The Saigon War Remnants Museum is so much more than a mute collection of artifacts from the Vietnam War…
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Special Note About this Photo Essay
I will allow the photographs to speak mostly for themselves and leave it to you to sort out fact from fiction and objective from subjective truth. That said, don’t let propaganda from either side distract you from the much more consequential lessons to be learned about the horrors and insanity of war.
Quote that Sets the Tone
“In America it’s the Vietnam War.
In Vietnam it’s the American War.”
-author unknown
*** Warning: Extremely Disturbing Images Below ***
Trophies of American Kit
Trophies from the Vietnam War conspicuously displayed on the grounds of the War Remnants Museum…
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Map of Vietnam
Salient geographical features: unusually narrow East to West, unusually long North to South, with an enormous length of coastline compared to it land area…
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First Indochina War
The United States was already indirectly involved in Vietnam by supporting the French colonialists during the First Indochina War (1945-1954)… well before getting more directly involved during the Vietnam War (1955-1975)…
US Military Troop Numbers Over Time
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Various Kinds of Ordnance
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The Costs of War
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Tiger Cage
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Defoliation using Agent Orange
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The Legacy of Agent Orange
Jennifer Loney
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International Protests Against the War
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Bob Kerrey
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Alliance between Ho Chi Minh and Mao Tse Tung
Ho Chi Minh, colloquially known as Uncle Ho, was the North Vietnamese political leader who served as the founder and first president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam from 1945 until his death in 1969.
Mao Zedong was a Chinese political leader who who founded the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, fomented the barbaric “cultural revolution“, and led Communist China until his death in 1976.
Ho Chi Minh and Mao Zedong formed a strategic alliance based on shared communist ideology and mutual geopolitical interests during the First Indochina War and the Vietnam War. Such was a major factor that legitimized the domino theory. and was used as a justification for US involvment in Vietnam.
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My Lai Massacre
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National Pride or Indoctrination?
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Napalm
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Photo Collection
The War Remnants Museum features many sobering photographs and tragic stories of American photojournalists…
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Legacy of Unexploded Ordnance
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Postwar McNamara Quote
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A Prayer for Peace
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Frank discovered and bought some interesting propaganda posters while there. He hopes to photograph and post them here sometime soon.
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Any war is cruel and a criminal action, no matter who started it.
Alas, “we” have no shortage of work to do to overcome the propensity to scapegoat and dehumanize human beings “we” don’t even know.
This is timing, just watched Netflix “Turning Point, Vietnam” – horrific as is this post, Frank. But, everyone needs to be reminded because it’s still happening today, and we haven’t learnt.
My partner is an EOD Tech (his passion), and we travelled through SE Asia (including Vietnam) trying to get volunteer work clearing mines.
The sad part is that this work is all sewn up by governments and INGOs who don’t want others interfering with the money that’s made. We even saw a small team of local EOD Techs with nothing to do but play football while they waited months for a “project” to be given to them.
Meanwhile, people die or are maimed daily from UXO – it’s heinous. Then there’s the other view that governments don’t want land mines cleared along borders (Myanmar/Thailand) to keep people out.
Thanks for suggesting the Netflix documentary “Turning Point, Vietnam”. Required viewing for sure. When will we ever learn?
And thank you for the meaningful work you and your partner do… or at least attempt to do… in the face of red tape, border disputes, and NGOs competing for market share… all the while innocent people suffer.
I’ve have experiences in Ethiopia where the partisan-religious governments lock out NGOs completely out of suspicion that they have ulterior motives.
All that said, please don’t lose heart. Keep on keepin’ on.
Thanks for covering this horrific history, Frank. We’ve been there, and the story of the brutality inflicted on millions of innocent Vietnamese peasants and their land, all in the name of “protecting them” from communism, is chilling.
Your summary is so painfully spot on, Jane. When will we ever learn? When will we e——ver learn?
Honestly, what words can you add to these pictures? “Horrors and insanity” are very appropriate ones, though. Still, we must look at them, and resist the urge to turn away. This is what war looks like and, even then, just a small sample. Very unsettling, but necessary viewing.
Thanks for having the guts not to turn away, Larry. Indeed that words would only diminish the impact. Now, if only people could see what is actually happening in places like Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan, Ethiopia,… they would do more than lament.
Thanks, Frank. Glad to see your work, as usual. A terrible story we need to be reminded of.
Thanks for that, Gerald. I hesitated to post this, but doing so felt so necessary given a world where so many nations and citizens seem blinded by a policy of “fear thy neighbor”.
Always wonderful to see you coming up in my queue! ‘Course, being me, I still expect to see it after we both “cross over” to the other side of life (I have it that there’s lots of studying that goes on there), but for now your works benefit third dimensional humans as well (and God knows they need it!) Haha! Hug your bad self one time for me, bro. Make it two.
Your hugs warmly received and reciprocated, Ana.
Mmmmmmmmm!! 🤗