Interviewees:

• Dat Nguyen, Dallas Cowboys
• Hung Nguyen, National Congress of Vietnamese Americans
• Kien Nguyen, Author "Tapestries"
• Mike Davidson, Major General (Retired)

Copyright 2005 National Public Radio (R)
All Rights Reserved
National Public Radio (NPR)

NEAL CONAN, host:

This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan in Washington.

As the last helicopter took off from the roof of the American Embassy in Saigon on April 30th, 1975, the first wave of Vietnamese prepared to flee their country. Most left with no money, no possessions and no idea what would come next. The first sailed out to the ships of the 7th Fleet, but long after the US Navy left, rickety boats crammed with desperate people sailed into the South China Sea. The boat people, as they came to be known, ended up in refugee camps hoping for a chance to restart their shattered lives. Thirty years ago, an estimated 15,000 Vietnamese lived in the United States. Today, that number is over 1.3 million, and they live in communities across the country. In a way, their story parallels other immigrant groups. The children of those refugees are now doctors, lawyers, shopkeepers, beauticians, restaurateurs and, yes, gangsters, too. In other ways, their stories are unique.

Later in the program, we'll talk about American soldiers who've returned to visit the country where they served so long ago. But first, Vietnamese in America. If you came here from Vietnam after the war, if you were born here to Vietnamese immigrants, if you were one of the children left behind from the union of an American father and a Vietnamese mother, we'd like to hear your story. Our number here in Washington is (800) 989-8255; that's (800) 989-TALK. You can also send us e-mail. The address is totn@npr.org.

Joining us now is Dat Nguyen. His family escaped shortly after the fall of Saigon. He was born in a refugee camp near Little Rock, Arkansas. He now plays linebacker for the Dallas Cowboys.

Dat Nguyen, welcome to TALK OF THE NATION.

Mr. DAT NGUYEN (Linebacker, Dallas Cowboys): Well, thank you for having me.

CONAN: What have your parents told you about their escape from Vietnam?

Mr. D. NGUYEN: Well, I remember I was growing up, they were always telling me--they really only brought it up when they were--when I was a little kid and when I was younger. And when I used to get in trouble, they told me, you know, how fortunate we really are when we came over to America to have an opportunity to live another day.

CONAN: Hmm. When you used to get in trouble. This was--What?--in high school?

Mr. D. NGUYEN: When I was in junior high.

CONAN: And what were you doing?

Mr. D. NGUYEN: I was just, you know, not obeying them...

CONAN: Aha.

Mr. D. NGUYEN: ...and not doing what they wanted me to do. And, you know, they'd bring back the stories and tell me, you know, basically, that, you know, my dad used to work when he was 11 years old. He used to walk five miles with bamboo shoots on his back, and he can't go home until he sold all the bamboo shoots, because he didn't want carry everything back. But you know, they kind of--they didn't really touch--touch really, as a family, on the subject just because I think it was something that it was a chapter of their life that they have closed. And knowing that, hey, the Lord gave them another day, another life and another life to live and that's why they move on.

CONAN: Your family eventually moved to the Gulf Coast, to Rockport, Texas, and worked in the shrimping industry.

Mr. D. NGUYEN: Yes, sir.

CONAN: We've heard stories that there was considerable tension there, particularly in the early days.

Mr. D. NGUYEN: Yes, there was a lot. Even as a kid--you know, sitting back now looking at it, I didn't realize it. Going to school, my mom would always tell me, you know, only speak to your family or your brothers and sisters and your relatives, because that's the only people you could really trust. And there was a lot of tensions going on, because you got to understand that we came from nothing, where we decided--we got all together as Vietnamese immigrants, we built boats, we went out and worked from dusk till dawn, and the people that were there in the community weren't too happy because basically they were saying that we were stealing their income. And there was a lot, a lot of tension. And I think, you know, that might have died out a little bit, but even though--I think still there's a lot of people that still hold grudges against us.

CONAN: Hmm. It gives you insight into, perhaps, the experience of other immigrants at other times in America.

Mr. D. NGUYEN: What's that? I'm sorry.

CONAN: I was wondering if that gave you any insight into the experiences of other immigrants at other times in America.

Mr. D. NGUYEN: I think it's very similar. I think if you're talking about the African-American and--you know, you can understand and see why there was so much tension or why there was so much hatred.

CONAN: Yeah.

Mr. D. NGUYEN: Because for us, you know, as a Vietnamese-American, or Asian-American, we all are hard workers. We are dedicated in what we do, and when we do it, we do it to perfection. And I think a lot of people that were there before didn't appreciate that because they were, like, `Oh, we have all this water, we just go out and work when we want, do what we want and, you know, do what it takes just to make it through the day.'

CONAN: Yeah.

Mr. D. NGUYEN: And as Vietnamese-Americans, we came over, we know that's the only way we can get food on the table, only way we're going to pay the bills or whatever we have to do for our kids, to put clothes on the kids or whatever it is. And I think that's why we had--we had a little bit more fire, more hungry in us to prove that we had to do just to live.

CONAN: When you started to be recognized as a terrific football player, was there an expectation somehow that you would be the Jackie Robinson of the Vietnamese?

