Читать книгу Voices from the Vietnam War - Xiaobing Li - Страница 18

No Final Victory, No Family Life

They are still friends. Ngoc and Tran worked in the same office in 1975–1976 at Ty Xay Dung, the largest construction corporation in An Giang Province. Ngoc's father was the CEO, a retired NVA lieutenant general; and Tran was from a small business family and soon fled the country as one of the “boat people” I was surprised to see their reunion after thirty years: emotional hug with tears, instant recall of some old-day gossip, and garrulous brags of their kids and families. Even though they went separate ways, there was no animosity, no regret, and no hard feelings. They seemed happy with the ending. Lt. Gen. Huynh Thu Truong was happy, too, having seen it all: the end of the French Indochina War in 1954, the end of the American War in 1973, and the end of the Vietnam War in 1975.1

As a senior artillery expert, Major General Truong's war experience both in the North and in the South reflects the technological aspects of the NVA and PLAF by showing how the Viet Cong adopted new technology and trained its officers. During the early years of the 1960s, Hanoi sent many of the NVA officers with Southern roots back to the South to participate in the NLF and PLAF’s struggle against the ROV government. Some of these officers had been recalled to north of the 17th parallel according to the Geneva Indochina Agreement signed in July 1954.2 Some had fled to the North during Diem's suppressions against the Communists in 1958–1961. While in North Vietnam, they received further training in guerrilla warfare, mass mobilization, political propaganda, and military technology. After they were sent back to the South, these officers played an important role in upgrading the PLAF’s weapons and equipment and improving their combat effectiveness.

The NVA high command began to pay more attention to military technology in the late 1950s in order to win large-scale, decisive battles against the ARVN forces, establishing artillery and engineering divisions and opening artillery and engineering schools to train their officers and commanders. When the first antiaircraft artillery brigade began its air defense of the capital city, Ho Chi Minh wrote to the commander that “Without antiaircraft artillery, Hanoi is like a house without a roof.”3 In the summer of 1965, the NVA established its antiaircraft missile regiments in the North. Meanwhile, the PLAF continued to improve its weaponry by introducing up-to-date military technology. In the late 1960s, the NVA transformed from a peasant guerrilla army into a modern professional army.4

Lt. Gen. Huynh Thu Truong

Rector, Artillery Training Center, PLAF (Viet Cong, South Vietnam)

I was born into a well-off family in 1923 in South Vietnam. After high school, I enrolled in a French Catholic College at Saigon [present Ho Chi Minh City] in 1944. I studied engineering, mathematics, mechanics, physics, and chemistry. The Pacific war was over in August 1945, and the Viet Minh established the Democratic Republic of Vietnam [DRV] in Hanoi with Ho Chi Minh as president in early September. The Viet Minh had been active in the South.

The First Indochina War broke out in 1946 when the Viet Minh troops clashed with the French forces in the North. Even though we were French college students, we didn't like the French colonial government's return after World War II, with their old-fashioned, out-of-date colonial policy. We liked national independence and wanted to take Vietnam back from France. I joined the student protests against French domination of our country.

The Viet Minh members were actively involved in these student movements in Saigon and rapidly developed their party branches all over the college campuses. I was approached by one of the party branch members in our college, and I became a Southern Vietnamese Communist Party member in 1946.⁵

After my graduation in 1948, I got married and had an engineering job to cover my secret mission as an undercover Communist engineering researcher. I had accomplished several important artillery tests and research projects for the People's Army of Vietnam [PAVN, also known as Viet Minh] in the North in my company lab in Saigon. The results of my research were sent all the way from the South to the North.

In 1952, the Viet Minh headquarters in the North sent a request through the South Vietnamese Party Committee in Saigon and asked me to join a newly opened artillery training school in the North. The party committee asked for my own opinion on this. At that time, I believed that I could make more contributions to Vietnam's Communist revolution by joining the army in the North than working as an undercover engineer in the South. Certainly, there was a war going on in the North between the Viet Minh and France. It meant that my decision would soon lead me to danger, hardship, and even death on the front line against the French forces. But I thought that the party needed me, and that there was also a good opportunity for my career. I left my job, a comfortable family life, and a pregnant wife behind. I walked for two weeks with a small group of people all the way to the North until we got to the Chinese-Vietnamese border.

