We are unsurprised that our kids lack interest in the Vietnam War, but I was nonetheless unnerved a bit when our Vietnamese guide of roughly the same age was equally detached. It is ancient history and life has moved on, but it isn’t totally forgotten either. That was a lesson when our guide took us to the war museum, which I probably wouldn’t have done in his absence. It was a bit of a downer, but interesting for several reasons. There were exhibits about Agent Orange and atrocities (the My Lai massacres and various forms of torture including what we now call waterboarding). There were also US tanks, choppers and fighters on display. But there seemed to be a certain lack of context. There was no explanation of why the US was there from any perspective (which is to say defending the right of democracy against a destabilizing guerilla attack vs. trying to halt the domino effect that would advance communism everywhere if we didn’t stop it in Southeast Asia). And there was no explanation of the link between the United States and the South Vietnamese government. From my perspective, South Vietnam was merely a client state, but the museum suggests that the government in Saigon, however corrupt and ineffective, was actually making the decisions. Where you stand on that one depends on where you live, I suppose.
We’ve now been to three countries – Japan, Korea and Vietnam—all of which have ties to the United States because of the wars we were involved in. That will continue when we visit Cambodia next. For those of us of a certain age, those wars defined the start of our interest in these countries and impose something of a prism that it is difficult to break out of.
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