Mr. D. NGUYEN: You know, it's crazy, but it never really crosses my mind. But I know deep down that every day I wake up, I'm not just representing my family or my community; I'm representing all Vietnamese-Americans that are around the country, knowing that I'm an icon and knowing that I open doors and break barriers for other kids that dream to do what I do. Because I know I'm very fortunate. I'm very blessed to be where I'm at. And, you know, he could have chose me and other people to do what I'm doing, and he chose me. And hopefully I did open doors, but you got to understand, the percentage is very small to do what I do. And if I can tell the other kids, just dream about what you're doing, but the chances of being a doctor and a lawyer is a little bit more higher than playing professional football.

CONAN: Dat Nguyen, thanks very much for being with us. And minicamp opens--What?--next week?

Mr. D. NGUYEN: We have a rookie minicamp tomorrow.

CONAN: Ah. Well, good luck.

Mr. D. NGUYEN: The next football season right around the corner again already.

CONAN: Well, I hope you got a rest in the off-season and you'll be ready to play against everybody except the Giants.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. D. NGUYEN: Thank you very much, sir.

CONAN: Dat Nguyen is a linebacker for the Dallas Cowboys, and joined us by phone from his home in Dallas, Texas.

With us here in Studio 3A is Hung Nguyen--no relation. Hung Nguyen is president of the National Congress of Vietnamese Americans and was kind enough to join us here.

Thanks very much for coming in today.

Mr. HUNG NGUYEN (President, National Congress of Vietnamese Americans): Well, thank you very much for having us.

CONAN: And the story that Dat Nguyen told us about his parents and him growing up--this is a story that many Vietnamese could also tell.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: It is a story--I mean, I found myself listening to Dat and shaking my head and agreeing with a lot of the stuff that he said. You know, we're hard workers, you had an introduction that many of us came here with nothing. That was the case with our family. And I'm actually happy to say I was a child of welfare. We came here with nothing, and the government provided some means. And now some of us, through hard work, we're able to wear nice suits, to be in the Capitol, to be football players and to be business owners.

CONAN: Mm-hmm.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: And even what Dat said about, you know, getting into trouble; I used to get into trouble as a child. And it's very funny that, for whatever, reason you get into trouble and your parents would say, you know, `If you don't shape up, we're going to send you back to Vietnam.' And that just kind of...

CONAN: Hmm.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: Our story, for some of us, was worse than having the monster underneath the bed or hidden in your closet.

CONAN: Did your family, like his, live in a refugee camp in this country?

Mr. H. NGUYEN: We did. We left Vietnam in 1975, and I was talking to my mom this past weekend actually about that and our story--and they said we just kind of headed out on a--because we were also fishermen, and we headed out to sea a few days before the fall of Saigon, not knowing where we were going to end up. But we eventually ended up at Camp Pendleton in San Diego, as many other refugees did.

CONAN: And it's been a long journey since then. I mean, I know that people who ran businesses in Vietnam, people who were intellectuals, wealthy people, suddenly found themselves utterly destitute, doctors unable to ply their trade. It must have been a desperate time.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: It is a very desperate time. I mean, like you said, there's some generals--I've heard of stories where there were generals in the army. They became janitors. They're nobody here in the United States. So they became janitors, because that's the only way you can make a living for your family. The good thing is--I mean, many of us 30 years ago were refugees, and oftentimes--we had a very difficult time the last 30 years, and we still continue to. But I have to say, though, that we've gone a long way. Now you have people who are bankers for Citibank or insurance agents for State Farm. And, you know, everybody talks about being a good neighbor and stuff, but you see these people becoming Americans, but they haven't forgotten who they are as Vietnamese, and so there's still a cultural heritage still that's involved.

CONAN: We're talking today about Vietnamese in America.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: Mm-hmm.

CONAN: If you'd like to join our conversation, the phone number is (800) 989-8255; (800) 989-TALK. Our e-mail address is totn@npr.org.

And let's begin with Ross. Ross joins us from Berkeley, California.

ROSS (Caller): Hello, Neal.

CONAN: Hello.

ROSS: Yeah. My experience in Vietnam started in 1974 when, at the age of 19, I went alone to Vietnam to open an office for a child welfare organization called Friends of Children of Vietnam. Ultimately, we took in many orphans for adoption and were responsible for hundreds of children who were evacuated during what's become known as Operation Babylift.

CONAN: That was just before the fall of Saigon.

ROSS: That's correct. Then I was subsequently evacuated from the roof of the embassy by helicopter early in the hours of April 30th.

CONAN: That has to be one of the most vivid experiences of your life.

ROSS: It certainly was. It has colored my entire life. And, in fact, now I'm going back to Vietnam quite frequently in my role as vice chair of the US-Vietnam Chamber of Commerce to try to promote reconciliation and business between Vietnam and the United States.

CONAN: And I wonder what--from that day 30 years ago, what would have utterly astounded you had you known that fact 30 years ago?

