The infamous Chu Chi tunnels are just over 30 km from Ho Chi Min City so we arrange a car and driver through Saignoncitytour.com. Taking advice from the wonderfully camp Luxe guide (www.luxecityguides.com) our driver Mr Thang stops at Annam, a shrine to Harvey Nicks food hall, so that I can pick up some food for a picnic.
The day proves to be a history lesson to rival any other, but unlike history lessons I remember, this one is fascinating.
Work started on these underground tunnels in the 1940s and it took 25 years to complete them. Built initially to evade the French, in 1960 the invading North Vietnamese communist army successfully overran many parts of the capitalist south, including Chu Chi and was one of the reasons citied by Lyndon Johnson to involve the United States in a war that, frankly, had naff all to do with them. But that just goes to confirm my (some may say tainted) image of certain of our Yankee brothers. Those canny commies went on to dig tunnels which came right up into the US base camp causing for many a soldier to wonder how it was that they were getting shot at in their tents during the night. The area around Chu Chi was virtually obliterated by the B-52s who carpet bombed it. The villages were evacuated and razed to the ground, chemical defoliant was sprayed from the trees and napalm ensured the job was finished off sufficiently so that there was no hiding place from the US troops.
Driven underground, the commies continued with their burrowing until there were 250kms of tunnels, some running several stories deep housing kitchens, hospitals and weapon factories. We were shown how the smoke from kitchens was exhausted meters away after having passed through a series of other tunnels, cooling the smoke down in the process, so that when it finally escaped over the forest floor, not only was it cool enough to stay low but it didn’t give away the true position of the tunnels. Some entrances were hidden underwater and could only be accessed from rivers. The men and women here would live underground for weeks, even months on end. In fact, one of the ladies who worked here was born in the tunnels.
There’s just one or two places to see where the tunnels are still their original size and even Harley has to crouch down to get inside. The rest have been widened and heightened to allow access to fat tourists, and still even skinny Ruby has to bend over. My slight claustrophobia gets the better of me and I decline the chance to scramble through but the others scuttle in and emerge hot and dusty a few metres further along.
We saw the bombs and missiles of the US Army, stacked up next to the crude but nastily effective weapons of the Vietnamese. Trap doors set in the jungle floor, landmines created from unexploded US bombs. All pretty nasty stuff.
For $1 per bullet, you can have a go at firing a rifle or even an AK-47. Plumping for the latter, I fire off a few bullets but this 30 year old gun is off centre and loud enough to make your ears bleed so I pass over the last 5 bullets to Will who also manages to miss the target. We’re both a bit spooked out afterwards to think that this gun was probably used during the war with devastating effect, although the sight must have been slightly better then to have inflicted any injury.
We decide to round off the day with a visit to the War Remnants Museum and ask Mr Thang if it’s suitable viewing for the children. He assures us several times that it would be ok to take them in and, since Harley’s now fallen asleep anyway, we take Ruby tentatively in. We’re greeted by the sight of old US army tanks and aircraft, an all too familiar sight to us by now. Pushing on inside, we can instantly see that this is not viewing for a 7 year old. Will takes Ruby to sit on a bench with him and sleeping Harley whilst I take a good look at the photos and stories on the walls. It’s a truly horrific sight: American soldiers carrying pieces of Vietnamese bodies in their hands, like souvenirs; smiling soldiers sitting around a couple of Vietnamese heads whilst the bodies lie discarded to one side; pictures of the area around Chu Chi pre- and post- napalm; torture; the My Lai massacre (where the American army suspected the South Vietnamese of harbouring the enemy, so killed every man, woman and child in the village, just in case); pictures of many of the victims of Agent Orange and, just for good measure, three pickled still-born babies, all badly handicapped as a result of Agent Orange. It’s more than I can face and I return, sobbing to Will telling him to go on without me. I take the kiddies outside to get some air and remember that the bottle of red I’d bought for the picnic is still sitting in my bag, and now seems like as good a time as any to drink it. I’m soon feeling better but you’ll have to read Will’s blog (www.willsworldtour2.blogspot.com) if you want further details about the museum as I didn’t move from that spot until closing time, when he returned dry eyed and completely unemotional. Boys, eh?
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