Vietnam​—Enduring Nearly 30 Years of War

As told by Nguyen Thi Huong

It was September 18, 1950, in Vietnam. The French army of occupation launched an attack against our resistance force of about a hundred combatants. We had just returned from a battle and had stopped to rest for a few days in the small village of Hoa Binh.

BORN in January 1923, I had grown up under French domination that had existed nearly a century. Now we were ready to sacrifice our lives for the liberation of our mother country. Our war for independence from French rule began soon after World War II ended in 1945. It had neither a front nor a specific battleground but was fought everywhere. Combatants took refuge in homes of villagers, where they were nurtured, loved, and cared for.

Now, fighter planes circled the village where we were, raking it with machine-gun fire. The inhabitants fled their homes, escaping to the rice fields. Others jumped into the river or into holes that the combatants had dug. As planes roared and bullets hissed, death was everywhere.

When the planes left, French gunboats circled in the rivers and fired on the embankments. They provided cover for the army coming to ransack the homes and to uncover the combatants’ hiding places, which were everywhere. Bursts of gunfire from all directions slaughtered the villagers, who fell in the fields, in the canals, in the gardens, their blood seeping into the earth of their mother country and fertilizing the rice fields, which the belligerent army trampled upon.

During the night, our fellow combatants dug holes along the embankments of the rivers. There they hid and waited. Early in the morning, the enemy boats patrolled, raking the embankments with gunfire and moving ever closer to the ambush. Suddenly, bursts of fire from guns of all kinds cut down the French soldiers in the boats. Their guns and munitions were quickly confiscated. Then the combatants fled in haste through the gardens and between the houses to escape the cannon fire that was sure to follow. We combatants would always run before our enemies but remain close enough to be ready to kill them, to drive them from our land.

A Promise to God

After six days of hide-and-seek encounters with the enemy, our resistance force was ordered to dissipate. My husband, his two brothers, and I discussed our situation. Since I was five months pregnant, I could not keep up with the combatants in their long and perilous escape. So we decided to hide ourselves separately the next day, with whoever survived taking care of the children.

That night was probably the longest and scariest of my life. Under cover of darkness, the inhabitants of Hoa Binh returned to their homes and collected their belongings, piling them in their sampans. The cry of fowl and pigs blended with the cries of children. I watched the sampan convoy move out like a long serpent. Pushed by the fast current, it was quickly out of sight. In the menacing silence, I thought of my three children far away with their grandparents. I placed a hand over my belly and felt the baby’s life in my womb. I could not restrain a shudder. The thought that certain death seemed imminent was like a dagger in my heart.

Early the next morning my husband left, saying he would return. But he didn’t. The sun was already high in the sky, and bullets clattered against the brick walls of the house we occupied. We fled into the nearby rice fields, but my brothers-in-law, fearing capture, left me far behind. Bullets struck everywhere around me, and I feared what would become of me in the brutal hands of the soldiers.

“My God, have pity on me!” I cried. “I am pregnant, and I have lost my husband. Show me the way out of this hell!” As I prayed, tears ran down my cheeks, bitter on my lips. When I raised my eyes, they were drawn to a hut a long way off. “Oh, my God, give me strength to walk,” I prayed, “because I am exhausted.”

With great effort I made it to the hut. As I sat on the ground inside the hut, my hands crossed over my bosom, my head lowered, I swore to God: “I offer my life to serve you, oh, God, if you will help me to get out of this hell so that I can see my husband and children again.”

Deliverance

In the afternoon, as the bullets struck with more and more regularity, other people ran toward the hut. There were now seven of us. In the distance, we could see smoke rise from burned houses. The French were not far from us.

Late in the afternoon, as the cannon explosions came closer and closer and the machine-gun fire became more intense, those in the hut fled to the rice fields and scattered in all directions. But what did I see? A single person running toward the hut. In spite of the bullets, I stood there trying to identify the silhouette. It was my husband! “How do I thank you, God?”

