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Couples Tour of Vietnam

By Anne Luginbill and Joel Greenberg

On the morning of Saturday, Nov. 30, 1991, three couples-John Lindquist and Anne Bailey, John and Edith Zutz as well as Anne Luginbill and Joel Greenberg-departed from Mitchell Airport in Milwaukee for the start of a two week trip to Vietnam. For Lindquist and Greenberg it was to be the first time back since the war. John Zutz had been back for the first time 3 years earlier. For Annie, Annie and Edie this was the first trip to this part of the world.

We were the sixth delegation to return to Vietnam-the third since the war ended, and the first couples tour sent by VVAW Vietnam.

Our delegation had two main goals, first, to work towards normalization of relations between Vietnam and the US, secondly, we wished to meet with vets organizations there. Our trip was sponsored by the Vietnamese Friendship Association.

Giap, or tour guide and interpreter, was instrumental in helping us achieve the goals of the delegation as well as fulfilling many of our personal goals.

After obtaining visas in Bangkok, we flew in Hanoi. Our first three days were spent there. During that time we met with the Assistant Director Of American Affairs at the Foreign Ministry. We presented him with a petition containing over 600 signatures from US citizens calling the US government to normalize relations and lift the embargo.

We also met with the Vietnamese Veterans Association. This group was formed in 1989. Within two years it has organized over two million veterans. Most of the people we met were retired Colonels and Generals of the North Vietnamese Army. The have been organizing chapters in every provence of the country, every major city and almost every town, with the assistance of the government they do not recognize or welcome veterans who fought with the ARVNS.

The main topics discussed were our organizational structure and goas as vets groups. One of their concerns was the 480,000 Vietnamese still listed as missing from the war with the US.

Later in our trip, we met their chapter in Ho Chi Minh City. The main concern they had was setting up tours for former US Servicemen to the areas they had fought in. A four color brochure they produce lists ten or twelve tours to different areas of what was South Vietnam, based on the major units that fought there.

These were formal meetings. A fixed protocol was followed in every one of 16 meetings we participated in. At the same time, the Vietnamese were very gracious and cordial hosts.

We also went to Bac Mai Hospital in Hanoi and Tu Do Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City. Books could be written about the conditions of each hospital, as well as health care in general. Suffice it to say that the efforts of the US embargo have placed two of the major hospitals in the country in deplorably inhumane condition.

Bac Mai was destroyed by the US Christmas Bombing in 1972. It was rebuilt by 1984. In 1989, they first had sufficient electricity to install lights in the halls. Indoor plumbing, including running water is virtually non-existent.

Tu Do Hospital, which specializes as the women's and children's hospital, delivers a average of 100 babies a day. We saw 'trees' of disposable surgical gloves drying in the hallways. They had been washed out and made ready to re-use. They had not been sterilized. Washing them was the best they could do.

The lifting of the embargo will go a long way in aiding Vietnamese health care to enter the 20th century. Forget hi-tech equipment, they need basic supplies like aspirin, pain killers, gauze, band aids, swabs (Q-Tips) and surgical gloves.

One of the more interesting adventures was the drive from Hanoi to Da Nang. Much of Hwy. 1, the major north-south road is unpaved. Most bridges were being rebuilt. Consequently, they were often one lane. Our Toyota van was one of the few individual cars to share the road with colorful but overloaded buses (people were literally hanging out the sides), motorbikes (50 to 85cc size, with up to four people on a bike), bicycles, trucks, herds of cows and water buffalo pulling carts.

At one point traffic had to go around someone who was taking a nap in the middle of the road. It was no surprise that we made less than 300 miles in 12 hours, even though we made only three stops.

Numerous articles and stories can be written about all the different activities on the trip: from the side trips en route to Da Nang to the tunnels of Cu Chi; shopping in Hanoi, Da Nang and Ho Chi Minh City; the people we met along the way; roadside restaurants to the bar on top of the Rex Hotel (formerly used as US officers quarters); from small, struggling production factories to successful international companies; from policy of joint ventures to the striving for self development. We were exposed to a wide variety of Vietnamese life. It was a very full and busy ten days.

One of the lasting impressions I will have of the trip are the Vietnamese people themselves. I was prepared for the attitude that the war was twenty years ago (the Vietnamese have had two other wars since then). I was not prepared for the generosity from one end of the county to the other.

The easing of travel restrictions, which has happened since our return, the normalizing of relations and the ending of the embargo will go a long way in helping Vietnam end a lot of unnecessary suffering and inhumane conditions.