LookAtVietnam – A new historical account of the Dien Bien Phu campaign containing portraits and stories from 167 witnesses has been published by a group of young journalists using private funds.

Their story: Chuyen Nhung Nguoi Lam Nen Lich Su (The Story of Those Who Make History).

The work is a collection of 167 eye-witness accounts of the battle and descriptions of their tasks. Hundreds of photos and documents about the featured witnesses and their battle comrades are also included.

“For more than a year we travelled with the war veterans on trips back into the past, more than half a century ago, living the many joyful and sad moments and sharing in their laughter and tears,” said Dao Thanh Huyen.

She added that the idea for creating the book came to the writers while they were creating a bulletin about the Dien Bien Phu battle in 2002 as lecturers at the Viet Nam Journalists Association.

“Most of the war veterans were reserved when they first met us; they were very modest and didn’t want to talk much about themselves,” she added.

“We regret that we were only able to talk with about 167 witnesses of the more than 50,000 soldiers who took part in the war. We beg the understanding of readers, and particularly war veterans, for this weak point of the book. We tried to honestly write down the memories of those we were lucky to meet and speak with,” Huyen said.

New directions

“For the first time in Viet Nam, history was written in a totally new style: familiar, sincere and emotive,” said historian Phan Huy Le when speaking about the book published by Chinh Tri Quoc Gia Publishing House last week.

“To be exact, it’s not a history book. It is a very respectful way of researching and writing about history. The method is not new in the world, but it is very new in Viet Nam. The country’s history will become more familiar to the youth and be more practical for society with this type of book,” he added.

The co-authors of the book are Dao Thanh Huyen, Dang Duc Tue, Pham Thuy Huong, Pham Hoai Thanh and Pham Hoai Nam. Young and enthusiastic, they invited an old soldier from the campaign, Nguyen Xuan Mai, to serve as a contact man for the project. He is also a former editor-in-chief of Cuu Chien Binh (War Veterans) newspaper.

“I was impressed and really admired the way they approached the history. When I was invited to work as an examiner of the book’s history sections, I thought I would have to work a lot on the figures and events. But they totally won historians like me over with their enthusiasm and sincerity for the job,” said Nguyen Manh Ha, deputy director of the Institute of Military History.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News