U.S. Officer Revisits His Past in Vietnam
DA NANG, Vietnam — Cmdr. H. B. Le, the first Vietnamese-American to command a United States Navy destroyer, had just stepped ashore on a formal port call, making an emotional return to Vietnam for the first time since he fled as a young boy on a fishing boat at the end of the war in 1975.
A youthful and smiling man of 39, he bore on his shoulders the weight of the symbolism of cautiously warming military ties between Vietnam and the United States in the visit over the weekend.
But the symbolism became more nuanced when his welcoming ceremony was delayed by a dispute over a request to display the red Vietnamese flag with its gold star aboard the U.S.S. Blue Ridge, the flagship of the Seventh Fleet, which had just pulled into port.
Two hours later the flag was finally raised high on the yardarm, seemingly in accord with the Vietnamese demand and contrary to American naval custom.
The waiting generals began to smile again, the red carpet was rolled out and Commander Le was free to proceed with his return...
... He was returning to a very different Vietnam from the one he fled at the age of 5 with his parents and three of his siblings. Most people in this young nation, like Commander Le himself, have no memory of the war.
In the last decade or more, Vietnam has opened its economy, increased trade with the United States and risen from postwar poverty even as the Communist government maintains control of the news media and political expression.
The city of Da Nang today, with four new bridges, broad streets and an emerging high-rise skyline, is almost unrecognizable to those who were here during the war years.
Despite the changes, the flag-raising dispute and the background of Commander Le’s own story illustrated the complexities of a relationship that remains shadowed by the war, even as it moves tentatively forward.
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A youthful and smiling man of 39, he bore on his shoulders the weight of the symbolism of cautiously warming military ties between Vietnam and the United States in the visit over the weekend.
But the symbolism became more nuanced when his welcoming ceremony was delayed by a dispute over a request to display the red Vietnamese flag with its gold star aboard the U.S.S. Blue Ridge, the flagship of the Seventh Fleet, which had just pulled into port.
Two hours later the flag was finally raised high on the yardarm, seemingly in accord with the Vietnamese demand and contrary to American naval custom.
The waiting generals began to smile again, the red carpet was rolled out and Commander Le was free to proceed with his return...
... He was returning to a very different Vietnam from the one he fled at the age of 5 with his parents and three of his siblings. Most people in this young nation, like Commander Le himself, have no memory of the war.
In the last decade or more, Vietnam has opened its economy, increased trade with the United States and risen from postwar poverty even as the Communist government maintains control of the news media and political expression.
The city of Da Nang today, with four new bridges, broad streets and an emerging high-rise skyline, is almost unrecognizable to those who were here during the war years.
Despite the changes, the flag-raising dispute and the background of Commander Le’s own story illustrated the complexities of a relationship that remains shadowed by the war, even as it moves tentatively forward.