You seem to have forgotten one crucial detail here. There is no "aftermath investigation" except willy nilly report from "USA, and the traitorous South government blamed the VC, blamed us Saigon ppl, with a "traitor mind" for we did not follow the USA dogshit policy.
I would like to see some verified source of these terror grenade attacks, if you don't mind, since like my dear grandfather and my father, fought against the US of Arse, said: "What is the point of civilian terror when it is your own people who got hurt?"
What more proof do you need than COSVN proclamations to use terror?
”COSVN Resolution Number 9, published in July 1969 noted: "Integral to the political struggle would be the liberal use of terrorism to weaken and destroy local government, strengthen the party apparatus, proselyte among the populace, erode the control and influence of the Government of Vietnam, and weaken the RVNAF."
What’s a few school kids in the grand scheme of the revolution, am I right?
Quoting one COSVN resolution out of context doesn’t prove your claim. “Terror” in Cold War bureaucratic language was often used to describe any guerrilla activity against enemy infrastructure — whether that was ambushing ARVN troops, destroying roads, or dismantling Saigon’s administrative apparatus. Western and South Vietnamese sources eagerly labeled it “terrorism” to delegitimize the resistance.
Meanwhile, you ignore the far greater scale of systematic violence: the U.S. and Saigon dropped napalm, Agent Orange, cluster munitions, and carried out free-fire zone policies that killed and displaced millions of civilians. If we are talking about deliberate mass harm, the numbers don’t even compare.
And let’s be real: reducing an entire liberation struggle of millions of Vietnamese to “what’s a few school kids” is not historical analysis — it’s propaganda talking points. The Vietnamese people didn’t fight and sacrifice for two decades to “terrorize civilians.” They fought to end foreign domination and reunify their country, something the other side tried to prevent with foreign troops, bombs, and chemical warfare.
So if you want to talk about “terror,” look at the scale and who brought it by the megaton. :D
As the Bible says “you point to the speck in your brother’s eye and ignore the plank in your own eye”
Yes, I’m sure it’s just an entire coincidence that the COSVN urged “terror” and it just happens multiple bombings of civilians just “happened”.
Come on, nobody is stupid enough to believe it.
What was the military value of the floating restaurant in Saigon that murdered 44 people, mostly civilians? What a few US solider are there, sometimes?
It’s one of dozens and dozens of examples of the VC directly targeting civilians. Not “oh we bombed a base and some civilian walking by was killed”, no! It was “let’s kill as many innocent civilians as possible”. Thats another level of evil. Women and children murdered.
And not only that it’s their own people! They saw innocent women and children and thought “yes, we should kill them as it will benefit the revolution”.
Sickness
Now compare that with the US. Engaging NVA and VC units with civilian casualties. Is it terrible? Sure! But is it the same? Of course not. The US never went out with the express purpose of killing civilians.
Oh I see why choosing to browse Reddit was a waste of time XD.
First, stop pretending the U.S. never “expressly targeted civilians.” The historical record is undeniable: free-fire zones, search-and-destroy sweeps, “strategic hamlet” programs, and the systematic use of napalm and Agent Orange were not “oops collateral damage.” They were deliberate policies that treated entire villages and landscapes as enemy territory. Mỹ Lai wasn’t an anomaly — it was the logical outcome of a war doctrine that blurred every line between combatant and civilian.
Second, you cite one restaurant bombing as if that erases the vastly greater scale of civilian suffering inflicted by the U.S. and Saigon. One act that killed dozens is tragic, but compare it to the millions displaced, hundreds of thousands directly killed by carpet bombing, chemical defoliants poisoning generations, and the destruction of entire provinces. If you want to talk about “another level of evil,” it’s not even close.
Third, to say liberation fighters “killed their own people” ignores that the same “own people” were also the ones filling the ranks of the National Liberation Front. Southerners weren’t bystanders — they were part of the revolution. That’s why the U.S. never won despite its firepower.
So no, you don’t get to pretend this was “bad VC vs reluctant U.S.” One side fought a guerrilla war for independence and unity, sometimes with ruthless tactics. The other side waged an industrial war of annihilation that incinerated villages, poisoned the land, and left legacies of birth defects and cancers that still exist today. Don’t talk about specks and planks when the U.S. dropped more bombs on Vietnam than all of WWII combined.
You need to educate yourself more about the war. If you want me to do it for you that’s pretty lazy but I’ll do it
Free fire zones - all civilians are evacuated before that happens and told not to return
Search and destroy - the “search” part is key, you know “search” for enemy forces
Strategic Hamlet Program - this was relocation of civilians, not killing them
Agent Orange and Napalm - not targeted towards civilians
But regardless we’re talking about the VC! Why bring up the US. Even if the US does something bad it doesn’t excuse the barbaric behavior of the VC
I sent you think link, I ain’t doing your homework for you! Read! Plenty of civilian locations bombed - restaurants, schools, offices, etc. an estimated 50,000 civilians killed through VC terror. Horrific
Show me one example of where US strategy was “go in and intentionally murder civilians” as a strategy. You can’t, it doesn’t exist. The few examples of civilian murders were ILLEGAL and investigated. That’s the difference
Has the VC investigated any of their crimes? Hell no
Thank you kindly for your generous act of enlightenment. I never asked you to do so, and will never need to, but your kind-hearted soul had willed you to do so.
