Life after Vietnam

by Darby Thu May 06, 2021 8:51 am

I've talked to many, many people about their tours in Vietnam. Most of the narrative is usually more about mundane things that went on or funny anecdotes, remembrances of friends, some is about operations or specific combats, but the rest is generally about what happened after the war and how it affected their lives. I have also spoken with many people who had lived in Vietnam during the war, and I have learned many surprising things about life before and after communism, as well as life here in the US for those who have been able to reach here. I think I have posted before about a fella I worked with back in the late 90's/early 2000s whose brother snuck into Vietnam via Thailand, joined up with FULRO and then was killed in an ambush less than a year later. Unexpected fallouts, echoes, occurrences and inheritance...

I have recently learned of something that I have found interesting in regards to how life sometimes shakes out for those who were able to escape from the Communist takeover of Vietnam:

Everyone knows the pulitzer prize awarded photo of BG Loan shooting VC CPt Len in the head with his .38 special (if not: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Execution_of_Nguy%E1%BB%85n_V%C4%83n_L%C3%A9m ). I was having a discussion with a fella who swore up and down that the "victim" was an innocent civilian so the execution was murder and that Loan was arrested in the US for warcrimes in the 80's. This is a stance that I have heard variations of for years, but what I had researched was that Lem had allegedly murdered a prominent family during Tet that Loan was acquainted with so the execution was both justice and vengeance, regardless of how kangaroo. We were both sort of right: the family which was slaughtered was that of an ARVN General and Loan was indeed investigated in the US in 1978 by INS and charged with a warcrime but President Carter intervened. The interesting part to me though, when we looked this all up to "settle the argument", was that Huan Nguyen, the at the time 9 year old son of the slain General, survived the attack on his family despite having been shot 3 times. And, not only did he survive but he joined the US Navy and in 2019 was promoted to the rank of Rear Admiral!

Anyone else learn of these sorts of things?

by TailEndCharles Thu May 06, 2021 5:36 pm

Darby wrote:The interesting part to me though, when we looked this all up to "settle the argument", was that Huan Nguyen, the at the time 9 year old son of the slain General, survived the attack on his family despite having been shot 3 times. And, not only did he survive but he joined the US Navy and in 2019 was promoted to the rank of Rear Admiral!

That in itself is just awesome! Surprised