When my husband reached me, I asked: “Why did you abandon me?” He replied that he had found a man seriously hurt, and he had to look for a place to hide him and take care of him. Bullets continued to strike all around us, but since darkness was fast approaching, we knew the French would soon discontinue their attack.

The moon lighted our path in our flight across the rice fields and through the water and the mud. At about two in the morning, we arrived at the village and saw the burned and ransacked houses. Two months after this series of attacks, we read in a report: ‘Of the more than one hundred women and girls taken captive and retained by the French on their gunboats, more than 20 became pregnant.’

Two years later my husband was killed by the French. Our infant daughter was then 20 months old. After my husband’s death, I left our native village of Binh Phuoc to get established in the nearby city of Vinhlong. I looked for work to support my four children, all of whom were now with me again, the oldest being nine. I became an elementary-school teacher. Independence from France was won shortly thereafter, in May 1954.

I Did Not Forget

I always remembered the debt I owed to God, and I searched for him. When I was a child, I had often gone to a pagoda near our house. My younger sister and I found amusement in looking at the great belly of the Buddha seated there. He was laughing with his mouth wide open. How many times I had poked my finger in his mouth and withdrawn it just in time for my sister to say, “He bites!”

Now I returned to that pagoda as a suffering creature who was indebted to God. I was hoping to find something higher, mightier, and more sacred; something that I had perhaps ignored during my youth. Here believers bowed before the image of Buddha, and priests and priestesses recited incomprehensible prayers in a monotonous tone. I felt completely disappointed. But I returned to talk with a priestess, who spoke about Buddhism and the restrained life at the pagoda. I did not feel encouraged. The books she gave me to read had a Hindu flavor that I did not understand at all.

Catholicism, introduced to Vietnam by French missionaries in the 1600’s, was another prominent religion of the country. But it did not attract me at all. The repulsive behavior of representatives of the church, their mixing in politics and seeking power and riches, turned me away.

During sleepless nights, I would pray to God for help to show me the way to know him. I remembered my parents’ teaching about the Creator. They had an altar in their front yard to show their respect for and fear of him. It consisted of a pillar with a piece of wood on it that was big enough for a jar for rice, one for salt, and a bowl for burning incense each evening and morning. Whenever they had good food, they offered it to him and prayed to him to accept it.

We called the Creator Troi, which means “the Most Powerful.” To warn disobedient children, people would say to them, “Troi will kill you.” There were no documents about the Creator, but we feared him and kept doing good. We prayed to him for help in time of distress and thanked him after being helped. Surely, the God that I was looking for should be the Creator! But how could I find him? How? How? This question obsessed me. Oh, I felt so guilty for not being able to find the true God so that I could serve him and pay my debt!

Civil War

After our independence from the French, our country was divided once more. This gave the superpowers a chance to intervene again, and a war between the North and the South of the country began that lasted nearly 20 years, until April 1975. With the advanced technical warfare capabilities of the intervening superpowers, the destruction was beyond human comprehension.

Almost daily, thousands of soldiers and civilians were dying​—in rice fields, at work, at the market, at school, in their beds. Children in their mothers’ arms were condemned to starvation in their hiding places. About two million Vietnamese combatants were killed, as well as countless numbers of civilians. The corpses, if they had been piled up, would have reached to the tops of the mountains. Many millions more were wounded and maimed. Some ten million South Vietnamese, or about half the population, were made refugees by the war.

My children had grown up and were forced to take up military duties to fight their brothers in the north. During sleepless nights, when the cannons’ echoes could be heard as far as the city, my heart pained and I would pray for my country’s peace and for my children’s safety.

In 1974, when the war was nearing its end, one of my sons and his troop of more than a hundred were surrounded and forced to live underground for three months. Only five of them survived, including my son. After five years of combat, my three sons came back alive and well. My daughter also survived the fighting. When the war was over, it was a complete victory for the communist North over the South.