ROSS: Well, I think that what is so remarkable is how far Vietnam has come since then. The days immediately after the change of government were very dark in Vietnam and indeed for many years afterward as many of the boat people can attest. But in the last few years, things have really started to turn around there, and Vietnam is a much brighter place today.

CONAN: Thanks very much for the phone call, Ross. We appreciate it.

ROSS: My pleasure, Neal. Thank you.

CONAN: And as the Vietnamese arrived in this country, the vast majority after 1975, there was considerable hostility. I'm just thinking there was a Gallup Poll taken at the time; 54 percent of Americans said they opposed settlement of Vietnamese in this country. It had to have been difficult times. And there are also stories of Ku Klux Klan rallies, that sort of thing.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: It was a very difficult time. And I want to first of all say thank you very much to the veterans and the men and women who were actually in Vietnam and those who gave their lives. But more importantly, as you said 54 percent of the people opposed the resettlement of the Vietnamese-American community. And I want to say thank you to those who, through their resistance, allowed us to come here, because as we mentioned, we came here with nothing; now we're contributors to the American economy. In 1997, according to the Census, we put about $9.3 billion into the American economy. That's not bad for a small community, and these are the people you would have said no to and closed the door on. Now they're leaders in the community. Like, you have a Dat Nguyen, who's the--you know, football player.

And it was very difficult. You have a lot of folks saying, `We don't want you in our neighborhoods.' Like, for example, in San Jose, California, a lot of Vietnamese communities, the families, they lived in small homes because not everybody can afford homes, so people had to live in small apartments. And so they paved. So they're obviously--there's a lot of people in the homes; you have a lot of cars. Well, we don't need grass, so we paved it over so cars can park. Well, some people don't want you in our community; `We don't want those kind of people in our community.' So it still happens actually today.

CONAN: We're going to take a short break now. When we return, we'll continue our discussion about Vietnamese in America and take more of your calls; (800) 989-8255, totn@npr.org.

It's TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.

(Soundbite of music)

CONAN: This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan in Washington.

Our guest is Hung Nguyen, the president of the National Congress of Vietnamese Americans. We're talking today about the issues Vietnamese-Americans faced and have overcome and the issues, of course, they continue to face today in the US 30 years after the fall of Saigon. Of course, you're invited to join us. Our number is (800) 989-8255; (800) 989-TALK. And the e-mail address is totn@npr.org.

And joining us now is Kien Nguyen. He's the author of the novel "The Tapestries" and the memoir "The Unwanted." He's joining us from the studios of Little Saigon Radio in Westminster, California.

Nice of you to be with us today on TALK OF THE NATION.

Dr. KIEN NGUYEN (Author, "The Tapestries"): Thank you for having me.

CONAN: Your books are about your experiences as a--I guess the phrase is Amerasian.

Dr. NGUYEN: Amerasian.

CONAN: Yes. Your father is American; your mother Vietnamese.

Dr. NGUYEN: Yes, and I was born in Vietnam in Nha Trang, outside of Saigon. I was one of the Amerasians that was left after the fall of Saigon and experienced 10 years under the communism. And in 1985, I came to America.

CONAN: Mm-hmm. What was it like growing up half-American in Vietnam?

Dr. NGUYEN: It was very difficult because the South Vietnamese harbored some hatreds for us because we resemble the Americans that left Vietnam. The North Vietnamese, the Communists, are trained to hate us. So growing up as Amerasian, I experienced so many different bias, and especially when we go to school. Even--if you read "The Unwanted," I describe about my relationship with my relative, who also ostracized us.

CONAN: Hmm. One of the things that we continually hear from Americans--whether they were soldiers or not--who visit Vietnam today is how graciously they are received by the Vietnamese as Americans. Yet your experience as a half-Vietnamese was very different.

Dr. NGUYEN: Yes. I think that when the fall of Saigon, there's a lot of anger among the people, and that anger need to divert somewhere. We just happened to be children. When I left, I was teen-age, and many of us--I was fortunate. I have a mother who took very good care of us. A lot of other children grew up on the street and they were nicknamed `dirt of life,' and they basically had to survive on their own.

CONAN: And you came to this country under a program that sought to get people like you out of Vietnam.

Dr. NGUYEN: Yes. In the ...(unintelligible) by the United Nations, they have a program called Orderly Departure Program, which allowed the Amerasians to come to America. And we left on that, my mother, my brother, my sister and I. We all left in 1985, and we came to Georgia.

CONAN: Georgia must be a very different place than South Vietnam.

Dr. NGUYEN: It's a very different place. But I only live in Georgia for two days, because I stayed there and I discovered there is the same tension that was--directed upon us, just the same as it was in Vietnam. And somebody told me that New York City was a much better place, more like a city of Oz. Everybody can stay and be whoever they are. So I told my mother that I wanted to go to New York City. So after two days, my mother cashed her welfare check for $178 and she gave it all to me. I bought a one-way ticket to New York on the Greyhound bus for $176. So I came to New York with $2 with a promise to my mother that I would take her with me in three months.

CONAN: Did you keep that promise?

