By David Rising and Hau Dinh
Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (AP) – Hamburger Hill, Hue, The Ia Drang Valley, Khe Sanh: some remember the Vietnam War Battles of the 1960s and 1970 titles, others of films and history books. And thousands of Americans and Vietnamese know them like the cemeteries of relatives who died while fighting more than half a century ago.
Today, the battlefields of Vietnam are pilgrimage sites for the veterans on both sides who fought there, and tourists wishing to see in the first hand where the war was waged.
“It was an area of war when I was here before,” said the veteran of the American army Paul Hazelton while walking with his wife through the field of the Museum of Remains of War in Ho Chi Minh Ville, who was known as Saigon when it was served.
The tour of Hazelton a little shy from his 80th anniversary brought him back for the first time in places where he served as a young recruited, including Hue, the old Bai Bai combat base on the outskirts of the city, and Da Nang, which was a major base for American and South Vietnamese forces.
“Wherever you went, you know, it was an occupied territory with our soldiers, now you just see agitation and industry, and it is remarkable,” he said.
“I’m just happy that we are exchanging and friendly with Vietnam. And I think the two parties take advantage of it. ”
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An US transport plane stands at the edge of the KHE SANH combat base in Vietnam. February 22, 2024. (AP photo / David rising)
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An US transport plane stands at the edge of the KHE SANH combat base in Vietnam. February 22, 2024. (AP photo / David rising)
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The story and the museum tell it
The Vietnam War with the United States lasted almost 20 years from 1955 to 1975, with more than 58,000 Americans killed and on several occasions this number of Vietnamese.
For Vietnam, he started almost immediately after the almost decadelong fight to expel colonial French people, who was supported by Washington, who led to the decisive defeat of the French forces in Dien Bien Phu in 1954.
The end of French Indochina has indicated major changes in the region, including the partitioning of Vietnam in northern Communist Vietnam under Ho Chi Minh and South Vietnam aligned by the United States.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of Saigon’s fall to the north-vietnamese and Vietnamese guerrilla troops, and the 30th anniversary of the reinstatement of diplomatic relations between the United States and Vietnam.
Tourism has rebounded quickly from the COVVI-19 pandemic and is now a critical engine of Vietnam growth, the fastest in the region, representing about one in nine jobs in the country. Vietnam had more than 17.5 million foreign visitors in 2024, near the 18 million record set in 2019 before the Pandemic.
The Museum of Remains of War attracts some 500,000 visitors a year, around two thirds are foreigners. His exhibitions focus on American war crimes and atrocities such as the My Lai massacre and the devastating effects of Orange agent, a defoliant widely used during the war.
The United States had to open the first exhibition specific to it at the museum this year, detailing the in-depth efforts of Washington to resolve the damage in wartime, but it is indefinitely pending after the Trump administration has reduced foreign aid.
Other war sites in Saigon, which was the capital of South Vietnam, include the independence palace of the South Vietnamese President where the North Vietnamese tanks crashed through the doors while taking the city and the Rex hotel where the United States held derisively nicknamed press points for their word of credible information.
In the northern outskirts of the city are Cu Chi tunnels, an underground warren used by Viet Cong guerrillas to avoid American planes and patrols, which attracts some 1.5 million people per year.
Today, visitors can climb and crawl through some of the narrow passages and take a turn to a range of shooting with war weapons such as AK-47, M-16 and M-60 machine gun known as “PIG” by American troops for its bulky size and high shooting rate.
“I can understand a little better now how the war went, how the Vietnamese managed to fight and protect themselves,” said Italian tourist Theo Buono after visiting the site while waiting for other members of his travel group to end in the shooting field.
The former artilleryman of the North Vietnamese army, Luu Van Duc, recalls the first-hand fight, but his visit to the tunnels of Cu Chi with a group of other veterans made it possible to see how their allies with the Viet Cong lived and fight.
“I am so moved by visiting the old battlefields – it was my last wish dying to relive these hard but glorious days with my comrades,” said the 78 -year -old man.
“Relics like this must be preserved so that the following generations know their history, on victories over much stronger enemies.”
Outside the city
The old demilitarized zone where the country was divided between the North and the South in the province of Quang Tri saw the heaviest fights during the war and attracted more than 3 million visitors in 2024.
On the northern side of the DMZ, visitors can walk in the Vinh Moc labyrinstanian tunnel tunnel complex, where civilians have sheltered from bombs that the United States has abandoned to disrupt the supplies in North Vietnamese.
The tunnels, as well as a memorial and a small museum on the border, can be reached during a hue day trip, which generally also includes a stop in the old combat base Khe Sanh, the site of a fierce battle in 1968 in which the two parties won the victory.
Today, Khe Sanh has a small museum and some of the original fortifications, as well as tanks, helicopters and other equipment left by American forces after their withdrawal.
Hue himself was the scene of a major battle during the offensive TET in 1968, one of the longest and most intense of the war. Today, the former citadel and the imperial city of the city, a UNESCO site on the north shore of the perfume river, still bears signs of ferocious fighting but has been largely rebuilt. West of Hue, a little off the beaten track near the border with Laos, is Hamburger Hill, the scene of a major battle in 1969.
About 500 kilometers (300 miles) in the southwest near the Cambodian border is the IA Drang valley, where the first major commitment between the American and North Vietnamese forces was led in 1965.
The fighting in northern Vietnam were mainly an air war, and today the Hoa Lo Prison Museum tells this story from the Vietnamese point of view.
Sardonically nicknamed “Hanoi Hilton” by the detainees, the former French prison in Hanoi was used to hold American prisoners of war, mainly pilots slaughtered during bombing. His most famous resident was the late Senator John McCain after being shot in 1967.
“It was a bit strange but fascinating at the same time,” said Olivia Wilson, a 28 -year -old woman from New York after a recent visit.
“This is an alternative perspective on war.”
Rising reported from Bangkok.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
