Four famous Vietnamese prisoners of the Communists speak via Paltalk on December 1

 
The four famous prisoners and their periods of imprisonment in the Communist gulags of Vietnam are:  Nguyen Chi Thien (27 years), Vo Dai Ton (12 years), Phan Nhat Nam (14 years).   They are moderated and connected by Ly Tong Ba, a Brigadier General of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) (12 years). 

 
You can find their descriptions and information about connecting to Paltalk in Vietnamese on  http://www.vietvungvinh.com/Portal.asp?goto=VietNam/2007/20071128_03.htm

Here are brief histories of the famous prisoners in English and reference to their writings.

Ly Tong Ba.  General Ly Tong Ba was captured on April 30, 1975, while commanding his 23^rd Armored Division who were fighting their way to Saigon in hope of joining with other ARVN regiments.  His leadership was described in Time Magazine as “lion-hearted.”  General Ly Tong Ba, originally a chief of the Binh Duong Province, was a hero of the 1972 Easter Offensive.  This victory by the Republic of Vietnam was squandered by the Americans in the Peace Accords in Paris.   It was expected that he would be executed by the NVA but instead Ly Tong Ba survived twelve years imprisonment in the Communist gulag.  He is the author of Hoi Ky: 25 Nam Khoi Lua (25 Years of Vietnam War).  

 
Phan Nhat Nam is known as South Vietnam’s most famous war reporter.  He was an officer in the South Vietnamese Airborne Division and served as Secretary to the Joint Military Committee at the Paris Peace Accords in 1973.  He was imprisoned by the Communists for fourteen years.  He is the author of Mua He Do Lua (Fiery Red Summer) about the Spring Offensive of 1972 and the relationship to the battle for An Loc in 1963.  He is also the author of Nhung Cot Tru Chong Giu Que Huong (The Stories Must be Told) and Tu Binh va Hoa Binh (Peace and Prisoner of War).  He has written for Talawas and has much informational material and writing on Nguyet San Viet Nam website.  There is an extensive interview with him on Radio Free Asia dated April 30, 2005.  Phan Nhat Nam is a commentator on SBTN and lives in Orange County, California.

 
Nguyen Chi Thien is a dissident poet who was first imprisoned following the Resolution #49 establishing the Reeducation Camps of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CVP) in December 1961.  For his three periods of imprisonment totaling 27 years between 1961 and 1991 there was only one trial, charged with “antipropaganda.”  Not allowed pen and paper in prison, Nguyen Chi Thien composed his poetry in his memory and recited them to friends, who memorized them and spoke them aloud in the streets of Hanoi and Haiphong.  In 1979, during a brief period of release, Mr. Thien—then age thirty-nine—brought a manuscript of his poems to the British Embassy in Hanoi, asking that they be published “in the free world.”  He was arrested outside the gates after this delivery (being refused asylum) and spent twelve more years in the Communist gulag, which he did not expect to survive.  He was released in November 1991 due to international pressure.  Nguyen Chi Thien is the author of Hoa Dia Nguc, the complete collection of poems in Vietnamese written before and after the first manuscript was brought to the British Embassy, and a collection of stories of the Hoa Lo prison, published in Vietnamese in 2001, translated into English and published in 2007 as the Hoa Lo/Hanoi Hilton Stories by the Yale University Council on Southeast Asia Studies.

 
Vo Dai Ton was a Colonel of the South Vietnamese Army Special Forces who earned 43 medals for his outstanding military career and service to his country.  Sentenced to a reeducation camp in 1975, he escaped to Australia a year later.  Despite grave risk to his personal health and safety, Colonel Vo Dai Ton secretly returned to Vietnam in 1981.  Captured a year later, he was subjected to ten years of solitary confinement, starved and tortured when he would not concur with a statement prepared by the Vietnamese government that he acted on behalf of the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States.  He writes poetry with the pseudonym Hoang Phong Linh (the Poet), publishing a book in 1993 following his release in December 1991 due to international pressure.  He was honored with a Resolution by the Washington State House of Representatives (U.S.A.) in 1994.  Col. Vo Dai Ton lives in Australia.

 
These brief histories in English are written in the hope they may be useful for the planned Paltalk event on December 1, 2007.  Scholarly references used for preparation are available on request.

Jean Libby, editor

VietAm Review

editor@vietamreview.net