Rare Vietnam War images from the winning side, 1965-1975
May 25, 2021 9:27 PM Subscribe
A perspective rarely seen in the West. A collection of photos taken by North Vietnamese photographers during the Vietnam War, 19**-1975.
(below is from the article - not intended to re-ignite any political views about the war but just show how it was seen from a different perspective than the ongoing Hollywood product line).
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The so-called first ‘television war’, the Vietnam war was defined and shaped by cameras and the bold photographers behind them. The pictures collected in this article are part of the photographic book Another Vietnam: Pictures of the War from the Other Side and show the war from the Vietnamese perspective.
...
While Western photographers had the most modern equipment and facilities, the Vietnamese worked with cumbersome outdated cameras, some dating back to the 1930s. Each roll of film was precious, so scarce that one cameraman shot only 70 pictures in the course of the entire war.
Using home-brewed chemicals, they developed their pictures in the open air or in underground tunnels, under the constant threat of B-52 strikes. Many of these photographs have been rarely published in Vietnam, let alone in the rest of the world.
(below is from the article - not intended to re-ignite any political views about the war but just show how it was seen from a different perspective than the ongoing Hollywood product line).
---
The so-called first ‘television war’, the Vietnam war was defined and shaped by cameras and the bold photographers behind them. The pictures collected in this article are part of the photographic book Another Vietnam: Pictures of the War from the Other Side and show the war from the Vietnamese perspective.
...
While Western photographers had the most modern equipment and facilities, the Vietnamese worked with cumbersome outdated cameras, some dating back to the 1930s. Each roll of film was precious, so scarce that one cameraman shot only 70 pictures in the course of the entire war.
Using home-brewed chemicals, they developed their pictures in the open air or in underground tunnels, under the constant threat of B-52 strikes. Many of these photographs have been rarely published in Vietnam, let alone in the rest of the world.
These were very interesting, and that mangrove swamp operating theater was something else.
posted by Harald74 at 3:30 AM on May 26, 2021 [7 favorites]
posted by Harald74 at 3:30 AM on May 26, 2021 [7 favorites]
These are amazing.
posted by octothorpe at 4:34 AM on May 26, 2021
posted by octothorpe at 4:34 AM on May 26, 2021
Whoof.
posted by seanmpuckett at 4:45 AM on May 26, 2021
posted by seanmpuckett at 4:45 AM on May 26, 2021
If you're ever in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), the War Remnants Museum is really worth seeing. It has some of these, and it's a revelation in general along these lines.
posted by texorama at 5:18 AM on May 26, 2021 [6 favorites]
posted by texorama at 5:18 AM on May 26, 2021 [6 favorites]
The 1975 collapse of the South Vietnamese military defenses was a helluva thing.
I was alive for most of the US's major involvement in the war but too young to have followed any of it at the time.
The January 1973 agreement was a cease-fire to let the US finish downscaling its military support to 50 advisors based out of the old MACV compound at Tan Son Nhut, while PAVN was left with all the territorial gains it had made in the 1972 Easter Offensive.
So 1974-75 was a replay of 1964-65: the Saigon regime was strong isolated coastal urban enclaves but the uninhabited interior highland provinces were insecure areas that the North could continue to infiltrate through, amass force, and eventually destabilize and seize.
When Buôn Ma Thuột fell in early 1975 that was it for ARVN.
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 5:53 AM on May 26, 2021 [4 favorites]
I was alive for most of the US's major involvement in the war but too young to have followed any of it at the time.
The January 1973 agreement was a cease-fire to let the US finish downscaling its military support to 50 advisors based out of the old MACV compound at Tan Son Nhut, while PAVN was left with all the territorial gains it had made in the 1972 Easter Offensive.
So 1974-75 was a replay of 1964-65: the Saigon regime was strong isolated coastal urban enclaves but the uninhabited interior highland provinces were insecure areas that the North could continue to infiltrate through, amass force, and eventually destabilize and seize.
When Buôn Ma Thuột fell in early 1975 that was it for ARVN.
