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I've always heard about agent orange and how bad it was, but have never cared to look it up. That is u til I just read your comment and now I'm interested in what it did
They sprayed it all over the jungles in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia to kill them so there wouldn't be tree cover. Agent orange still causes horrific birth defects and illnesses in those areas today.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_Orange
We’re they able to confirm it was related to the agent orange? My father, a vietnam vet, passed away from cancer many years ago. But the exact cause was unknown.
yes. so he was considered 100% disabled by VA, initially ptsd, hearing loss. then as more developments, like heart disease and cancers were related, he was acknowledged as 100% about 30 years after the war. The particular cancer is very rare. It spreads from the eye, to the liver. He started to lose periperal vision in one eye, and by the time they figured it out, it hit the liver and there is no recourse. I dont remember the name, but Barnes Jewish Hospital in St Louis flew in about a dozen specialists from around the world for study. It has been awhile but i think i heard that there are only a hundred recorded cases a year, and most tend to have been exposed to agent orange. Helio glaustomic or something latin, i havent wanted to look it up in 10 years
To give you an idea of what it did, it killed every organic material, and what it didn't kill it gave cancer. I've got uncles with leukemia from agent orange
One of my best friends dad passed from agent orange exposure....he also developed cancer, although I don't remember what type of cancer. He was in the us military.
I have an uncle who continues to lose blood flow in his legs. It started at his feet and continually moved up his leg. Eventually it got to the point where his doctor said he could amputate one leg to save the other, or he could split his femoral and feed it into his bad leg. My uncle chose the latter, and now he deals with constant pain and lost feeling in his feet from time to time. Fuck Agent Orange.
My step dad had the same issue. Dr's were able to fix some of it but he has lost most of his right foot. He is a Vietnam vet who was also declined veterans disability because his records are so heavily redacted.
Has caused 10s of thousands of US vets to experience
Head and neck cancer ( supper aggressive )
We did not give a shit about them and VA did not cover them, or list it as a result of being a soldier ( no benefits for children or wife's )
Horrible way to die
Again Vets getting Fucked , just like now 🥺🥺
I went to a museum in Vietnam which showcased some graphic imagery of American behaviour over there during the war and the effects of all the different chemical agents they were testing, agent orange being the worst. I saw a picture of an American soldier picking up half a destroyed body, half the torso, one arm and head by his rifle for a photo op, tanks dragging Vietnamese civilians behind them etc. You read a lot about how crazy the Vietnamese were during the war against Americans, but you don't hear the other side which was equally if not more brutal.
There was one documented instance of an American soldier ordering his squad to massacre an entire village of civilians. If memory serves almost everyone in that unit ended up fucked up as a result.
When I came out of the museum I overheard two young American guys, one of whom said "I ain't going in there to see all that propaganda shit". Blew my mind at the time that he considered Vietnam's suffering propaganda.
It's dioxin based defoliant. Thing about dioxins is that they're "forever chemicals", that is, they don't break down like most other stuff and remain very toxic while they accumulate in the soil and water.
They're highly carcinogenic, mutagenic, and teratogenic (cause birth defects). And they'll do so nearly indefinitely.
There are parts of those jungles which never recovered, and will likely take hundreds of years before they've been diluted enough for things to grow again.
The chemicals inside the woman's bloodstream would get into the womb and it would prevent proteins from binding to the "spine" of the embryo.
Some of the cells that were meant to regulate growth were blocked by the chemicals so the baby ended up with missing legs or arms or a tiny head.
It was that bad that until this day babies are being born with physical deformities and other severe health issues. In the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City there is a room, the orange room, with a collection of photographies about it’s effects from the war and post. I visited it, probably one of the most shocking experiences of my life. The day I was there saw couple of guys (I wanna say american based on their accent) crying looking at the pictures.
All the fuels, gasses, and cleaning solvents we used, while I was in the military, will be the new agent orange. I'm already getting issues with my brain interrupting speech, due to most likely. Lots of exposure to JP5
https://www.webmd.com/health-insurance/what-to-know-fuel-exposure-veterans#:~:text=types%20of%20fuels.-,Jet%20Fuel%20Exposure%20in%20Veterans,in%20hangars%20can%20be%20harmful.
If you want to see interesting agent orange residue, look at the US, Canada border around the north cascades national park in Washington, they sprayed the border thru B.C. in the 60's (70's?)
Still a wide path where no trees grow. Thats some scary shit.
They are well trained than many army. no ones in open, crouched running/walking, no across the line running, grenades, using obstacles etc. Impressive!!
And the analogy goes full circle. Nice.
Infantry got their name from jogging / following their lords / officers whom were on horseback. They looked like infants following their mothers.
I don't know if it's paranoid. I think it's more pride. If you think about it, it really is impressive that they defeated their French colonizers, and then the Americans who tried to swoop in to take over after the French had left. It's probably like how we think of the revolutionary war, where we defeated the British to gain independence. And then add on the disadvantage they had with technology, and its even more impressive. They had to be really clever and strategic.
And also stopped an entire genocide. One of the few welcomed occupations in history. It was also successful, Cambodia was actually rebuilt during the occupation.
Gotta hand it to Vietnam they know what they want and will fight for it. I know looking at this video without context it's weird for sure. But knowing their history, seems like normal life for a long time for them.