Dr. NGUYEN: And--I did. I came to New York and I knew I had to take--I'd never been to New York. I know no English. I had no idea where I should go. And I look at this map, I studied that map for about two hours, the subway map, and it said Chinatown. And I can only take one subway ride. That's it. So I took the subway ride to Chinatown, got myself a job as a waiter in a Vietnamese restaurant and a place to stay for $200 a month. And I worked and I saved the money, and I brought my mother with me to New York City three months after that.

CONAN: I should say that you've gone on to considerably more success afterwards; not just a published author, but a dentist as well.

Dr. NGUYEN: Yes, sir. One of my biggest dreams when I came to New York was walking down the street, and I wanted to have a place on Central Park. I thought it was such a beautiful place. And in 1998, when I graduated as a dentist and got my license to practice, I opened my practice in Central Park West and 68th Street overlooking at this park, and I thought my life went in full circle.

CONAN: Let's get some more callers on the line. Let's talk now with Ramona. Ramona's with us from Reno, Nevada.

RAMONA: Hello.

CONAN: Hello. You're on the air, Ramona. Go ahead.

RAMONA: Sorry. Yes. I was born at the height of the war in a town outside of Saigon, and I did not actually come to America until I was almost seven years old. I hardly have any memories of Vietnam, but I was adopted by an American family in Sacramento, California. And I just--I kind of grew up always feeling not really part of any group and always feeling disconnected and having no roots. And I still struggle with that every day. My mom gave me up for adoption; I haven't seen her since I was five years old. And my father, I think, was an officer, and he knew that he had a child. But he was called back to the United States or his term was up or something when I was a few months old, and my mom never gave me any information about him. And so I've always wanted to find him but have no--I just feel like there's--it's impossible. So I just wanted to...

CONAN: I wonder, Kien Nguyen, does this story about feeling half-way between two worlds, that must have some resonance for you.

Dr. NGUYEN: Oh, definitely. I totally understand Ramona and identify with her. I don't know who my father is. I question that every single day of my life. I think that Amerasians, as a group, are very--it deserves some more attention. We came here as teen-agers or a lot younger than that. We have no support. Most of us don't have the education in both languages. We are not adapt to take care of ourselves, and we basically have to grow up and survive on our own. We're very scattered. We don't have the group that--I think my book is the only book that talk about it in the recent years. Before that, nobody heard about it. And I think one of the biggest problems we have is that many Amerasians are not US citizenship, and when they get in trouble, they liable to be deported back to Vietnam. And I'm trying to work on that to change the law.

CONAN: I wonder--Hung Nguyen is also with us here in the studio. Is that an issue that the Vietnamese community as a whole is working on?

Mr. H. NGUYEN: It is something that some members of the community are working on. And I think something to--a little background here is that after the Patriot Act, after 9/11, this is something that's going on with a lot of the other Asian countries, Southeast Asian countries, where what our other guest speakers are saying is that if somebody is considered a felon--for example, recently in Montgomery County, Maryland, a young man several years ago, when he was a teen-ager in high school, broke the law.

CONAN: Mm-hmm.

MR. H. NGUYEN: He admitted to something that he said he didn't do. Well, because of that, it's on his record. Now he was up for deportation. His family's here. He does not know anybody in Vietnam. And in some instances, some people do not have any language skills, have not connection to anybody. But because of our government, we're going to send them back.

And what our other speakers are saying is that that is happening, and some folks are looking more into that, because one of the things is that the Vietnamese community is not as empowered politically. We're still getting more involved with the process, and because of that, we're a little slower. And that's where we're also working with some of the other Asian communities, the Asian-Pacific-American communities, to work jointly on this sort of legislation.

And just to kind of let you know, too, though, that I think Ramona or Kien had mentioned the Orderly Departure Program.

CONAN: Mm-hmm. Yes.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: Technically, those programs ended a few years ago, but this past year, what's known as the Davis Amendment--Tom Davis from Virginia, actually through the support of some of the Vietnamese-American community, pushed for an extension to this law that was originally called the McCain Bill or whatever.

CONAN: Mm-hmm.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: But basically, it allows Amerasians to have a quicker process to get into the United States and not go through the same paperwork as a lot of the other folks, because ultimately we, as an American society, have to be responsible for the children we leave behind in other places.

CONAN: Ramona...

RAMONA: Sure.

CONAN: ...I wonder, have you ever been back to Vietnam?

RAMONA: I went back in '99. And I have to say, I thought it would bring back memories, but it really didn't spark anything. And I tried to find the place where I was born and was converted to a video store. And I'm just curious, is there some kind of organization for--you know, 'cause the number that I've heard is over 25,000 children were born from that war. And, I mean, that's the size of a small town. I'm just wondering if any group has formed to try to reunite American fathers with their Amerasian children.

CONAN: Kien Nguyen, can you help us there?

Dr. NGUYEN: No. There is no group. Like I said, we are very scattered. I recently consider myself part of the Vietnamese community in Orange County, because I was being received with open arms, and I get tremendous support from the Vietnamese community here. As far as looking for father, I think the American Red Cross can help you and a few other groups, but nothing permanent, nothing specific.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: If I can interject...

