| Actual Image
Dong Xoai — in war and peace (31)
ngythanh
![Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 503 W: 139 N: 2296]](http://i1.trekearth.com/misc/g-g-g.gif) (8354) | .
Dong Xoai — in war and peace
I have three little notes about the location of the photo for you:
ONE: During the Vietnam War, it was a name that became one of the most fierce and bloody battles for the two sides to get to know each other. On June 10, 1965, about 1,500 VCs rapidly assaulted the district capital of Dong Xoai, Phuoc Long province, some 60 miles northeast of Saigon — decimating the local militia. [for details, click here]
TWO: I had been detained two years from 1986 to 1988 in a communist prison under a beautiful term “re-education school”. Needless to tell you how my life was like, when they discovered I was a soldier of the collapsed regime and also a former combat-photographer working for the Associated Press. To the new government, I was qualified as the worse enemy of the liberators. During these years, Dong Xoai has been shifted to Song Be provincial authorities.
THREE: The AP has successfully petitioned the Vietnam authorities to get me and my family out in 1990, during the period when both sides were working hard toward a normalization of diplomatic relationship. After 15 years in peace and freedom, I could not resist the wish to visit the location where I experienced the most wretched part of my life.
Now, Dong Xoai has been changed hand again: it belongs to Binh Phuoc — a province with most significant industry is forestry. Looking at this picture, you no longer see blood, fire, corps, prison or weapon. All those have been lost. Here you witness the 30-year-old peace of Vietnam when men are trying to erase the mistakes of the past. Birds don’t hear the sound of guns, and men don’t have to spy after each other’s meal and accuse and denounce at the people’s trials as I suffered. Birds are flying to their nests, men returning to the genealogical vestige.
Please share with me a minute over the field without battle. May this peace subdue all personal hatred.
. |
|
