My Lai Massacre on 16 March, 1968 is one of
the numerous war crimes committed by US troops during Vietnam War
Hundreds of armless and resistless villagers were shot
their food burnt, village destroyed, paddy crushed
The only casualty on the three US platoons was a soldier
who shot his own foot to stay clean of this atrocity.
Age distribution of a massacred family
Some Americans might shrug it off as another "communist propaganda"
Well, it could have been.
Anyway, none of them is gonna jump out and testify
They all died!
The peaceful paddy in the restored neighborhood
Khe Sanh now looks like a war theme park
It is where General Westmoreland swallowed Viet Cong's bait in 1968
He and the similarly idiotic President Johnson believed that
the communist was going to turn Khe Sanh into another Dien Bien Phu
thus focused all attention here
This facilitated Viet Cong's Tet Offensive, which,
though failed, proved to be the turning point of Vietnam War
Ho Chi Minh Trail has turned to Ho Chi Minh highway
One of the entrances into Vinh Moc Tunnel
Due to US troop's constant bombing of civilian,
villagers of Vinh Moc had to dig an enormous tunnle network
and lived inside like rats
This makes me recall Nong Khiew in northern Lao
where villagers had to live in cliff cave like monkeys
to survive from US bombing.
Serene beach right outside Vinh Moc Tunnel
I can roughly feel what the villagers felt
when they stepped out the tunnel after air raid
General Curtis Lemay, Commander of then US Strategic Air Force, boasted in November 1965 that:
"We can reach any target in this world with our air force. The North Vietnam should touch his nape, otherwise it will be entirely destroyed by our bombardment thus driving the North Vietnam back into the stone age. The North Vietnam could sustain only for a few weeks under the pressure of the US bombardment."
Most of this prophet's forecast became true: by the end of the war there was not a single bridge standing in North Vietnam, whereas civilians (even in neighboring countries like Lao) did have to resort to cave-dwelling as in stone age.
Unfortunately, his last sentence was a little bit unproved.
What a pity for the "free world"!