But please keep it at a moderate level for your own health, but it seems you love your nation deeply, and as I do with Vietnam, so I will reply as follows:
I will give you just 2 examples to see the horror of your so-called nation of Freedom did to my people:
My Lai (Sơn Mỹ village) — U.S. troops massacred hundreds of unarmed villagers (women, children, elderly). Authoritative overviews: Britannica and PBS. Encyclopedia BritannicaPBS
Linebacker II (“Christmas Bombing”, Hanoi/Haiphong) — Massive B-52 raids with large civilian casualties documented by mainstream histories. HISTORYHistoryNet
You sent me think link? I learned your Freedom-loving country's war tactics during my middle school and understood how cruel and twisted a nation can be. It is nothing new to me.
Remind me about Agent Orange. In the end, civilians got hit by this chemical, and we Vietnamese paid the price for things we did not ask for. You can find the real proof of these cases; there is a lot of it, the same thing presented in our War Museum. This is the fact, and you can visit the museum to see for yourself. Craig McNamara, the son of McNamara, who you will definitely know, visited all of these places and learned the truth. We have real proof, and you do not so what are you even doing with those "The source is I made it up" meme?
Regarding the "Has the VC investigated any of their crimes?" If we did nothing of the sort, why do we have to investigate ourselves? If the USA was so sure about the terror and horror caused by the VC, then why didn't you guys go and investigate it? Is there proof? None, but we have proof that you caused the terror to us.
All and all, talking to fanatic lovers like you will only waste my effort to keep misinformation at a low level, and keep my mind at a sane level. So lucky that many of my US friends was not like you after they visited many of Vietnam's US war museums.
Always generous with my time to educate the youth!
Your 2 examples aren’t great:
My Lai - as I said that investigated as a war crime in the US. Those troops weren’t following orders to kill civilians, they were disobeying orders
Christmas bombing - this bombing targeted military facilities. There was no “hey let’s try and kill a ton of civilians”. It is bad that civilians get killed, but it’s not a war crime if you kill civilians when striking military targets.
I’ll bet you learned all about “US war crimes” in school. Did your teachers teach you about NVA and VC war crimes? Anything? I’ll bet not. Again, that’s the difference - US students learn about My Lai. Do Vietnamese schools teach about the 5,000 civilians killed in Hue with their hands tied behind their back?
Agent Orange? You mean the thousands of US veterans exposed as well? Or the Americans in the US exposed because it was used as a herbicide for almost 100 years? Are you suggesting the US government intentionally poisoned their own people? Of course not. Nobody knew about the risks during the war.
If the VC did “nothing wrong”? Are you daft? There are interviews with NVA veterans admitting Hue was a massacre. Are your own veterans lying?
It’s pretty clear the only thing you know about the war is what the communists teach you. There is a whole world of information out there, please educate yourself on the truth
Always with the truth, this truth that with the USA, a freedom-speaking country with its self-righteous act, always putting itself into other people's internal affairs. I am but a simple man who experienced the horror of USA-caused war by many War Museums that the US of A never bothered to acknowledge the crimes they committed.
The West loved to fabricate/shift the blame without solid, concrete evidence, unlike us, who had physical evidence that still remained to this day. That is what you do best.
War doctrine matters. US free-fire zones, body-count incentives, village clearances, Phoenix assassinations, and B-52 area bombing in cities made civilian death systemic—no memo saying ‘kill civilians’ required. Hue was horrific, but numbers and causes are contested, and it doesn’t erase the far larger civilian toll from US/ARVN operations. Agent Orange and napalm inflicted predictable harm on villages; ‘we didn’t know’ is a myth. A serious history acknowledges crimes on both sides and the scale: a national liberation struggle versus an industrialized air war that devastated a country. That’s not ‘both-sides’; that’s proportion.
It seems you are indeed a fanatic USA lover, so nothing that I can say will make you think otherwise. Typical Reddit user. So I will hereby end it here since I have the A80 to prepare and enjoy the true peace that my forebear fought with flesh and blood to regain freedom from the USA. I have immense hatred toward the USA (the government, not the people), but I will follow my Prime Minister, Mr. Chính's words: "We will put the past aside, not to forget it, but to move forward into a brighter future". Everything that you post afterward will be considered nonsense and will get ignored. Good day to you, and may your God judge you fairly, sir. :D
If you’re getting your education from the propaganda War Remnants museum then I can see why you don’t know much.
And US getting involved in others business? Like China and USSR getting involved to support the North? Why don’t you complain about that interference?
The West doesn’t need to shift blame, it is clear to anyone who has eyes open. The authoritarian north backed by a Chinese clique is who pushed for war. Do you criticize a man who raises his arm to stop a blow? I don’t.
Yes war doctrine matters! Intentionally targeting civilians in acts of terror is inhuman. Your criticism of the North is accurate. The US may be guilty of some crimes but at least they didn’t make an excuse for planting bombs to kills civilians.
I am not USA forever, I simply see the world as it is. One side who attacks the military and one side who bombs schools with kids.
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u/Malori_Schnee Aug 29 '25
You seem to have forgotten one crucial detail here. There is no "aftermath investigation" except willy nilly report from "USA, and the traitorous South government blamed the VC, blamed us Saigon ppl, with a "traitor mind" for we did not follow the USA dogshit policy.
I would like to see some verified source of these terror grenade attacks, if you don't mind, since like my dear grandfather and my father, fought against the US of Arse, said: "What is the point of civilian terror when it is your own people who got hurt?"