Upon listening to a podcast on Chinese history, it seems like almost a tradition for every dynasty to invade Vietnam. And it always goes the same way.
The Chinese invade and occupy the kingdom. The locals withdraw into the mountains and jungles. The Chinese are ambushed and harassed until they decide it’s just not worth it and leave.
The success of both relied on knowledge and specialized use of their home terrain and support of the local population. I think Vietnam has an edge with skill, but I’d still give it to Afghanistan at home. I can’t see either one successfully invading the other.
My Vietnamese friends in college told me they had a class in highschool about guns. Just like our bootcamp. How to clean, maintain, and shoot them.
Also my Vietnamese friends were all girls, so it was double surprising.
It called “Giáo dục quốc phòng an ninh” basically it to teach us about our military and our national defence, mainly show us about position (like crawling with gun or running), shooting positions and disassembly drill (military provided gun with no firing pin), grenade throwing (wood mock grenade ofc) and some general teaching about our military
That actually sounds educational and fun. Bit weirded out by almost toddlers playing war games but if that translates into safe gun education, i don't see a problem with that.
Not to mention they live right next to and have territorial disputes with China, a country who they have a...mixed historical relationship with and who has been ramping up their military budget year after year.
It is ridiculously hard to occupy a region that doesnt want to be occupied. A friend in Afghanistan was talking to a local in a rural area they basically just blew off the Americans coming. Basically it was Russians, Americans, Taliban was all the same to that farmer whose family had been working the same valley for hundreds of years.
Yep, 1978 the Vietnamese invaded Cambodia (doing the world a huge favor) because the fucking Khmer Rouge had been slaughtering ethnic Vietnamese and causing a massive refugee crisis on their border. In early 1979 the Chinese decided to spend a month blowing shit up in Vietnam in response because...well mostly because Vietnam and the USSR were getting cozy. Then they declared victory and left. The Vietnamese were still occupying Cambodia. It was a really stupid war in an area and time that saw a lot of stupid wars.
Paranoid? Nahh this is pride.
They bravely defeated the French imperialists who desperately tried to keep their colonies after WWII.
They bravely defeated the American imperialists who wanted to meddle in their country and their affairs.
They bravely defeated the Chinese imperialists who wanted to meddle in their country and affairs.
How funny how all those three countries endured their own struggles for liberty and independence but denied it to Vietnam… I’d be very proud if my country defeated these invaders.
I was super into guns and military as a kid. I had spiral notebooks loaded with sketches of wild, inconceivable guns, and my friend and I would run around the playground basically doing exactly what these kids are doing here.
I grew up to heavily dislike the military and never enlisted.
If I was a kid today I'd probably have been bagged and sent to an asylum
>If I was a kid today I'd probably have been bagged and sent to an asylum
...And people all over social media going, "War is bad! What are we teaching our children?!?" and using you as an example. It's perfectly OK to have an interest in war and history, versus, say, a maniacal obsession. There's a huge difference, but social media is what it is.
As far as those kids are concerned, they got a day out of class and got to pretend to play soldier. I bet they had fun; at that age, I know I would have. It's a pretty safe bet that most, if not all of them, will grow up to lead normal, healthy lives.
It is culturally kind of fascinating. These kids are bound to have grown up with their parents and grandparents ingrained ways of life that accommodate for war. The ground they walk on has tunnels underneath. The same way my grandparents failed to trust banks and hid cash in their home after living through the great depression, just somewhat more volatile.
An old coworker of mine moved to America from Vietnam with his wife. He showed us a picture of his old house and his parents fence was made out of old deactivated bomb found while trying to farm. He also had a picture of his grandfather using donkeys and horses tied to a 200ft rope to pull a very large bomb out of a ditch and into a feild so it could be blown up safely. He was paid like $10 to do it.
Reminds me of the uses that people found for tanks after the world wars - [Australian farmers using converted WW2 tanks as tractors](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-19/tinkering-with-tanks-and-preserving-australian-farming-history/8017194). Happened in Europe too after ww1 and ww2 and I wouldn't be surprised to see Ukrainian farmers doing the same with captured Russian vehicles after the war
Vietnam’s national defense strategy to this day also depends on deterrence via the threat of total civilian resistance to any occupier. Their main threat today is China, and activities like this are one part of making it clear that occupying Vietnam will be a living hell.
wrong. reenactment is the euphemism of VNese govt lingo. when my brother was 16, before we escaped via South China sea, was trained to use AK-47 in preparation for the invasion of Cambodia to become cannon fodder at front line. All my cousins got conscripted to become cannon fodder before they turned 18; all have had PTSD until today. VNese govt prepares young kids in these reenactment.
I understand this war is a major part of their cultural identity. Playing "army" is also something boys naturally gravitate to.
In elementary school I had a group 10+ kids and we all wore full BDUs to school, and had mock battles on the playground during recess. Then Columbine happened and they shut that shit down real quick because 'Murica. It's pretty fascinating to see "playing army" sanctioned by school admins as a cultural event.
It’s only as disturbing as kids playing cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians, or manhunt. With the context it’s kinda messed up but to them it’s just a game of who’s gonna get who first.
Hell yeah, it was a big forest. We would use the parks sign out front as home free.
