News-Info-Alerts

Re: An Old Soldier Searches

To: ALL

From: Andi Wolos & Bob Necci

(POW-MIA InterNetwork)

Date: March 17, 2002

"Haunted by memories, an old soldier searches

By Bill Bainbridge and Lon Nara

Over the past 50 years Vietnamese soldiers have frequently found themselves fighting and dying on Cambodian soil. Wars against French colonialists, conflict with the Khmer Rouge, and the bloody "American War" have left as many as 22,000 Vietnamese soldiers buried here.

"Many Vietnamese people have written to the government begging them to find the members of their families," says Thach Gang Thai, an ethnic Khmer from southern Vietnam.

Thai is part of a 29-strong Vietnamese team searching for the remains of fallen comrades in Sa'ang district, Kandal province. Thai's group and ten other teams around Cambodia have been searching former conflict areas since early January. So far they have recovering the remains of over 250 soldiers.

Today, March 7, the men are raking over ground in the Preak Ambel district school yard.

"We use a traditional method of finding the body," says Thai. "First we clear the grass, then we lay cigarette paper on the ground. If the paper stays dry then we dig. We've dug more than ten graves in this spot so far."

The men were directed to the site by locals who still recall the April 1970 battle that saw Vietnamese soldiers killed only an hour's drive from Phnom Penh. So far they have had no luck. But while no bodies have been recovered in this school yard, 18 have been unearthed in the surrounding area.

"He can recognize the remains of the people he buried himself," says Thai, pointing to retired commander 53-year-old Huynh Tri. He buried many of his comrades in his days as a liberation fighter, many of them while operating as a guerrilla fighter in Cambodia between 1970-73.

Most remains are mere mud-caked fragments of bone. Once recovered they are parceled into body bags the size of a manila envelope. The bags are then placed in a large tin chest in the center of the soldiers' sleeping quarters. Fresh flowers and burning incense stand on the chest.

"We put them there every day and night to pay our respects to the dead," says Thai.

When a Vietnamese soldier died, his comrades wrapped him in his nylon hammock and buried him in the hope that they would one day return for him. They wrote his name and some personal details on paper and sealed it in a penicillin bottle which they placed with the body.

Few of the bottles survived the intervening 30 years in the ground, and consequently most remains are repatriated as unknown soldiers and re-buried in soldiers' cemeteries across Vietnam.

An estimated 300,000 of the 1.5 million North and South Vietnamese killed during the "American War" are still missing, more than five times the total number of US casualties in the conflict.

Tri gestures towards the tranquil waters of the Tonle Bassac remembering an altogether more tumultuous time when he was fighting against the South Vietnamese marines. He still recalls with bitterness the cruelty of his old foes "and their American advisors".

"I would not exaggerate to you," he says. "They would shoot flames into the houses of the villagers and steal their chickens".

"My feeling is so profound. Even a great writer could not express my feelings for my comrades. We fought shoulder to shoulder. Now I smoke this filter cigarette, but then even though our cigarettes were just rolled out of the leaves of trees we would still share one among all our comrades. Our only goal was to liberate Cambodia and Vietnam," he says.

Tri retired in 1999 after a long military career, but remains haunted by the memories of his fallen friends.

"I am one survivor among the thousands who died. I have seen peace, but their families have not found peace," says Tri. "To be honest I should be living happily with my family, but I sacrificed my happiness to search for my comrades."

Phnom Penh Post, Issue 11/06, March 15 - 28, 2002
© Michael Hayes, 2002