CONAN: Go ahead, Hung Nguyen.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: I do know that there is--in light of just looking for your parent, the father, I know that there are some support groups for adoptees, Amerasian adoptees, that have formed, and I can give you some information later on.

CONAN: OK. And what we'll do, Ramona, if you want to access that information, well, get in touch with us here. Send us an e-mail, totn@npr.org, and we'll relay that information on to you.

RAMONA: Thank you.

CONAN: OK. Thanks very much for the phone call. And, Kien Nguyen, we wanted to thank you for your time today. We appreciate it.

Dr. NGUYEN: Thank you.

CONAN: Kien Nguyen is the author of the novel, "The Tapestries" and the memoir "The Unwanted." His next book will be called "House of Echoes" about his experience as a young Amerasian immigrant in the Bronx. We're talking today about the experience of Vietnamese in America 30 years after the fall of Saigon. And you're listening to TALK OF THE NATION, which is coming to you from NPR News.

And let's get another caller on the line, and this is Patricia. Patricia's calling us from Raleigh, North Carolina.

PATRICIA (Caller): Good afternoon. I wanted to know--I came over in the '80s. I'm a boat person, and it's funny because now people are calling me--there's a joke that I'm a Twinkie. I'm white on the inside and yellow on the out. And now I have my own children. I'm married to an American. I can't use those threats to my kids anymore, you know, sending them back to Vietnam. And I guess there's a lot of us that are real confused. You know, coming over around seven years old, kind of like the Amerasians, you're half American and half Vietnamese. Now how do we pick our generations, our next--our youngest generations now that, you know, we're all grown up, having kids? They're all Americanized, but you don't want them to lose that touch of our Vietnamese heritage, you know. So that's one of the biggest--I don't know--struggles I'm having raising my own child.

CONAN: As it goes into a third generation, Hung Nguyen, Patricia's not alone.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: No, she isn't. I actually came here when I was four or five years old and, you know, Patricia was mentioning that, you know, this difficulty of the threat no longer works, and that often is the case, but I do know that there is--a lot of churches around the country are very involved in language schools.

PATRICIA: Right.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: And so you can have your child go to the school--I mean, I was a child; I went to school, and I hated it, you know.

PATRICIA: I did, too. I know what you're talking about.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: You know, putting the accent marks on the words and letters, I hated it, you know. Even today...

PATRICIA: Yep.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: ...I write and I rarely put accent marks on them, but...

PATRICIA: Yep.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: ...God bless my parents. They understand what I'm writing.

PATRICIA: Yes. And I look back today, as my parents saying, `Under my roof, you speak Vietnamese. Out anywhere else, you can speak any language,' and it was one of the toughest things for me growing up, because you want to be so Americanized, and now as an adult, I want to revert back to being Vietnamese again.

CONAN: And do you speak Vietnamese with your children?

PATRICIA: Actually, my daughter knows how to order all the, you know, Vietnamese meals by herself, so she's six years old, so I'm starting. You know, it's difficult since I don't speak the language very fluently, because I don't have any family over here. You know, I'm not very fluent, and I can't practice every day. And Raleigh's still a very small Vietnamese community here. But like you said, that's a great idea about churches and everything. I'm trying to get involved in that community.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: And I would also suggest that there are some online Web sites that have software that you can teach your child how to speak Vietnamese. You know, they're not that great really, to tell you the truth. I think the best experience is to be around other Vietnamese Americans who can help you.

PATRICIA: Right.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: And I think if you--I know that in Raleigh, there is, like you said, a small emerging community, and also there are some Montagnards, too, and the Montagnards have their own language, but they also speak Vietnamese.

PATRICIA: Right, right, correct. Well, thank you so much.

CONAN: Thanks for the call, Patricia.

PATRICIA: All right. Have a wonderful day.

CONAN: Bye-bye.

PATRICIA: Bye-bye.

CONAN: I wonder, in this country, you're regarded as Vietnamese. When you return to Vietnam, I understand people who come back are called the Vietque.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: We are. We are known as Vietque, and that translates literally to `overseas Vietnamese.' I had a conversation with somebody about this a while ago, a foreign minister, and I said, you know, `When you call that, to me, I feel insulted because I am an American of Vietnamese descent.' And the person says, `Well, there's no offense. We just don't know how else to refer to you.' But my thing is we're American citizens now, and when somebody refers to you as an overseas Vietnamese, it almost says that they still have control over you, dominance over you, and I take offense at that, and I think that's one of the reason why a lot of Vietnamese Americans take offense at the Vietnamese government right now, because, you know, the war was 30 years ago, but to a lot of people, the war has not ended. That doesn't mean that people are still fighting the war, but it's about equality. It's about the treatment of persons.

You know, we left not just in 1975, but we also left in 1954 because we were Catholics living in North. My grandmom lived in the same hometown, Vinh, as Ho Chi Minh. They probably knew each other. But the thing is we had to leave in 1954 because of discrimination, you know, of communism against Catholicism. And again, in '75, we left. Had we stayed behind, we would have been persecuted because a lot of the folks over there had mentioned that, you know, they were behind, they came here under the Orderly Departure Program of the H.O. Humanitarian Order. But the thing is, Vietque is a derogatory term for us, you know, because if anything, they should refer to us as a Vietnamese American, because again, we're Vietnamese in America.

