Reeducation in Postwar Vietnam

by Metzner, Edward P.; Van Chinh, Huynh; Van Phuc, Tran; Binh, Le Nguyen

• ISBN13: 9781585441297
• ISBN10: 1585441295
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-10-01
• Publisher: Texas A & M Univ Pr

Summary

When helicopters plucked the last Americans off the roof of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon in 1975, countless Vietnamese who had worked for the Americans remained behind. Many were arrested and sent to "reeducation" camps, where they faced forced labor, indoctrination sessions, and severe privation.

For a decade before the fall of Saigon, Edward P. Metzner served as an advisor among the people of the beautiful and hotly contested Mekong Delta. After the war, he diligently sought news of the close friends and comrades he had made among the Vietnamese military officers. Many had died; others could not be found. When Metzner eventually located a few, he believed their stories should be told. Three agreed to do so, and their accounts form the core of Reeducation in Postwar Vietnam.

Huynh Van Chinh and Tran Van Phuc, who had been colonels in the Army of Vietnam, lived through the deprivation and torture of the camps and eventually found freedom in America. Le Nguyen Binh tells a different story: that of his dangerous escape from Vietnam, with some of his junior offi

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	ix
Preface	xi
Acknowledgments	xvii
Part I. Col. Tran Van Phuc's Story
Advisory Days	3	(2)
Saigon Memories	5	(5)
Thirteen Years of ``Reeducation''	10	(6)
Moved to North Vietnam	16	(12)
Release	28	(2)
My Family's Years of Misery	30	(4)
The Final Years	34	(5)
Part II. Col. Huynh Van Chinh's Story
Advisory Days	39	(4)
Background	43	(2)
The Beginning of the End	45	(10)
The Lie of ``Thirty Days''	55	(12)
Long Giao Prison	67	(6)
Sent North	73	(14)
Return to the South	87	(5)
Released	92	(11)
Part III. Col. Le Nguyen Binh's Story
Advisory Days	103	(3)
The Dreaded Alert	106	(3)
Escape	109	(3)
Avoiding Mutiny	112	(2)
Singapore	114	(2)
A New Life in America	116	(3)
Part IV. One a Hero, One a Saint
Gen. Le Minh Dao	119	(4)
Father Joe Devlin	123	(8)
Epilogue	131	(2)
Index	133