Under Communist Rule

Then came the communists’ revenge on all who had served the government of the South. They, according to the communists, were responsible for the nearly 20 years of war between the North and the South. A million were put in prisons. These were built in the forests by the prisoners themselves, who were condemned to the harshest of treatment. Many died from lack of food and medicine, and especially from overwork. They were given only a little rice each week, with very little meat. And the work assigned was beyond their capacity.

If the work was not done, the prisoners had to stay until it was finished. Sometimes their work area was about five miles (8 km) from the camp. So it would be very late when they returned. They got only a few hours’ sleep and then had to return to work the next day. As time passed, their health deteriorated and many died. Many others committed suicide. My sons underwent these same hardships.

Since the communist government could not provide the needs of a million prisoners, under a cloak of humaneness, they allowed the families to visit each month and bring food. We, the parents, the wives, and the children of the prisoners, doing what was expected, thanked the communist government for allowing us to feed them, to prolong their lives. With a million men imprisoned, some five million people were directly affected.

I had given up my job in order to care for my sons, and my daughter was a help to me. The boys were constantly being transferred from one camp to another​—farther and farther away. So by all means of transportation​—by foot, by automobile, by sampan—​I brought to the camp each month about 33 pounds (15 kg) of dried food. I often carried it, walking in mud or over slippery roads.

When I reached the camp, I could see my sons for only two hours. We didn’t talk very much. The words would hardly come from our lips, since we were in such distress. We had to hold back our tears. Their poor physical appearance revealed their hardships. Despite our efforts, they were always hungry because they shared their food with those whose relatives had died, had fled the country, or were too poor to bring anything.

For more than 30 months I brought food to my sons, and many others did the same for theirs. We looked like a great crowd of beggars, with dirty clothes, a big basket in our hands, and our big hats made of palm leaves almost hiding our faces. In the heat and the rain, we stood at bus stations and at boat stops. I sold all that I possessed, including our property, to buy food. In extreme poverty, I called to God to save my children from such a hell. Finally, after nearly three years, they were liberated.

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I feared what would become of me in the brutal hands of the soldiers

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My son and his troop were forced to live underground for three months

[Picture on page 17]

I had often gone to a pagoda in Vietnam where believers bowed before the happy Buddha, similar to this one

[Picture on page 18]

People bringing food to prisoners of war, just as we did to our sons imprisoned after the war

[Credit Line]

U.S. Army photo

[Picture Credit Line on page 15]

Bettmann Newsphotos

The Price of Freedom

ALTHOUGH freed from the concentration camp, my sons were still prisoners within the boundaries of the village. There was no future for us in Vietnam. So, after a few months, in May 1978, two of my sons, my daughter, and I made our escape. Since our home was quite far from the sea, we traveled the river in a small boat, fearful the whole way of being stopped by a communist patrol and sent to prison.

Finally, at night we set out to sea​—53 of us, the majority women and children—​in a small, overcrowded boat built to navigate on rivers. It had an engine but was steered by a helm. We were heading south for Malaysia over 400 miles (640 km) away. A light wind rippled the surface of the sea and refreshed us, as the full moon, in all its brightness, lighted our route. Overjoyed at making a successful escape, we sang.

During the next two days, the sea was relatively calm and we made good headway. The third day was the most beautiful, with the sea perfectly calm, like a gigantic mirror. We dropped anchor and took time for some personal hygiene in the sea. But the activity attracted a great number of sharks, and since our boat was so small that they could damage it, we lifted anchor and left.

We were hoping to meet a foreign ship on the international route and perhaps to be asked aboard, or at least to be given food and water. Then, at about ten that morning, our men spotted a large vessel. Our hearts beat faster, hoping we would be helped, maybe saved. But, as it came closer our worst fears were realized​—it was a Thai pirate ship! We had heard about how they preyed on helpless refugees fleeing our country, ruthlessly raping the women.