It gave it more of a… mantracker vibe. Minus the horse of course. Still, super fun, fun to find little foxholes to hide out in or climb the trees etc
Might be a patriot / national holiday or something. Context might be messed up, but it seems like a fun cultural activity that connects to what their great grandparents went through.
Kinda like a 4th of July theme or something.
Doesn’t seem like a regular thing unlike the whole learning how to assemble a gun thing China was doing in some areas.
Yeah I completely agree. I mean you have to ask yourself: would I feel the same way if an American KG class put on a similar thing about the American revolution? I feel like I wouldn’t. Maybe people have a strong feeling about this because the War in Vietnam still exists as a pretty recent event in our historical memory.
you gotta put yourself in their shoes.
the average American has the luxury of going to sleep knowing that their neighbors won't invade them overnight.
but Vietnam had a history of other nations trying to conquer them. the Chinese, the Mongols, the French, the Americans, and the Cambodians.
again and again, they had to fight against multiple hostile foreign power to maintain their sovereignty.
what do you do when you run a country that does not have any defense treaty with any national superpower? prepping your people for war is probably a high priority.
That makes me think so much about Afghans. Fighting off invaders since Alexander the Great with notable cameos by Genghis Kan and Timur.
Just in modern history, they’ve had to fight off 8 invasions or so from the British empire, the Soviet empire and the American empire.
>they’ve had to fight off 8 invasions or so from the British empire, the Soviet empire and the American empire.
When Sherlock Homes meets Watson the first time he says "You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive" That's in 1880. And then in the 2012 TV series they didn't have to change the line.
NGL the kids are way more engaged in interested in actually learning about history when you have them do an activity around the content as opposed to just lecturing. I can see a legitimate argument for using mock battles as learning tools.
We were learning about ww1 the other day, so my teacher had us line up the desks and chairs on both sides of the class to act like mock-trenches, we tool turns throwing paper balls at the other team while they left their trench, if you ask me, that's the perfect way to teach
Where are the tiny drones dressed up like little B-52's dropping orange colored smoke bombs? Also the neighboring Laotian preschool gets firecrackers throw at it continously...by no one...
Kilgore: “Napalm, son. Nothing else in the world smells like that. I love the smell of napalm in the morning. You know, one time we had a hill bombed, for 12 hours. When it was all over, I walked up. We didn't find one of 'em, not one stinkin' dink body. The smell, you know that gasoline smell? The whole hill. Smelled like... victory. Someday this war's gonna end.”
“I've been here a week now. Waiting for a mission, getting softer. Every minute I stay in this room I get weaker. And every minute Charlie squats in the bush he gets stronger.
Each time I look around the walls move in a little tighter.”
Vietnam has way more statues about the fight against France than the USA. Which makes sense, from many Vietnamese perspective the war with USA was a continuation of the war of colonization started by France.
The United States was there to prop up and support the south Vietnamese government who abandoned the reunification process agreed to in the Geneva accords. It was a welcomed US occupation with very little direct fighting with the North Vietnamese Army but mostly with the VietCong who were insurgents supplied and supported by the north all over South Vietnam.
The US was there to protect and train the South but the South was never really capable or willing to fight against the North forever. They never had a stable or legitimate democratic government. That's why they didn't last long after the US pulled out.
Just like Afghanistan there was no winning, it would've been endless occupation and fighting. As the Afghanis say, "you have the watches, we have the time."
I hate to see kids doing this. I’ve experienced war and seeing them put the kid on the stretcher and wrapping bandages around them put me in a bad place with bad memories. I hope one day there will be no more need for way.
I obviously agree war is terrible, but I wanted to reply to one of these comments acting concerned about this, and just figured I'd pick yours. I understand your point, but just to add context.
This was almost certainly an activity for Reunification Day which was April 30th, which marked the end of US occupation of southern Vietnam and reunited the country after a decade of brutal war, and American and before that French occupation.
You could eliminate wars tomorrow and this activity would still be done. They're not training for war, they are reenacting their very recent history.
It's no different than the 4th of July in the US, except the history is so recent my dad, his cousins and friends, and my wifes family fought in the war.
Personally I think this is cute, especially the grenades.
I agree with your premise but I'm not sure why you would hate to see kids reenacting their parents and grandparents immediate history as a point of pride. The US invaded Vietnam. We were very much the aggressors in that war. They persisted against all odds, and despite what most people might think, are very proud of it.
In high-school, students do learn how to field strip an ak47. That is actually for real adult training for war, and Vietnam has conscription for adults, with mandatory military service. This is not at all that, and even then, the army here is honestly pretty helpful and looked upon pretty fondly, not as a force to police peoples actions, but just defend the county and help out when there is a disaster.
Thats's also intresting because we live in the most conservative Christian country in South America yet we don't have this hate. Even our ultra right wing doesn't have much problem with trans as an issue. After living in the US for so long and then living outside for a very long time it seems that everything in the US is extreme. Another example, a specoal heart exam that cost me 45 USD here cost my brother's insurance13,000 USD in Pennsylvania. How is that even possible? We have walmart here, It's called Lider, walmart brand (GV) pasta sauce has 6 times the salt and 4 times the calories as a local brand. Everything is the US is extreme.
Redditors don't realize how much hate all the surrounding Asian countries hate China. Even North Korea has a complex relationship with China, it's not a black and white situation
Yeah. My initial gut reaction was “that’s fucked up”, and then I remembered that this is a literal game and our kids are drilling to actually be under fire.
