigned an essay about the
history of Vietnamese-Russian relations. I was interested in seeing what they
would write. They didn’t write much about Russia but instead wrote mainly about
the war. I think a lot of people assume that people over here are all brainwashed
by anti-American propaganda but the essays I read impressed me. 14 year old Vietnamese
students could write sophisticated essays in English about the containment
strategy the United States had during the Cold War and the fear of the domino
effect that would occur if Vietnam became a communist state. It made me think
that when I was in high school I believe we only spent one day on the Vietnam
War. The history we learned that one day wasn’t white washed but I can’t say we
were pushed to really think about the war.
I remember meeting an American guy in Cambodia who served in
the war and he was annoyed that Vietnamese people think that the war was
between Vietnam and the USA when actually the Vietnamese were primarily fighting
each other. I do agree with him that after World War 2 there was by no means a unanimous
consensus among the Vietnamese for what direction they wanted their country to
go. I am no historian and there are myriad books detailing this part of history
but the impression I got was that independence was the first priority. The ideology
of the independent government was still up in the air. The division of Vietnam
was really a deal brokered between the USA, France, China, and the USSR. The
Vietnamese did not have much say in this. I think that as more and more US
troops and US money came into the South to bolster the government, the
government’s lost more and more legitimacy. When you combine the ineffective
and corrupt government of South Vietnam with the heavy-handed tactics of the US
military it is easy to see how Vietnamese people could become disillusioned with
what the US government was trying to accomplish. A military cannot construct a sustainable
society. It is disheartening to me that a lot of the American politicians from
the Vietnam War generation seem content to make the same mistakes in
Afghanistan.
I also had the privilege of meeting a young woman that works
for Vietnamese television. She is interested in bringing stories of victims of
Agent Orange to light. Agent Orange is some nasty stuff and millions of people were
affected by it. People are still affected by it today since once it is in your
system it permanently alters your genes so it could cause your children to genetic
deformities. I see people that seem to have deformities associated with Agent
Orange on a somewhat regular basis. There also numerous US soldiers that were
exposed to it and are still living with the harm it did to them. It is kind of
absurd that the companies the manufacture this stuff still insist that there
isn’t enough evidence to conclude that it is harmful to human beings. This didn’t
stop the US government from discreetly compensating the American victims of it.
War is terrible and always will be. We can debate the
reasons and situational circumstances for why wars start but there is no debate
about the damage they cause. I understand that there are wars of necessity but we
can still recognize the tragedy. I believe the war in Vietnam was a mistake and
I think Lyndon Johnson was irresponsible or worse a coward for letting the
things escalate the way they did. That being said, I don’t really like the government
Vietnam has today. The government has to take strong steps to root out
corruption and loosen its restrictions of freedom of expression. I think Ho Chi
Minh was a great man and it is really unfortunate that we will never know what
he would have done if he would have governed a unified Vietnam. Because of the
war over a million of Vietnamese were needlessly killed alongside tens of
thousands of Americans. We also shouldn’t forget the thousands of Laotian and
Cambodian people that were killed. There also millions of other lives that have
been permanently damaged, Vietnamese and American, both emotionally and
physically. There is a reason why so many of the homeless people in the United
States were veterans in the Vietnam War.
At the end of the day I feel like we have to reconcile this
past with the bright future. The Vietnamese people I know are not interested in
dwelling in the past. They are interested in blazing a new path for their
country. When we look to the future we have to remember the past even if it is
painful. We cannot overcome the mistakes of the past through voluntary amnesia.
This reminds of a conversation I had recently with another Vietnamese guy I
know. He told me:
“Vietnamese people will never forget about the war.” I
replied to him:
“Anh nghỉ người Việt
Nam không nên quen về chiến tranh Hoa Kỳ và Ngươi Mỹ cũng không quen về chiến
tranh Hoa Kỳ.”
“I think that Vietnamese shouldn’t forget about the war and Americans
also shouldn’t forget about it.”