Back then, the Viet Minh force was a guerrilla farmers’ army. Short of financial sources and military technology, they didn't have their own artillery instructors and training facilities in the early years of the French Indochina War. The Chinese Communist forces, the People's Liberation Army [PLA], provided artillery pieces, equipment, and training for the North Vietnamese troops. Among the 250 advisers of the CMAG [Chinese Military Advisory Group] were eleven artillery officers, who arrived in North Vietnam on August 11, 1950. In May 1951, the Chinese helped the Viet Minh establish the 351st Division, the first Vietnamese artillery and engineering division.⁶ In the same year, the PLA also trained the Vietnamese officers inside China by opening an officer academy, an artillery training center, and engineering schools. While the Viet Minh high command was grateful about the Chinese effort to train the Vietnamese artillery officers, it also worried about the military dependence and Chinese influence. Since the Viet Minh had grown from two divisions up to seven regular divisions by 1952 and was winning the war against the French forces, it should have its own artillery training programs.

After arriving in the North, I served as an artillery training officer at the Viet Minh's No. 9 Quan Khu Phao Binh [Artillery] Training Center.⁷ Most of the artillery equipment came from China, including 60 mm, 80 mm, and 82 mm artillery guns. Their best artillery technology was the Chinese-manufactured six-rocket launchers and 75 mm recoilless guns against tanks and defense works.

During the early years at the artillery training center, we translated many technology notes and manuals from Chinese to Vietnamese. I also translated many French technical instructions into Vietnamese and helped our officers to operate captured French artillery pieces.

Viet Minh's Dien Bien Phu Campaign, March-May 1954

After my promotion to a major in the Viet Minh, I took part in writing our own training curriculum, officer assessments, promotion requirements, and equipment maintenance regulations. At the training center, I taught classes, organized routine drills, and assessed joint exercises. We also developed our artillery planning, operation instructions, mobile tactics, defense deployment, and offensive bombardment. Our program became more sophisticated, and our classes got bigger. In 1953, we had an average of 150 officers on the campus all year long. The artillery training and tactics played an important role in the major battles, such as the Red River campaign in 1953.

During these years in the North, I missed my wife and my little two-year-old daughter, whom I had never seen. But I knew her name was Ngoc, which I’d picked for her before I’d gone to the North. I had to fight for our victory before I could have my family reunion. We had to fight harder and win the war by defeating the French.

From December 1953 to April 1954, the Viet Minh forces encircled the 15,000 French troops at Dien Bien Phu. Our artillery troops played a very important role in the final battle. The 351st Artillery Division, rocket battalion, and 75 mm recoilless gun battalion effectively engaged in the offensives. Many of our artillery officers received their training from our center. In March, their successful shelling against enemy airfields, supply depots, and communication lines had isolated the French forces and also diminished their escape chance. By April, the French troops held only three points. On May 6, the Viet Minh high command launched its final all-out attack. In a couple of days, the French surrendered. After eight years’ fighting, we finally defeated French colonial forces in Vietnam.

After our victory in the First Indochina War, in the summer of 1954, I traveled back to Saigon and looked for my family. Thanks to the Southern Communist Party members who had taken good care of my family, my wife and my daughter were doing just fine. I moved them all the way from Saigon to the North. In 1957, I was transferred from the artillery training center to the NVA Artillery Academy in Hanoi. My family followed me to the capital city. We had a little boy a year later, when I was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel in 1958.

In the early 1960s, the war between the NLF and the Diem government of the so-called Republic of Vietnam [RVN] became intensified. Diem and his forces killed thousands and thousands of the Southern Communist members and jailed hundreds of thousands of the Communist sympathizers. Chairman Ho always reminded us that “Comparing with the great hardships that the Southern people and army have to endure, your difficulties remain modest. You have to follow their example, fighting more valiantly and achieving greater victory.”⁸ Our party and army decided to support the Communist movement in the South by providing military aid and training to the South Vietnamese guerrilla troops.