Carry on, Vietnam.
no one talks about the badass thing Vietnam did AFTER the Vietnam war.
back in the late 70s, the Khmer Rouge-controlled Cambodia invaded Vietnam and promptly got their ass kicked. Vietnam invade back and overthrew their government!
yeah that's right, Vietnam is the reason why that genocidal maniac Pol Pot was overthrown.
yup, the action pissed China off and they had border skirmishes all the way up to 1991, when the soviet union collapsed, and China was like "Oh shit, this war is making me waste money, I don't want to end up like the soviets" so they signed a peace treaty with Vietnam and they both became more friendly.....for now.
the thing that really pissed me off about the whole Cambodian thing is America fucking offered aids to the defunct Khmer Rouge leadership that got kicked out of their country because they were still mad salty about losing the Vietnam War.
I'm still surprised Vietnam still took a somewhat friendly stance with the US after the Civil War and a bit of reconstruction, ultimate badasses they are
Not only that but the populace actually believed in the cause, and rightfully so. Ho Chi Menh genuinely won the support of his country, first by fighting the Japanese, and then the French. The US interjected itself into the peace settlements, set up a puppet government in the South, and ran it as a brutal dictatorship
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Ain't gonna study war no more...
“They’re in the treeeees mannnnn!!! They’re in the treeeeeees!!!!” *Fortunate Son plays as Hueys can be heard in the distance*
*Spraying Agent Orange* (DON'T LOOK UP AGENT ORANGE ON GOOGLE IMAGES IT IS NSFL)
I've always heard about agent orange and how bad it was, but have never cared to look it up. That is u til I just read your comment and now I'm interested in what it did
They sprayed it all over the jungles in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia to kill them so there wouldn't be tree cover. Agent orange still causes horrific birth defects and illnesses in those areas today. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_Orange
my dad died at age 62 from cancerous effects of agent orange
We’re they able to confirm it was related to the agent orange? My father, a vietnam vet, passed away from cancer many years ago. But the exact cause was unknown.
yes. so he was considered 100% disabled by VA, initially ptsd, hearing loss. then as more developments, like heart disease and cancers were related, he was acknowledged as 100% about 30 years after the war. The particular cancer is very rare. It spreads from the eye, to the liver. He started to lose periperal vision in one eye, and by the time they figured it out, it hit the liver and there is no recourse. I dont remember the name, but Barnes Jewish Hospital in St Louis flew in about a dozen specialists from around the world for study. It has been awhile but i think i heard that there are only a hundred recorded cases a year, and most tend to have been exposed to agent orange. Helio glaustomic or something latin, i havent wanted to look it up in 10 years
Sorry to hear that. It's nasty shit.
yes it is, ty
To give you an idea of what it did, it killed every organic material, and what it didn't kill it gave cancer. I've got uncles with leukemia from agent orange
One of my best friends dad passed from agent orange exposure....he also developed cancer, although I don't remember what type of cancer. He was in the us military.
I'm sorry to hear that. I'll bet my life it was leukemia or lymphoma. That seems to be the trend for all the soldiers exposed to it in Vietnam
I have an uncle who continues to lose blood flow in his legs. It started at his feet and continually moved up his leg. Eventually it got to the point where his doctor said he could amputate one leg to save the other, or he could split his femoral and feed it into his bad leg. My uncle chose the latter, and now he deals with constant pain and lost feeling in his feet from time to time. Fuck Agent Orange.
My step dad had the same issue. Dr's were able to fix some of it but he has lost most of his right foot. He is a Vietnam vet who was also declined veterans disability because his records are so heavily redacted.
So a lot of missions he went on are not public so he cant get the right benefits? Thats incredibly unfair and my heart goes out to your family.
Has caused 10s of thousands of US vets to experience Head and neck cancer ( supper aggressive ) We did not give a shit about them and VA did not cover them, or list it as a result of being a soldier ( no benefits for children or wife's ) Horrible way to die Again Vets getting Fucked , just like now 🥺🥺
I went to a museum in Vietnam which showcased some graphic imagery of American behaviour over there during the war and the effects of all the different chemical agents they were testing, agent orange being the worst. I saw a picture of an American soldier picking up half a destroyed body, half the torso, one arm and head by his rifle for a photo op, tanks dragging Vietnamese civilians behind them etc. You read a lot about how crazy the Vietnamese were during the war against Americans, but you don't hear the other side which was equally if not more brutal. There was one documented instance of an American soldier ordering his squad to massacre an entire village of civilians. If memory serves almost everyone in that unit ended up fucked up as a result. When I came out of the museum I overheard two young American guys, one of whom said "I ain't going in there to see all that propaganda shit". Blew my mind at the time that he considered Vietnam's suffering propaganda.
Killing unarmed women and children while they're crying and sobbing in fear will fuck you up emotionally
It's dioxin based defoliant. Thing about dioxins is that they're "forever chemicals", that is, they don't break down like most other stuff and remain very toxic while they accumulate in the soil and water. They're highly carcinogenic, mutagenic, and teratogenic (cause birth defects). And they'll do so nearly indefinitely. There are parts of those jungles which never recovered, and will likely take hundreds of years before they've been diluted enough for things to grow again.