CONAN: Hung Nguyen, thanks very much for being with us today.

Mr. H. NGUYEN: Thank you.

CONAN: Hung Nguyen is president of the National Congress of Vietnamese Americans, was here with us in Studio 3A.
When we come back from a short break, a soldier's story, a return to Vietnam.

It's NPR News.

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CONAN: This is TALK OF THE NATION. I'm Neal Conan in Washington.

And here are the headlines from some of the stories we're following here today at NPR News. Iraq's parliament has endorsed the new government of Prime Minister Ibrahim Al-Jafari, but several key Cabinet positions, including the ministries of defense and oil, still have not been named. And Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist has proposed to allow Democrats 100 hours of debate on a future Supreme Court nominee and each of President Bush's judicial choices if they agree to give up the right to a filibuster and allow a confirmation vote on each. You can hear details on those stories coming up later today on "All Things Considered" from NPR News.

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Many of the millions of Americans who served in Vietnam during the war spent their last few weeks in country, counting the days until they could leave. Over the past few years, thousands of them have returned to Vietnam to visit old battlefields, to remember old friends. In a moment, we'll talk with our friend, Mike Davidson, who's just returned from his first trip to Vietnam since the war. If you have questions about what that was like or if you've made that trip yourself, our number is (800) 989-8255; that's (800) 989-TALK. And the e-mail address is totn@npr.org.

Mike Davidson retired from the staff of the Joint Chiefs of Staff a couple of years ago with the rank of major general. Mike, I'm guessing you were a lieutenant the first time you went to Vietnam.

Major General MIKE DAVIDSON (Retired): Absolutely, a very green, young and eager lieutenant.

CONAN: And how long were you there, as it turned out?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Six months and one day.

CONAN: And which unit?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: I was in the Ranger Company in the 1st Air Cavalry Division. We were doing long-range reconnaissance patrols.

CONAN: So you were out in what was regarded at the time as the boonies.

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Yes, or even beyond the boonies out in what we called Indian Country, well away from any other US forces.

CONAN: After that experience, as a young man, this had to be remarkably vivid. I mean, you must remember a lot of it.

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Certainly, I do. It's a pretty intense experience, and it certainly puts all these Washington and Pentagon battles in a different perspective.

CONAN: And does it help, I wonder--you were a senior officer much later. Does it help to remember what it's like to be a lieutenant at the end of a very long telephone line?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Absolutely. And frankly, I'm not sure how you could be a senior officer unless you'd had some combat experience in there somewhere, and we've certainly fixed that problem, haven't we?

CONAN: Yeah. Well, let's talk about--why did you decide to return and why now? I mean, it's been some years since, you know, former GIs started going back to Vietnam.

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Well, I went back on something of an unusual basis. I went back to do a bike ride from Hanoi to Saigon, and that's a bicycle, not a motorbike. And really hadn't focused on much of the Vietnam stuff. I was looking more for the bike ride and then found a lot of good Vietnam things while I was there.

CONAN: You weren't looking for--you were going back to Vietnam. You had to be thinking about what you'd done 30 years before.

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Well, yeah. And the funny part was, I was on the telephone making a reservation, an airline ticket to Hanoi, and I thought, `Oh, what am I doing? Guys used to get killed trying to fly into Hanoi.' So, but, yeah, certainly, I knew where I was going.

CONAN: The bike ride--was it down the coastal route for the most part?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: It was. And we lost our head and went up into the Highlands for a couple of days, which is a 4,500-foot elevation. I know a lot of cyclists listen to NPR. They will appreciate that, even if some of the others won't.

CONAN: Of course, we'll always remember to--it's important to remember the difference between cyclists and bikers in this context.

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Absolutely.

CONAN: Did you return to any of the places you remembered as a young man?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: You know, I did. Because if you're going to ride your bike from one end of the country to the other, you're going to go over some familiar ground, and, in fact, I did.

CONAN: What was that like?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: It wasn't bad. The people in Vietnam are a very attractive people and it's a beautiful country. They're very young. They don't remember the war. Most of them were born well after the war was over. American things are fashionable in Vietnam for some reason, logos and clothes, and so it was a very warm reception. They're friendly
people.

CONAN: Could you see the war--the signs of it, the remnants of it?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Oh, yes, of course, even back from the French War in '52 up to '54. They still have pillboxes. We have more pillboxes. The damage has pretty well been cleaned up, though.

CONAN: Are there memorials there in Vietnam to--well, to what, when you were there, was the other side?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Yeah. And that was a bit of an experience. I will tell you, I wrestled with the issue of whether to visit the My Lai Memorial and ended up doing that, and now that was a good experience. It came to me, since I'm still here in Washington to do national security things and still deal with issues like Abu Ghraib, that if my Army had done at My Lai what we did, ought to have the chutzpa to go stand there on the ground where they did it, so I did.