In the Hands of Pirates

The pirates waited on deck with knives in hand and their faces painted to resemble different grotesque animals. Terrified, we pushed the young women into the compartment in the front of the boat and barricaded it just in time. The pirates jumped onto our boat and, like a rushing wind, tore away everything they wanted​—gold chains, bracelets, earrings. They confiscated our bags and looked into our purses, searching for gold and silver. They threw everything they did not want into the sea, including clothes, and milk and flour for the children. Then, as suddenly as they had come, they left, leaving us dumbfounded.

The pirates’ chief, a tall man of large build, without a hair on his head, wore around his neck a chain with a skull that hung to his belly. He laughed loudly, with his face turned to the sky, happy at the results of his piracy. Then, with a motion of his hand he freed our boat.

We continued on our route, but after only about an hour a storm began to raise enormous waves, bigger than the boat itself. We were mercilessly heaved to and fro. Soon almost everyone became seasick, filling the boat’s interior with slimy vomit. Noting that my little niece, whom I was holding, had stopped breathing, I screamed. But using mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, I was able to revive her.

Then the boat began to advance more smoothly. My son had changed its direction to flow with the wind and the waves. But this would turn us in the direction of the pirate ship! Sure enough, eventually it came into view. On seeing us, it lifted anchor and headed our way. The terrified passengers on our boat screamed out accusingly against my son. But as he later explained, “This was the only way to save the boat and the passengers.”

Thankfully, the pirate chief’s eyes now reflected a certain compassion. He gave signs for us to maneuver closer, and he threw a line so that we could attach to his ship. But the storm was so severe that our passengers could not endure much longer. At that moment, one of the pirates crossed over to our small boat and offered refuge. So one by one, all 53 of us were helped onto the much larger pirate ship.

It was late in the afternoon, and another woman and I fixed dinner from the rice and fish the pirates gave us. Afterward I sat in a corner holding my little niece, who was better now. The storm had slackened, but a cold wind blew and I had nothing but a sweater, which I wrapped around my niece. I trembled from the cold.

One of the men, whom I addressed as “fisherman” out of respect, befriended me. He said that as he looked at me he thought about his mother. We were about the same age. He loved his mother and was sad that he always was so far from her. Then he asked whether I had a place to spend the night, and without waiting for a reply, he said I could sleep on a deck above. He took my niece in his arms, and I followed him, but I was worried about being isolated from the rest below. I didn’t forget that the man, although showing me kindness, was really a pirate.

From above, our boat below appeared so small in relation to the ship. I sighed. How could we traverse over 400 miles (640 km) of ocean in such a boat without the aid of God? I felt our insignificance compared to the grandeur and eternity of the universe. “Oh, God,” I prayed, “if you supplied this ship to save us from the storm, please again protect us from the harm of the pirates.”

The pirate led me to a large compartment and handed my little niece back to me. But I was afraid of being alone, and when he left, I returned below and led seven others back to share the compartment. During the night, I was awakened by cries and moans from below. Fear-stricken, I waked those with me, and although it was only about two o’clock, we decided to see what had happened below.

Everyone was awake. Some of the women were crying, their shoulders shaking from their sobs. The men were assembled in the rear, near the kitchen. We learned that a pirate had fought one of the men and then had raped his wife. I asked permission to prepare some food, and we all had something to eat. With the morning light, the pirate chief released us, and we continued on to Malaysia.

In Malaysia

When representatives from our boat went ashore to ask for a landing permit, it was refused. The officials threatened to throw all of us in prison if we landed. In the meantime, local inhabitants on the beach came and examined us curiously. They were amazed to see that such a boat could have crossed the ocean. They knew who we were, as there had been other refugees from Vietnam. We jumped into the sea to cleanse ourselves from a week’s filth, laughing and enjoying ourselves before a growing number of spectators.

All of a sudden a tall blond foreigner called out to us from the beach, promising us food, drinking water, and medicine. “If the Malaysians don’t allow you to go ashore,” he yelled, “destroy the boat and swim to shore.” The foreigner kept his word, for later in the afternoon a little boat brought us food and drinking water, as well as a nurse who took the sick to the hospital and returned them that night. What joy! We were sure not to starve to death!