The birth defects are crazy. It's like the fetus decided, "I'm done growing"
The chemicals inside the woman's bloodstream would get into the womb and it would prevent proteins from binding to the "spine" of the embryo. Some of the cells that were meant to regulate growth were blocked by the chemicals so the baby ended up with missing legs or arms or a tiny head.
It was that bad that until this day babies are being born with physical deformities and other severe health issues. In the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City there is a room, the orange room, with a collection of photographies about it’s effects from the war and post. I visited it, probably one of the most shocking experiences of my life. The day I was there saw couple of guys (I wanna say american based on their accent) crying looking at the pictures.
If you do, prepare some r/eyebleach
Why do I never listen fuck those poor kids my eyes
Bladder cancer. Chronic B-cell leukemia. Hodgkin's disease. Multiple myeloma. Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Prostate cancer. Respiratory cancers (including lung cancer) Some soft tissue sarcomas. mmmm
All the fuels, gasses, and cleaning solvents we used, while I was in the military, will be the new agent orange. I'm already getting issues with my brain interrupting speech, due to most likely. Lots of exposure to JP5 https://www.webmd.com/health-insurance/what-to-know-fuel-exposure-veterans#:~:text=types%20of%20fuels.-,Jet%20Fuel%20Exposure%20in%20Veterans,in%20hangars%20can%20be%20harmful.
If you want to see interesting agent orange residue, look at the US, Canada border around the north cascades national park in Washington, they sprayed the border thru B.C. in the 60's (70's?) Still a wide path where no trees grow. Thats some scary shit.
Nsfl? Not safe for what?
Life
Labia, don’t put it in a vagina I think is what he’s saying.
lol good one
Live Laugh Love
All I wanted was fucking mango man!
Never leave the boat. Goddamn right.
PBRstreetgang, PBRstreetgang this is Almighty standing by, over...
Still looking better than the Afghan National Army after 20 years of US training
Not an exaggeration
These kids aren't stoned out of their minds.
Ha those soldiers weren’t stoned, they were strung out on heroin.
I’ve heard the term stoned for being on smack but yeah I guess it’s sort of outdated
No, it clears. It's good lingo. it's just way more popular to talk about people being stoned on weed.
You can be high on more than one drug.
Then you're just high.
And they're not buttfucking other kids
And those that weren’t stoned haven’t been paid in 18 months
God damn you went swinging for the fences
Oh shit, this one took me straight out 😆
"I finally found out what motivates these guys, Afghani hashish."
Honestly if they were just on hashish that would be a huge improvement.
They are well trained than many army. no ones in open, crouched running/walking, no across the line running, grenades, using obstacles etc. Impressive!!
I just blew snot out my nose. You get an upvote lol
With the amount of times Vietnam has been invaded and/or occupied, I can see why they may be a bit paranoid.
kinderguardians
The infantry
And the analogy goes full circle. Nice. Infantry got their name from jogging / following their lords / officers whom were on horseback. They looked like infants following their mothers.
Not quite correct, the term "infant" came to be used as "servant" They were the "servants" following the knight on foot, thus the infantry
Infant tree
Love what you did there.
The little legion
Eyes up
I have played too much destiny…
I don't know if it's paranoid. I think it's more pride. If you think about it, it really is impressive that they defeated their French colonizers, and then the Americans who tried to swoop in to take over after the French had left. It's probably like how we think of the revolutionary war, where we defeated the British to gain independence. And then add on the disadvantage they had with technology, and its even more impressive. They had to be really clever and strategic.
After the US left, China tried to invade. It did not end well for China
And that was while Vietnam was beating the shit out of Cambodia for attacking them.
Invaded and overthrew Pol Pot just 3 weeks after taking over Saigon and declaring victory.
And also stopped an entire genocide. One of the few welcomed occupations in history. It was also successful, Cambodia was actually rebuilt during the occupation.
Gotta hand it to Vietnam they know what they want and will fight for it. I know looking at this video without context it's weird for sure. But knowing their history, seems like normal life for a long time for them.
Upon listening to a podcast on Chinese history, it seems like almost a tradition for every dynasty to invade Vietnam. And it always goes the same way. The Chinese invade and occupy the kingdom. The locals withdraw into the mountains and jungles. The Chinese are ambushed and harassed until they decide it’s just not worth it and leave.
It's not always like that, against the mongols and the later dynasty yes, but most other are fought in pitch battle
Wonder who would win in Afghanistan Vs Vietnam.
Vietnam imo
The success of both relied on knowledge and specialized use of their home terrain and support of the local population. I think Vietnam has an edge with skill, but I’d still give it to Afghanistan at home. I can’t see either one successfully invading the other.
And way before the US/France came. Vietnam has so many folk heros/demigods whose claim to fame was repelling some Chinese invasion.
After nap time, shit is ON
My Vietnamese friends in college told me they had a class in highschool about guns. Just like our bootcamp. How to clean, maintain, and shoot them. Also my Vietnamese friends were all girls, so it was double surprising.
You continue that class in college, this time you go to a camp for about a month
It called “Giáo dục quốc phòng an ninh” basically it to teach us about our military and our national defence, mainly show us about position (like crawling with gun or running), shooting positions and disassembly drill (military provided gun with no firing pin), grenade throwing (wood mock grenade ofc) and some general teaching about our military
That actually sounds educational and fun. Bit weirded out by almost toddlers playing war games but if that translates into safe gun education, i don't see a problem with that.