CONAN: And what was it like? What did you see?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: It was an unusual trip. I was--going in, it's a disorienting experience, because when you're going through a--past a rice paddy and there's a tree line, you find yourself thinking, well, where am I going to jump when they start shooting and where am I going to call in fire? So you kind of get in a mind-set for that. And the one remarkable thing about the My Lai Memorial, it's not remotely a memorial like we would have a memorial. It's not grand or--it's more like a strip shopping center, frankly. But they had a path that ran through the village, and they poured concrete on the path, and while the concrete was still wet, they took a jungle boot and made imprints going in all directions. They had bare feet, children's size, going in all directions, and it kind of captured the confusion that must have taken hold during that day. So it was a good experience.

CONAN: What evoked the strongest memories for you? Was it the sights? Was it the smell, the sounds?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: No. It was the people. It was the people. They haven't changed. They're still very attractive, still very young, still making their way. I'm glad you're doing a show on Vietnamese. They're resilient people. They have a strong culture. It merges well with the American culture. Our two countries bonded during that war. We had two and a half million American men and women serve in Southeast Asia during that war. So there's an enduring connection between our two countries.

CONAN: Not too long ago, I think there was a news report of the first Vietnamese-American to die in Iraq.

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Yeah. And you can't stereotype these things, but as I say, I found the Vietnamese a very appealing culture, and they do family things well. They do religious things well. They do well in America, of course.

CONAN: We're taking calls now from people who may have served and returned to Vietnam. If you've made that trip, give us a call: (800) 989-8255, (800) 989-TALK. You can also send us an e-mail: totn@npr.org.

John joins us on the line from Portland, Oregon.

JOHN #1 (Caller): Hello, Neal.

CONAN: Hey, John.

JOHN #1: How are you?

CONAN: Very well, thank you.

JOHN #1: I was a--I served in Vietnam as a teen-age helicopter pilot. I was there in 1968 and 1969, and I went back last year with my wife and two teen-age daughters, and we had just a fabulous time. It was just phenomenal.

CONAN: Did you have any concerns when you started booking this trip and making arrangements?

JOHN #1: No. I had a number of people ask me if I was going back there to kind of make peace with myself, and my experience wasn't such that I needed to do that. It was purely to go back to a country that I loved very much when I was there, and we were not at all surprised. It was just--the people could not have been nicer. Yeah. It was absolutely wonderful. We started in Saigon and went all the way up the coast and ended in Hanoi. Hanoi was--it just blew my mind. It's a sophisticated, beautiful city. We spent two days in Hue. I couldn't believe Hue. It was just a phenomenal trip. And the people are absolutely wonderful. There was absolutely no remnant whatsoever of ill feeling.

CONAN: I wonder, how did your daughters like it?

JOHN #1: They loved it. They loved it. As I say, it was great shopping. You hear it's a Communist nation. I've never seen so many capitalists in my life. Everybody is selling something. It was just--it was a phenomenal trip. I'd recommend it to anyone, whether you've been there or not.

CONAN: I wonder, you said there was no necessity for you to go back to make your peace with anything, but was one of the people that you may have encountered during your trip yourself as a young man?

JOHN #1: No. You know, you asked the general what he was stricken by. I think one of the things that I was stricken by was how quiet it was. You know, when I was there, you could never get away from the sounds of helicopters. They were always in the air, and I never saw one helicopter, so it was kind of interesting from that perspective.

CONAN: The sound of the Huey, the universal symbol of Vietnam. Yeah.

JOHN #1: That certainly was universal.

CONAN: John...

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: John, this is Mike Davidson. Did you get a chance to visit the Imperial City when you were at Hue?

JOHN #1: We did. And, you know, you talked about seeing remnants of the war. I was stricken by there's virtually no war damage visible. I think you do see pillboxes and things like that, but the Imperial City was just amazing. You know, obviously, I'd read a lot about Hue and the assault there in Tet of '68, but I had no idea it was as beautiful as it was. Hue was frankly--probably next to Hanoi, was my favorite place.

CONAN: All right. Well, thanks very much for the call, John.

JOHN #1: You bet. Thank you. A great program.

CONAN: Appreciate it. Let's talk now with Lou, and Lou is calling us from Overland Park in Kansas.

LOU (Caller): Good afternoon.

CONAN: Afternoon.

LOU: Excuse me. I was an Army nurse from October of '69 through October of '70 during the war, and I was stationed at Chu Lai, which was just south of Da Nang. I've been back to Vietnam twice. I was back in November of '94 and then in January of '96, and actually, I got a couple more trips planned that ended up being canceled and would like to get back again. I just--my reason for going back may be a little bit of closure, but just because I was curious. I thought that it was a beautiful country, and I wanted to get back and see what had happened, what had transpired, how it had changed. And I did actually get back to where my hospital had been, but there's nothing there. It's all gone.

CONAN: That must seem remarkable; a place that I'm sure you can remember every step and turn of in your imagination and all gone.

LOU: Yes. And fortunately, since all of us tend to lose a little of that thought process as we age, I took lots of slides while I was there, and I actually now speak to students all the way from about fifth grade on through college level about my year there, and so I have these actual visual aids to keep my memory very fresh. And what I do now when I speak is there is a slide, I went up in a Loach one day, which is a little helicopter, and took some overhead shots of the hospital, and I show
that as part of my presentation. And then at the very end, I show a slide taken on down the road from Chu Lai on the beach, looking up, and saying, `Can you see the similarities in the terrain? But that's where the hospital was. There's nothing there now.'