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 5:53 AM on May 26, 2021 [4 favorites]
I have seen a couple of those photos before, but not the others. All of them are really striking.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:35 AM on May 26, 2021
posted by Dip Flash at 6:35 AM on May 26, 2021
Highly recommend Thi Bui's graphic novel, The Best We Could Do to anyone finding these interesting - it details her family's multi-generation experiences w/the struggles against the French and the US in Vietnam, and her move to California as a refugee after the collapse of South Vietnam. It really opened my eyes to how clueless, as an American, I was about the true nature of the war.
posted by ryanshepard at 6:58 AM on May 26, 2021 [13 favorites]
posted by ryanshepard at 6:58 AM on May 26, 2021 [13 favorites]
Thank you for sharing this. It is key to seeing things from the other side. I have extended family (inlaws of inlaws) who had to flee Vietnam as 'boat people's, so these pictures are hard to look at knowing their outcome, but so important and yes, this is the true sense of 'both sides' as opposed to whatever nonsense MAGAs want us to believe. Texorama I would love to see that museum. I really enjoyed the revolutionary museum in Havana.
posted by biggreenplant at 7:01 AM on May 26, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by biggreenplant at 7:01 AM on May 26, 2021 [3 favorites]
When the international media descends on a place such as Vietnam, the Balkans, Iraq/Afghanistan, etc., they rely on a small army of locals usually known as "fixers" who provide translation, navigate local bureaucracies for access, and more (sometimes even doing a lot of the reporting, but rarely getting credit). These fixers either innately have or quickly develop skills through this work to become very good journalists themselves. Sometimes they already are great journalists for their local newspaper, too. Some say that "fixer" is a problematic term, because they're really just journalists who don't get credit, but I'll use it here because the distinction is useful.
One of the consequences of this is often the emergence or strengthening of a local journalism community in those places long after the international attention has faded. I'm most familiar with how this has worked out with photography in the Balkans because of my particular areas of interest.
Almost all of the older photographers and photo editors that I've met in the Balkans got their first exposure to photojournalism because they were decent English speakers and managed to find work as fixers during the 1990s for all of the globe-trotting photojournalists who parachuted in to cover the conflict for the news magazines at the time. When the international photographers left, the fixers began to work as photographers (sadly, the local rates for wire services are usually much lower than what the wire rates are for non-locals) producing phenomenal work on the after effects of the conflict. They then began to organize in local press photography organizations or got involved with journalism instruction in local higher education institutions, and have since mentored and trained newer generations of photojournalists, some of whom have gone on to great careers.
And while the international media has generally lost interest in these places, I know a few American and European photographers who have maintained contact and offer free workshops periodically in partnership with their former fixers (now the elders in their local photojournalism communities), organizing annual festivals in these places, serving on boards of local journalism organizations, helped to establish local wire services, worked to get books of locals' work published, etc., as a way of empowering people to tell their own stories. Through word of mouth, photo festivals in these countries or regions, and online databases of local photographers, this has resulted in somewhat self-sustaining local photojournalism and art photography communities in some of these places and international media more often can turn to local photographers to work on stories in their home countries rather than rely on parachuting in a foreign photographer for a one-off assignment (though that does still happen).
I believe this is also the case in South Africa with the young people who helped out the foreign photographers who covered apartheid, and is beginning to happen in Iraq/Afghanistan/Syria (in those cases, safety concerns prevented foreign photographers and especially freelancers from working, so the process has been sped up a bit).
All of this is not to say that there aren't local photography traditions in these places, as this FPP well shows, but rather what the brief (or sometimes not so brief) attention of international media can influence locally. And as I mentioned, the local photographers rarely get the same fee for an assignment that a foreign photographer could get and local news organizations often pay an absolute pittance even compared to the international publication/wire's local rate, but that's another discussion....
(I know this comment isn't directly related, but thought it was a good enough place to put it)
posted by msbrauer at 7:33 AM on May 26, 2021 [16 favorites]
One of the consequences of this is often the emergence or strengthening of a local journalism community in those places long after the international attention has faded. I'm most familiar with how this has worked out with photography in the Balkans because of my particular areas of interest.
Almost all of the older photographers and photo editors that I've met in the Balkans got their first exposure to photojournalism because they were decent English speakers and managed to find work as fixers during the 1990s for all of the globe-trotting photojournalists who parachuted in to cover the conflict for the news magazines at the time. When the international photographers left, the fixers began to work as photographers (sadly, the local rates for wire services are usually much lower than what the wire rates are for non-locals) producing phenomenal work on the after effects of the conflict. They then began to organize in local press photography organizations or got involved with journalism instruction in local higher education institutions, and have since mentored and trained newer generations of photojournalists, some of whom have gone on to great careers.
And while the international media has generally lost interest in these places, I know a few American and European photographers who have maintained contact and offer free workshops periodically in partnership with their former fixers (now the elders in their local photojournalism communities), organizing annual festivals in these places, serving on boards of local journalism organizations, helped to establish local wire services, worked to get books of locals' work published, etc., as a way of empowering people to tell their own stories. Through word of mouth, photo festivals in these countries or regions, and online databases of local photographers, this has resulted in somewhat self-sustaining local photojournalism and art photography communities in some of these places and international media more often can turn to local photographers to work on stories in their home countries rather than rely on parachuting in a foreign photographer for a one-off assignment (though that does still happen).
