Nothing epitomises the perseverance and tenacity of the Vietnamese people during the war quite like the Cu Chi tunnels – a network of underground tunnels near the village of Cu Chi only 30km from the then enemy capital, Saigon. At their peak the network stretched 250km to the Cambodian border, sometimes even within the perimeter of the American bases in the area.
A forest on top, a network of tunnels below.
The tunnels had innumerable trapdoors and booby traps, while at the same time serving as living areas, kitchens, field hospitals and weapons factories for the guerrilla troops. The discovery of the tunnels, coupled with the ineffectiveness of the US to eliminate this threat, quite literally under their noses, led to the area of Cu Chi becoming “the most bombed, shelled, gassed, defoliated and generally devastated area in the history of war”.
One of the original tunnels that hasn’t been enlarged for tourists – it is tiny!
Today, the tunnels are a very popular tourist attraction complete with a shooting range where you can spend a small fortune firing machine guns. Our tour around the tunnels was very interesting, largely because of our guide. Mr Thoong (or Slim Jim as he liked to be called), was 24 during the war and fought alongside US and Aussie forces for South Vietnam against the Viet Cong (hence the appropriate “Aussie” moniker.)
He was both interesting and funny with his English phrases often even slipping into cockney rhyming slang (clearly he had spent too much time with tourists!). His voice was cracking because “he was on the lash last night”; when we had to hurry up, we had to “shake a leg” and when it was tea time we had to have a “Rosie Lee”. This was made all the funnier in an accent that was a mixture of Vietnamese and Aussie but ended up sounding like Nelson Mandela.
I digress. Speaking from his experience, his perspective on the war was completely different and is not the one that you read on the propaganda pamphlets and the official party line. He describes Vietnam like this: During the war, there were two countries with two governments. Today Vietnam is one country… geographically… but still two countries in the hearts and minds of the people. The South does not trust or like the people of the North. The war was lost because the Americans abandoned the people of South Vietnam after promising to help and the people of the North were duped by good propaganda that the US was an invading force rather than allies of the South.
Most interesting was his last comments on the matter. I paraphrase, “What was the point of three million dead and 20 years of sanctions after the war, only for the US and Vietnam to be friends again now. Nothing was achieved and the people of the South are still oppressed by a one party communist government.”
The tunnels that are open today are in an area called Ben Dihn and although the tunnels have been enlarged by 50% for tourists, “ben-dihn” is exactly what you have to do to get inside. They are small! I was too big even with bending and squatting and shuffling and couldn’t manage it. But the contortionist Adrie managed to scurry through about 100m of ill-lit tunnel to emerge on the other side hot and sweaty. I cannot imagine living down there even if bombs were raining down above ground.
I was still optimistic at this stage of the process…
Unfortunately this is as far as my tall frame would allow me to go.
Surely she must have slipped a disc to get into that position!
After 100m she emerges hot and sweaty
We also saw some examples of the booby traps used in the jungle and some old burnt out tanks. We climbed down into one of the disguised sniper foxholes. It was rather weird to walk through the jungle with the sound of gunfire in the background (from the shooting range) and imagine how scary this place must have been.
One of the traps – a clipping armpit trap. Sounds painful.
Although the site was a bit of a tourist circus, it was a really interesting visit.