CONAN: Just the terrain.

LOU: Just the terrain. But the people were very warm. I found the same thing. You can--at least in '96 and '94, you could buy almost anything you wanted for one US dollar, and I did get up to North Vietnam and those areas where, fortunately, I didn't get during the war. The one really interesting thing about the northern area of Vietnam now is in '94, when I went back, they were in the process of demolition of the Hanoi Hilton, and when I went back a year and a half later, it was gone. So I kind of felt fortunate I had a chance to peek in and see the cells in there in '94 before they were gone.

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Did you get a chance to visit the hospital tunnel complex at Chu Lai?

LOU: I did. As a matter of fact, that was a vivid memory of my working there as we would occasionally get patients from the tunnel hospitals and...

CONAN: These were tunnel hospitals run by the Viet Cong?

LOU: Underground, yes, and if anybody goes--I've said this many times--you need to visit either in Cu Chi or in Chu Lai, somewhere, the tunnel system, because it makes you appreciate that we were fighting an enemy that could live underground for months on end, and there was probably not much chance, from that fact alone, that we were going to
win that war. They knew what was going on, and we didn't even know they were there. It's a real learning experience.

CONAN: Lou, thanks very much for calling.

LOU: You're welcome.

CONAN: Appreciate it.

LOU: Thank you.

CONAN: We're talking about returns to Vietnam. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News.

And let's get another caller on the line, John. John's calling from Ann Arbor, Michigan.

JOHN #2 (Caller): Hello, gentlemen. My name is John, and I've been a student of military history, so I know a little bit about the battles and whatnot that were fought in Vietnam, but I've got a question for the general concerning his feelings about maybe who actually won the war. And the reason I say this is the general mentioned that, you know, American logos and products are all the rage in Vietnam. The other day, I saw on the news about a Vietnamese software company that is actually selling services--I think it was to IBM or some big American company. So I kind of see maybe some openings for some democracy in the future of Vietnam, so despite the fact maybe the war was lost, do you see in the long run, that maybe there's some irony that things like democracy can actually come to the Vietnamese people?

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Enormous amounts of irony. I kept asking the Vietnamese I was with--and believe me, when you're in a bicycle traveling that many miles, you spend all of your time out with the Vietnamese people--ask them what they thought about the Communists and how it was going. Every village, no matter how small, has one nice building, and that's the Communist headquarters. And the local people take it as a joke that they have to have the building for the Communists, and there's the other life that they all live. Those people don't know or care whether their government is Communist or what have you. So I think you raise a good point. The Vietnamese people will ultimately win by their own talents and initiative, regardless of what we or anybody else does.

CONAN: John...

JOHN #2: Yeah, I--oh, yeah, I agree, and I think that, you know, I have a lot of Vietnamese American friends, and I've always had the highest regard for them. They're very smart. They work very hard. They believe in the American ideal, and by the way, I think it's really great that some of our former warriors can actually travel back to a country, you know, where they were involved in a conflict and participate in positive things, and I'm not too sure, you know, warriors from other countries would do that.

CONAN: John, thanks very much.

JOHN #2: Thank you.

CONAN: Bye-bye. And let's see if we can get one more caller in, and this is Bob. Bob's with us from Hailey, Idaho.

BOB (Caller): Yes.

CONAN: Hi.

BOB: Hi. I'm Bob from Hailey, Idaho. In '95, I rode my bicycle through Vietnam for 30 days, starting from Hanoi on down--all the way down into South Vietnam.

CONAN: And have your legs stopped hurting yet?

BOB: It was a pretty leisurely ride, actually. That wasn't the important part of it. But it was a fascinating trip and it's a beautiful country, and I hadn't gone back there with the intention of trying to find any sort of resolution, but I did have one incident that brought a lot of resolution to my experience that was pretty meaningful. And that was that--and I was having lunch at a village in North Vietnam, and one of the guys who was the brother of the person who had invited us for lunch showed up, and he had actually been at the same place in Tay Ninh Province that I had been, at the same time that I had been there; only he was either Viet Cong or a North Vietnamese regular. I'm not sure. And when we both realized that and our conversation, which was limited at best, just because I don't speak Vietnamese--but when we realized that, it was clearly a significant, meaningful event for him, too, in that we both had tears in our eyes and recognized that here was a former enemy, that we were sitting face-to-face having lunch together. And it was a very meaningful experience.

CONAN: Bob, thanks very much for the phone call. We appreciate it.

BOB: All right.

CONAN: Take care.

BOB: Thank you.

CONAN: And, General Davidson, Mike, it's always good to have you on the program.

Maj. Gen. DAVIDSON: Thank you for having me back, Neal.

CONAN: Mike Davidson, major general, retired, US Army, was with us here in Studio 3A.

This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. I'm Neal Conan.

LOAD-DATE: April 28, 2005

[Posted 6/12/05]