I believe this is also the case in South Africa with the young people who helped out the foreign photographers who covered apartheid, and is beginning to happen in Iraq/Afghanistan/Syria (in those cases, safety concerns prevented foreign photographers and especially freelancers from working, so the process has been sped up a bit).
All of this is not to say that there aren't local photography traditions in these places, as this FPP well shows, but rather what the brief (or sometimes not so brief) attention of international media can influence locally. And as I mentioned, the local photographers rarely get the same fee for an assignment that a foreign photographer could get and local news organizations often pay an absolute pittance even compared to the international publication/wire's local rate, but that's another discussion....
(I know this comment isn't directly related, but thought it was a good enough place to put it)
posted by msbrauer at 7:33 AM on May 26, 2021 [16 favorites]
Agreed with texorama about the museum. Beware tho, I was crying like a little baby about 30 minutes after entering.
posted by Grither at 7:34 AM on May 26, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by Grither at 7:34 AM on May 26, 2021 [1 favorite]
Amazing pictures. The "unexceptional" one of the operating room in the swamp is incredible.
posted by Gray Duck at 7:42 AM on May 26, 2021 [5 favorites]
posted by Gray Duck at 7:42 AM on May 26, 2021 [5 favorites]
The operating tent in the mangrove swamp resonated with me. In May 1966, our team was dispatched to find one such outfit. We spent five days and nights up to our hips in water, but we never found it—also interesting was the field of punji stakes. I saw several like that. One of them was covered with maybe ten acres of densely woven netting which rendered the punji stakes hard to see from a helicopter swooping in to drop off a load of grunts. The stakes were nearly four feet long. I had several hours to contemplate this last field while we waited for a chopper to come in and extract us. I wondered how many thousands of people-hours were spent splitting and sharpening those many-thousand stakes. and weaving those acres of nets.
I hadn't known that the North had instituted their military draft until as late as 1973. It's interesting that our (America's) draft kicked in several years earlier.
In the 1980s, I was privileged to talk with some former VC guerrillas--their children, as it so happened--attended the same first-grade class as my son, in Clovis, California. Their war sounded a lot like mine--mud and bugs, and adrenalin rushes.
Propaganda being what it is, not much is said about the Viet Cong Main Force units. They were mostly Vietnamese from the South. They were excellent, well-disciplined soldiers. Their legacy seems to have been overtaken and smothered by Northern pride and American chagrin.
Sadly, war histories are too much about the valor of the troops who fight and die and not enough about the "collateral" effects. I guess the human heart has room for only so much outrage and sorrow, and the additional weight of shame is just too much to bear.
posted by mule98J at 8:05 AM on May 26, 2021 [40 favorites]
I hadn't known that the North had instituted their military draft until as late as 1973. It's interesting that our (America's) draft kicked in several years earlier.
In the 1980s, I was privileged to talk with some former VC guerrillas--their children, as it so happened--attended the same first-grade class as my son, in Clovis, California. Their war sounded a lot like mine--mud and bugs, and adrenalin rushes.
Propaganda being what it is, not much is said about the Viet Cong Main Force units. They were mostly Vietnamese from the South. They were excellent, well-disciplined soldiers. Their legacy seems to have been overtaken and smothered by Northern pride and American chagrin.
Sadly, war histories are too much about the valor of the troops who fight and die and not enough about the "collateral" effects. I guess the human heart has room for only so much outrage and sorrow, and the additional weight of shame is just too much to bear.
posted by mule98J at 8:05 AM on May 26, 2021 [40 favorites]
Not surprised they had dark rooms in the tunnels; they had everything else down there. (Highly recommend The Tunnels of Cu Chi to anyone who’s never read it.)
Striking pictures. That first one with the masks is haunting.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:08 AM on May 26, 2021 [4 favorites]
Striking pictures. That first one with the masks is haunting.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:08 AM on May 26, 2021 [4 favorites]
Turns out you can show images from the Vietnam War without playing The Temptations or "Fortunate Son" over them.
posted by lon_star at 9:12 AM on May 26, 2021 [6 favorites]
posted by lon_star at 9:12 AM on May 26, 2021 [6 favorites]
Excellent photos. I'll look for the book.