To make it impossible to leave, we secretly damaged the boat’s engine. After the authorities examined it the next day, they said they would take us to where it could be repaired. They towed us into a river and up to a large lake and left us there. Three days passed, and our food ran out​—the foreigner had not found us. So even though the boat’s owner wanted to save the boat in order to sell it, we decided to sink it and swim ashore.

Oh, how warm was the inhabitants’ welcome! They had been watching our boat, and when all of us had made it to shore safely, they ran toward us carrying bread, biscuits, and rice. We stayed a day at the site where we came ashore, and then we were transferred to refugee camps. There we learned that the kind stranger on the beach was none other than the High Commissioner for Refugees of Southeast Asia.

My three children and I stayed for more than six months in refugee camps in Malaysia, destitute of everything. But then we were able to emigrate to the United States of America, where we now live. But what about my promise to God?

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A pirate fought one of the men and raped his wife

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We escaped in a boat like this

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U.S. Navy photo

Fulfilling My Promise to God

I NEVER forgot the promise I had made to God almost 30 years earlier​—that I would give my life to serve him if he would help me. And I felt that he had helped me many times. How guilty I felt for not paying my debt to God!

Life in America was so different from Vietnam. How fine to be able to enjoy freedom​—going where you want when you want! Yet I was completely bewildered by the materialistic way of life with its scientific point of view. Moral values seemed so rare! Daily the news was filled with reports of terrible crimes​—children killing their parents or vice versa, abortion, divorce, violence in the streets. All of this frightened me. ‘Why so much decadence in a country so favored with beauty and riches?’ I wondered.

Now old questions haunted me more than ever: Was it really God that created man? Are we really the children of God? If so, why is he so indifferent to these faults? Why not punish men now to prevent yet worse things? Or is God waiting for man to repent from his sins? And as for man, if he was created by God, why does he not resemble his Father? Why not try to make Him happy?

From my own experiences, I was convinced that there is a God. Yet I wondered why he is so misunderstood. Does he not have some children who understand him, who love him, and who make him happy by their righteous deeds? Surely he must! But where are they to be found, and how? How can I get acquainted with them?

Such questions obsessed me, and not having the answers made me unhappy. Then one day in June 1981, while living in Pasadena, Texas, an older man and his grandson visited me. They spoke about God’s having a Kingdom, a real government, and that it would bring blessings to the earth. The man then asked me whether I would like to live forever in Paradise on earth.

My response was, “No.” My great desire was to know the true God, and living forever in Paradise was not then of interest to me. Yet their dignified manner engendered my respect and confidence, so I invited them in. I related my experiences of what I believed were God’s protection and loving care. “I’m looking for the God who has these outstanding qualities,” I said. “If your God is really this One, please show me the way to get to know him.”

For nearly an hour the older man read to me from the Bible about the great God, Jehovah. He explained, for example, how Jehovah dealt with his people, the Israelites, showing his love and concern for them. The following week the man returned with the publication My Book of Bible Stories. He opened it and showed me the 33rd story, “Crossing the Red Sea.” Without reading it, by the picture only, I guessed what had happened​—God had miraculously delivered his people from the hand of oppressors.

I thought to myself, ‘This really is the God that I’m looking for.’ The following week, I started a regular study of the Bible with Jehovah’s Witnesses, and as I studied, all my questions found logical answers from the Bible. Yes, I finally had found the true God to serve in order to pay my debt. To show that I had given my life to serve him forever, I submitted to water immersion.

Now my time is filled with helping others to learn about Jehovah, about his reasons for permitting wickedness till now, and about his means for soon eliminating earth’s troubles. At last I feel a true sense of peace and security, serving Jehovah with his earthly organization of my loving brothers and sisters.

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‘Why so much decadence in a country so favored?’ I wondered

[Picture on page 23]

With my niece whom I resuscitated during the storm