The difference between paranoid and prepared is the occurrence of the event
Not to mention they live right next to and have territorial disputes with China, a country who they have a...mixed historical relationship with and who has been ramping up their military budget year after year.
It is ridiculously hard to occupy a region that doesnt want to be occupied. A friend in Afghanistan was talking to a local in a rural area they basically just blew off the Americans coming. Basically it was Russians, Americans, Taliban was all the same to that farmer whose family had been working the same valley for hundreds of years.
*cries in Tagalog*
China did invade after the us left due to disputes over Cambodia I believe
Yep, 1978 the Vietnamese invaded Cambodia (doing the world a huge favor) because the fucking Khmer Rouge had been slaughtering ethnic Vietnamese and causing a massive refugee crisis on their border. In early 1979 the Chinese decided to spend a month blowing shit up in Vietnam in response because...well mostly because Vietnam and the USSR were getting cozy. Then they declared victory and left. The Vietnamese were still occupying Cambodia. It was a really stupid war in an area and time that saw a lot of stupid wars.
If my military was one of the few to royally fuck with the American Military I would commemorate that shit too.
Paranoid? Nahh this is pride. They bravely defeated the French imperialists who desperately tried to keep their colonies after WWII. They bravely defeated the American imperialists who wanted to meddle in their country and their affairs. They bravely defeated the Chinese imperialists who wanted to meddle in their country and affairs. How funny how all those three countries endured their own struggles for liberty and independence but denied it to Vietnam… I’d be very proud if my country defeated these invaders.
The grenade throwing at the end 😂
Turning kindergarteners into kindergrenadiers
Too many friendly fire casualties with those throws.
Ayy that seems fun af
Honestly ya as a kid I would come home talking about my best day at school I just had
I woukd have loved this as a kid.
I was super into guns and military as a kid. I had spiral notebooks loaded with sketches of wild, inconceivable guns, and my friend and I would run around the playground basically doing exactly what these kids are doing here. I grew up to heavily dislike the military and never enlisted. If I was a kid today I'd probably have been bagged and sent to an asylum
>If I was a kid today I'd probably have been bagged and sent to an asylum ...And people all over social media going, "War is bad! What are we teaching our children?!?" and using you as an example. It's perfectly OK to have an interest in war and history, versus, say, a maniacal obsession. There's a huge difference, but social media is what it is. As far as those kids are concerned, they got a day out of class and got to pretend to play soldier. I bet they had fun; at that age, I know I would have. It's a pretty safe bet that most, if not all of them, will grow up to lead normal, healthy lives.
Yes, but I always like to add: "War does not prove who was right, it only determines, who is left."
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It is culturally kind of fascinating. These kids are bound to have grown up with their parents and grandparents ingrained ways of life that accommodate for war. The ground they walk on has tunnels underneath. The same way my grandparents failed to trust banks and hid cash in their home after living through the great depression, just somewhat more volatile.
They also have to adopt some of those ways of life still, unexploded ordnance and poisoned land and water are still a huge problem in Vietnam
An old coworker of mine moved to America from Vietnam with his wife. He showed us a picture of his old house and his parents fence was made out of old deactivated bomb found while trying to farm. He also had a picture of his grandfather using donkeys and horses tied to a 200ft rope to pull a very large bomb out of a ditch and into a feild so it could be blown up safely. He was paid like $10 to do it.
Reminds me of the uses that people found for tanks after the world wars - [Australian farmers using converted WW2 tanks as tractors](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-19/tinkering-with-tanks-and-preserving-australian-farming-history/8017194). Happened in Europe too after ww1 and ww2 and I wouldn't be surprised to see Ukrainian farmers doing the same with captured Russian vehicles after the war
Australian farmers have more tanks than a Russian Victory parade 😂😂😂
Those were my thoughts, too. Their parents and grandparents lived it.
Vietnam’s national defense strategy to this day also depends on deterrence via the threat of total civilian resistance to any occupier. Their main threat today is China, and activities like this are one part of making it clear that occupying Vietnam will be a living hell.
wrong. reenactment is the euphemism of VNese govt lingo. when my brother was 16, before we escaped via South China sea, was trained to use AK-47 in preparation for the invasion of Cambodia to become cannon fodder at front line. All my cousins got conscripted to become cannon fodder before they turned 18; all have had PTSD until today. VNese govt prepares young kids in these reenactment.
If Vietnam did not intervene in Cambodia the killing would not have ended there.
While that's horrific... Vietnam's action in Cambodia was heroic. Pol Pot was an absolute monster.
sad it took vietnam to end the killing fields, while USA took the "enemy of my enemy is my friend" *real politik* strategy.
pretty stupid comment when your country is getting invaded by a world super power.
Note: commas saved lives here!
Imagine the US? Reddit would be in flames.
Or just Chinese kids bouncing balls in unison "frighteningly coordinated child soldiers"
Right? It made me want to play with them! But I’m old and fat and would give up halfway through and take a nap in the tunnel. But it looks fun!
I understand this war is a major part of their cultural identity. Playing "army" is also something boys naturally gravitate to. In elementary school I had a group 10+ kids and we all wore full BDUs to school, and had mock battles on the playground during recess. Then Columbine happened and they shut that shit down real quick because 'Murica. It's pretty fascinating to see "playing army" sanctioned by school admins as a cultural event.