Speaking of books, there's a lot of Vietnamese writing about the war(s). I usually recommend Bao Ninh, The Sorrow of War.
posted by doctornemo at 9:16 AM on May 26, 2021 [3 favorites]
Speaking of books, there's a lot of Vietnamese writing about the war(s). I usually recommend Bao Ninh, The Sorrow of War.
posted by doctornemo at 9:16 AM on May 26, 2021 [3 favorites]
Troops walk the Ho Chi Minh Trail in the Truong Son Mountains is wondrous.
posted by y2karl at 9:38 AM on May 26, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by y2karl at 9:38 AM on May 26, 2021 [3 favorites]
I remember the feeling after watching "Platoon" the first time. There was a period where these soul-searching
Viet Nam movies were a thing, and my friends and I were really into that whole narrative: young (almost always white) American men sent over to fight a meaningless war, establish brotherly bonds, etc. I am embarrassed to think how long I bought into that crap. It was just one step removed from the initial lies, and with each passing year I hope the enormity of the crimes of that history continue to grow in prominence. I have family that escaped the aftermath and to this day they've only shared a tiny glimpse of what it was like. Thank you for sharing this post.
posted by elkevelvet at 9:47 AM on May 26, 2021 [2 favorites]
Viet Nam movies were a thing, and my friends and I were really into that whole narrative: young (almost always white) American men sent over to fight a meaningless war, establish brotherly bonds, etc. I am embarrassed to think how long I bought into that crap. It was just one step removed from the initial lies, and with each passing year I hope the enormity of the crimes of that history continue to grow in prominence. I have family that escaped the aftermath and to this day they've only shared a tiny glimpse of what it was like. Thank you for sharing this post.
posted by elkevelvet at 9:47 AM on May 26, 2021 [2 favorites]
Also recommend the book The Sympathizer for an excellent fictional read looking at the effect of the war on the Vietnamese from both sides. It rips the living hell out of Coppola and Apocalypse Now for being a "movie about the Vietnam war in which not one Vietnamese has a line of dialog."
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:23 AM on May 26, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:23 AM on May 26, 2021 [2 favorites]
Troops walk the Ho Chi Minh Trail in the Truong Son Mountains is wondrous.
Agreed. I really wished it'd been in color.
posted by kirkaracha at 10:25 AM on May 26, 2021
Agreed. I really wished it'd been in color.
posted by kirkaracha at 10:25 AM on May 26, 2021
Apocalypse Now isn't about the Vietnam War.
posted by kirkaracha at 10:28 AM on May 26, 2021 [7 favorites]
posted by kirkaracha at 10:28 AM on May 26, 2021 [7 favorites]
Turns out you can show images from the Vietnam War without playing The Temptations or "Fortunate Son" over them.
The post and this comment has got me wondering about music that expresses Vietnamese perspectives of the war. The only English-language example I can think of is Kate Bush's Pull Out The Pin (1982), where she takes on the voice of a member of the Viet Cong. Does anyone know of other examples - including more authentic or knowledgable voices - in Vietnamese or English? I'd be interested to listen to them.
posted by brushtailedphascogale at 8:10 PM on May 26, 2021 [1 favorite]
The post and this comment has got me wondering about music that expresses Vietnamese perspectives of the war. The only English-language example I can think of is Kate Bush's Pull Out The Pin (1982), where she takes on the voice of a member of the Viet Cong. Does anyone know of other examples - including more authentic or knowledgable voices - in Vietnamese or English? I'd be interested to listen to them.
posted by brushtailedphascogale at 8:10 PM on May 26, 2021 [1 favorite]
Good question, brushtailedphascogale. Not offhand.
You might start with Vietnamese movies.
posted by doctornemo at 7:07 AM on May 27, 2021 [1 favorite]
You might start with Vietnamese movies.
posted by doctornemo at 7:07 AM on May 27, 2021 [1 favorite]
It caught my eye that in the third picture (A Viet Cong guerilla stands guard in the Mekong Delta), the weapon she's holding is an American M16. Plenty of implications in that.
posted by McCoy Pauley at 7:34 AM on May 27, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by McCoy Pauley at 7:34 AM on May 27, 2021 [2 favorites]
Does anyone know of other examples - including more authentic or knowledgable voices - in Vietnamese or English? I'd be interested to listen to them.
Just a starting point, but this Wikipedia entry provides quite a few leads to music by Vietnamese songwriters about the war.
posted by ryanshepard at 5:41 AM on May 28, 2021 [2 favorites]
Just a starting point, but this Wikipedia entry provides quite a few leads to music by Vietnamese songwriters about the war.
posted by ryanshepard at 5:41 AM on May 28, 2021 [2 favorites]
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