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War museums of all kinds tell the story of the 'American War'
Sunday, April 30, 2000
By Reg Henry, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
HO CHI MINH CITY -- For a country that is said to be focused on a peaceful future, Vietnam is not reluctant to provide opportunities for tourists who want to see evidence of past wars.
In Ho Chi Minh City, which was called Saigon until the Hanoi government, with its infantry and tanks, dictated an official name change 25 years ago, a number of museums tell the story of what now is called here the "American War."
Visitors also flock to the Cu Chi Tunnels, a vast underground base northwest of the city, where they can marvel at the ingenuity of the Viet Cong while experiencing claustrophobia. Much farther afield, to the north, it is possible to go to a museum dedicated to the massacre at Son My (known in the United Sates as My Lai).
But in Ho Chi Minh City, one of the places to go if you are a war tourist is the War Remnants Museum, 28 Vo Van Tan St., which in recent years dropped a reference to American atrocities from its name, perhaps in deference to many of the paying customers.
If so, it softens the blow only a little. What remains is a stark indictment of the U.S. war effort, which is bound to make any American visitors uneasy, whatever they thought about the war before.
It is a highly selective presentation, and evenhandedness might be asking too much under the circumstances. The effect, however, is to leave the impression that U.S. forces did nothing but commit atrocities. There's no hint that the Communist forces also committed war crimes.
It is reminiscent of the peace museum in Hiroshima, an emotionally wrenching memorial that nevertheless suggests that, one fine day, the Americans just happened along and, with nothing better to do, dropped an atomic bomb.
Interestingly, the War Remnants Museum includes a "Hiroshima Stone for Peace," a gift from people in the Japanese city to the president of Vietnam. It is as if one lack of context is saluting the other.
In one respect, the museum is well named. One enters from the street into a courtyard filled with remnants of the U.S. war machine, presumably supplied by way of America's defeated South Vietnamese ally. There are tanks, bombs, planes and artillery. This display is more interesting than disturbing.
It is in the halls off the courtyard where the going gets tough. Each has a theme -- War Victims, Historical Truths in Vietnam, the World and the U.S. Aggressive War in Vietnam, and so on.
Again, the exhibits tend to have been supplied unwittingly by Americans. They include press photos and some apparently taken by GIs displaying gruesome trophies, such as severed heads. Former U.S. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara's act of contrition -- his book "In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam" -- is on display and is quoted in the pamphlet given to visitors.
In one hall, there is a diorama of the sort that the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh uses to bring animals to life. In this version, however, a GI stands menacingly with his rifle, a cigarette in his mouth, next to a smaller South Vietnamese soldier in his American equipment. They are trampling grain underfoot and, on the painted backdrop behind them, a hut is burning.
The propaganda is not precise. In the hall dedicated to the weapons used by the U.S. military in Vietnam, some of the troops listed are not American but Australian. Although not identified as such, the pictures were taken by the Australian Army Public Relations Corps. (The author served in this outfit in 1970 and is fairly certain that one picture in the museum, a simple portrait of a soldier, was actually taken in his presence.)
Vietnamese students earnestly make notes of all this. One young woman had her face covered with her hand as she looked at one particularly shocking exhibit. But if visiting Americans feel uncomfortable, it is not because of the Vietnamese around them. At least on this day, nobody makes personal recriminations.
Hanoi, too, has museums about the war. One of them is the so-called Hanoi Hilton, where American prisoners of war, including Sen. John McCain and U.S. Ambassador Pete Peterson, were kept until 1973. It is about a quarter-mile from the modern Hilton in the center of downtown Hanoi.
Its real name is Hoa Lo Prison and it is a relic of the French colonial time. Most of it has been demolished to make way for an office and hotel tower, but one part has been kept as it was.
The surprise here is that the American presence is not the focus. This museum is dedicated to showing the cruelty of the French administration. A guillotine is on display, as well as cells where Vietnamese patriots were imprisoned.
Only one cell illustrates the fate of the American POWs. A sign on the wall says: "Though having committed untold crimes on our people ... American pilots suffered no revenge once they were captured and detained. Instead, they were well treated with adequate food, clothing and shelter."
Some photos attempt to support this preposterous premise -- prisoners at Mass, receiving Christmas presents and meeting journalists. There are some artifacts -- a bed, slippers, towel -- and several small portraits of pilots, including McCain.
To what extent war museums reflect lingering resentment among the Vietnamese is impossible to gauge. But there was a time in living memory that if you wanted to find war in Vietnam, you didn't have to go to a museum. It is progress of a sort.
A mural of Vietnamese spiritual leader Ho Chi Minh overlooks the celebration of Independence day at the Reunification Palace in Ho Chi Minh City. The celebration is commemorating Vietnamese independence, the fall of saigon 25 years ago. (Annie O'Neill, Post-Gazette)