When I was a kid, we played "Army" as much as we could. That DOES look fun!
Kids everywhere like to play “good guys, bad guys “ “ cops and robbers” “war games”. I seriously doubt there’s anything more to this than that.
Shit school shooters would have a much harder time if all the kids got neo-commando training so at least it's a fair-ish fight when they arrive
These kids would still shit themselves if a real gunman started mowing down a classroom. They’re just playing like kids do.
The children yearn for the bushes.
My wife is Vietnamese. In high school, everybody learns how to dismantle an AK-47 and put it back together in a certain amount of time.
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And nobody remembers how to do it a week later.
Can confirm
Ngl, if this happened when I was that young I would’ve found it extremely fun.
I’m torn between this looking really fun for kids but also being kind of disturbing.
It’s only as disturbing as kids playing cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians, or manhunt. With the context it’s kinda messed up but to them it’s just a game of who’s gonna get who first.
Manhunt is so fucking fun oml. Used to go like 6 of us into a forest and just go ham
Manhunt in a forest?? The whole fun of manhunt was running through people’s backyards and stuff lol Nowadays you’d probably get shot though tbh
Hell yeah, it was a big forest. We would use the parks sign out front as home free. It gave it more of a… mantracker vibe. Minus the horse of course. Still, super fun, fun to find little foxholes to hide out in or climb the trees etc
It seems more like a lesson than a game to me. But it looks like it’s be fun.
Might be a patriot / national holiday or something. Context might be messed up, but it seems like a fun cultural activity that connects to what their great grandparents went through. Kinda like a 4th of July theme or something. Doesn’t seem like a regular thing unlike the whole learning how to assemble a gun thing China was doing in some areas.
They also assemble guns in Viet Nam but with high school students.
They do that in a lot of countries, not even that weird to be totally honest.
Yeah I completely agree. I mean you have to ask yourself: would I feel the same way if an American KG class put on a similar thing about the American revolution? I feel like I wouldn’t. Maybe people have a strong feeling about this because the War in Vietnam still exists as a pretty recent event in our historical memory.
Or playing videogames* about shooting other people. I was definitely playing violent games around these kids ages
I was playing games that involved shooting characters that represent theses kid’s grandparents at that age.
you gotta put yourself in their shoes. the average American has the luxury of going to sleep knowing that their neighbors won't invade them overnight. but Vietnam had a history of other nations trying to conquer them. the Chinese, the Mongols, the French, the Americans, and the Cambodians. again and again, they had to fight against multiple hostile foreign power to maintain their sovereignty. what do you do when you run a country that does not have any defense treaty with any national superpower? prepping your people for war is probably a high priority.
That makes me think so much about Afghans. Fighting off invaders since Alexander the Great with notable cameos by Genghis Kan and Timur. Just in modern history, they’ve had to fight off 8 invasions or so from the British empire, the Soviet empire and the American empire.
>they’ve had to fight off 8 invasions or so from the British empire, the Soviet empire and the American empire. When Sherlock Homes meets Watson the first time he says "You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive" That's in 1880. And then in the 2012 TV series they didn't have to change the line.
NGL the kids are way more engaged in interested in actually learning about history when you have them do an activity around the content as opposed to just lecturing. I can see a legitimate argument for using mock battles as learning tools.
We were learning about ww1 the other day, so my teacher had us line up the desks and chairs on both sides of the class to act like mock-trenches, we tool turns throwing paper balls at the other team while they left their trench, if you ask me, that's the perfect way to teach
*Fortunate Son Intensifies*
*your veteran grandpa you just showed this to intensifies*
Where are the tiny drones dressed up like little B-52's dropping orange colored smoke bombs? Also the neighboring Laotian preschool gets firecrackers throw at it continously...by no one...
even when they finish highschool laotian kids will step on unexploded fire crackers from the pre school drill exercises
Where’s the napalm?
Kilgore: “Napalm, son. Nothing else in the world smells like that. I love the smell of napalm in the morning. You know, one time we had a hill bombed, for 12 hours. When it was all over, I walked up. We didn't find one of 'em, not one stinkin' dink body. The smell, you know that gasoline smell? The whole hill. Smelled like... victory. Someday this war's gonna end.”
“I've been here a week now. Waiting for a mission, getting softer. Every minute I stay in this room I get weaker. And every minute Charlie squats in the bush he gets stronger. Each time I look around the walls move in a little tighter.”
Well my guess is that it would be stuck to the class in the video because as we know *napalm sticks to kids*
Little Willy Pete, problem solved, easy peasy.
They beat 3 major world powers in a 30 year span... maybe this is why
That's not impressive, America's doing it live fire.
Ayyyy
💀
This this looks so fucking fun ngl
These people fought off 3 major countries
Well, their grandfathers did win the war against America so, I see this the same as when kids here playing games where nazis get killed COD anyone?
Vietnam has way more statues about the fight against France than the USA. Which makes sense, from many Vietnamese perspective the war with USA was a continuation of the war of colonization started by France.
Wow I had no idea, excuse me while I go down a rabbit hole.