After nine years’ service in the North, in 1961 I was sent back to the South and joined the PLAF [People's Liberation Armed Forces] of the NLF to train their artillery troops. The Diem government referred to the NLF as “Viet Cong,” meaning “Vietnamese Commies.”

I left my post in the NVA Artillery Academy in Hanoi, and left my family again in December 1961. After we crossed the North Vietnamese-Laos border, we began to walk on foot. Then we entered Cambodia and walked a long way down south. They told me that it took longer going this way, but it was much safer. Then we entered South Vietnam by crossing the Cambodian-South Vietnamese border. After a twenty-three-day journey, we finally arrived at a Viet Cong military base in An Giang Province in January 1962.

The Viet Cong base was at the top of the Ca Mountain, which has many big trees and overlooks the Ca Mau River. Isolated in the forest and less populated, this mountainous area was far away from Diem's controlled areas. The villagers around the base were supportive to the NLF and the PLAF military struggle against the Diem government and the U.S. armed forces in South Vietnam.

We opened a PLAF artillery training school and began to offer classes to the PLAF officers. I was ranked colonel in the PLAF, an automatic promotion of one level up for most officers who returned from the NVA in the North to the PLAF in the South. The PLAF command sent its officers to our school for training in small groups. Usually we had an average of thirty to forty officers in our school. But we got better and more advanced artillery technology.

During the mid-1960s, we began to receive Soviet artillery pieces and equipment, including Russian-made 120 mm and 155 mm guns. Even though they were not available in the South until 1971, we began to learn how to operate and maintain these new weapons. Of course, we also studied American artillery technology since the PLAF had captured a large number of American artillery equipment and supplies. I was promoted to the rank of major general in 1964.⁹

During these years, I missed my wife and my children a lot. It had been more than fourteen years. We could send a letter and received mails without mentioning anybody's real name. It took about one to two months for each mail traveling from the South to the North, or the other way around. I believed that we had lost some of our mail. Nevertheless, I had my tears in my eyes every time when I received their mail. At first, I saw a small piece of my daughter's or my son's drawing; then a few words in their handwriting; and soon a short essay. They could not send any photo picture. The only photos I had were taken fourteen years ago when they were very little. I always wondered if they could remember me and accept me as their father who was never there during most of their lives. I really wanted to end this war by defeating the enemies so I could have my family back and have my own life back.

Lt. Gen. Huynh Thu Truong in Saigon in 1975.

In the late 1960s, the war situation was getting better and better for the PLAF. Our artillery troops began to show their firepower when the PLAF started its offensive campaigns against the enemy strongholds and military bases. The main artillery operations in the South occurred in 1968, 1972, 1973, and 1974–1975, the later part of the war.

Because of the nature of the guerrilla warfare and lack of road control and transport vehicles, the Viet Cong did not employ large artillery pieces until much later. Among their favorite guns were small artillery pieces, like 60 mm mortars and single rocket launchers. We trained them how to repair these weapons and how to manufacture the shells. Our training helped the PLAF troops win the battles against the ARVN and U.S. forces. I was promoted to lieutenant general in 1974. Eventually, we won the war in 1975.

Lt. Gen. Huynh Thu Truong (PLAF, ret.) in My Thanh in 2006.

By 1975, I haven't seen my family for fourteen years. My wife still lived in Hanoi, and she'd survived the American air raids and bombings. My daughter, then twenty-three years old, studied in a medical school in China on the North Vietnamese government scholarship. My son, seventeen now, was sent away from Hanoi to one of the government grade schools in the rear areas along the Vietnamese-Chinese border. The North Vietnamese government tried to ensure the safety of the children of all the high-ranking DRV officials and NVA generals, who were fighting the war on the front lines. We, as generals and parents, really appreciated that.

In 1975, I retired from the army. I found a position as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at Ty Xay Dung (a construction corporation), one of the major companies in An Giang Province. My wife moved from Hanoi to An Giang to join me. Our daughter continued her study in a medical school in Hanoi. In 1982, I retired from the company. My daughter as a physician also moved to An Giang to practice her medicine in order to take care of us. My son, married with three children, became a chief engineer in a petroleum-chemical company, and lives in Ho Chi Minh City with his own family. I enjoy our family life and my retirement.