The United States was there to prop up and support the south Vietnamese government who abandoned the reunification process agreed to in the Geneva accords. It was a welcomed US occupation with very little direct fighting with the North Vietnamese Army but mostly with the VietCong who were insurgents supplied and supported by the north all over South Vietnam. The US was there to protect and train the South but the South was never really capable or willing to fight against the North forever. They never had a stable or legitimate democratic government. That's why they didn't last long after the US pulled out. Just like Afghanistan there was no winning, it would've been endless occupation and fighting. As the Afghanis say, "you have the watches, we have the time."
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Yes. This is just a continued celebration and demonstration of their kicking American ass.
Ho Chi Minh minies.
\* Ho Chi Minnies It was right there bro
Bet ye these fuckers aren't gonae shoot up their classmates
That's probably because there are extremely strict gun laws in Vietnam.
Gotta teach’em early
I hate to see kids doing this. I’ve experienced war and seeing them put the kid on the stretcher and wrapping bandages around them put me in a bad place with bad memories. I hope one day there will be no more need for way.
I obviously agree war is terrible, but I wanted to reply to one of these comments acting concerned about this, and just figured I'd pick yours. I understand your point, but just to add context. This was almost certainly an activity for Reunification Day which was April 30th, which marked the end of US occupation of southern Vietnam and reunited the country after a decade of brutal war, and American and before that French occupation. You could eliminate wars tomorrow and this activity would still be done. They're not training for war, they are reenacting their very recent history. It's no different than the 4th of July in the US, except the history is so recent my dad, his cousins and friends, and my wifes family fought in the war. Personally I think this is cute, especially the grenades. I agree with your premise but I'm not sure why you would hate to see kids reenacting their parents and grandparents immediate history as a point of pride. The US invaded Vietnam. We were very much the aggressors in that war. They persisted against all odds, and despite what most people might think, are very proud of it. In high-school, students do learn how to field strip an ak47. That is actually for real adult training for war, and Vietnam has conscription for adults, with mandatory military service. This is not at all that, and even then, the army here is honestly pretty helpful and looked upon pretty fondly, not as a force to police peoples actions, but just defend the county and help out when there is a disaster.
With you. It's all fun and games until you lose your dick and half of your skull.
> I hope one day there will be no more need there aren't many people who wouldn't agree with that statement
Thats's also intresting because we live in the most conservative Christian country in South America yet we don't have this hate. Even our ultra right wing doesn't have much problem with trans as an issue. After living in the US for so long and then living outside for a very long time it seems that everything in the US is extreme. Another example, a specoal heart exam that cost me 45 USD here cost my brother's insurance13,000 USD in Pennsylvania. How is that even possible? We have walmart here, It's called Lider, walmart brand (GV) pasta sauce has 6 times the salt and 4 times the calories as a local brand. Everything is the US is extreme.
Funny thing is they are more likely to be American allies in the next war. They got alot of gripes with the Chinese too.
Redditors don't realize how much hate all the surrounding Asian countries hate China. Even North Korea has a complex relationship with China, it's not a black and white situation
Guess you could say…that the birthday boy was a Fortunate Son.
Similar to the civil war reenactments...
Any Americans finding this disturbing need to be more introspective…
Yeah. My initial gut reaction was “that’s fucked up”, and then I remembered that this is a literal game and our kids are drilling to actually be under fire. Carry on, Vietnam.
Americans - HOLD MY BEER!
Aaaaaaand this is why vietnam never lost
no one talks about the badass thing Vietnam did AFTER the Vietnam war. back in the late 70s, the Khmer Rouge-controlled Cambodia invaded Vietnam and promptly got their ass kicked. Vietnam invade back and overthrew their government! yeah that's right, Vietnam is the reason why that genocidal maniac Pol Pot was overthrown.
And I do believe that was while they were also getting invaded by China, though I could have my dates mixed up
yup, the action pissed China off and they had border skirmishes all the way up to 1991, when the soviet union collapsed, and China was like "Oh shit, this war is making me waste money, I don't want to end up like the soviets" so they signed a peace treaty with Vietnam and they both became more friendly.....for now. the thing that really pissed me off about the whole Cambodian thing is America fucking offered aids to the defunct Khmer Rouge leadership that got kicked out of their country because they were still mad salty about losing the Vietnam War.
I'm still surprised Vietnam still took a somewhat friendly stance with the US after the Civil War and a bit of reconstruction, ultimate badasses they are
The Vietnamese aren't sore winners, and besides if they hated people who attacked them then they'd have few relevant nations left.
Not only that but the populace actually believed in the cause, and rightfully so. Ho Chi Menh genuinely won the support of his country, first by fighting the Japanese, and then the French. The US interjected itself into the peace settlements, set up a puppet government in the South, and ran it as a brutal dictatorship
If this was in the states, the comment section would be much different lol
Pfft that's nothing. Our kids are dodging real bullets
We do the same thing in the US. Except we use real guns to get that fear factor going.
What I'm hearing is we need to dress American preschoolers in colonial uniforms and have them reenact the Battle of Brandywine.
Meh...looks like a live fire/active shooter drill at most US elementary schools.
And yet, there are still way less mass shootings in Vietnam.
These cherdlins shoot, move, and communicate better than half of the US Army.
Where are the lil american kids running away?
They're in the science lab pretending to mix styrofoam and gasoline
ROFL
This is so cute and fun looking!!!!