During the war, the baggage of the soldiers of the Liberation Army, besides weapons, equipment and military equipment, also appeared in the battlefield diaries. Those diaries come in many different forms, sometimes just small notebooks with the size of a hand, but they contain many meaningful things. It reflects the pulse of life on the battlefield, the soldier's ideals and reasons for life, personal feelings, love and nostalgia. Each page is written in a deep inner world.
In a place full of bombs, dangers, life and death with almost no boundaries, those blood-filled pages over the years are still like the hot breath of the battlefield, simple but extremely true like comment of writer Nguyen Quang Thieu (Vice President of Vietnam Writers Association, First Deputy General Secretary of Asia-Africa Writers Association): “Nothing is more accurate about the war than the diary pages. of soldiers. Because they write these diaries right on the battlefield... It is only when death is near that the human voice is most honest. And that honesty has proved their love of the country, their fearless love of independence and freedom, and their complete dedication to the country”. In the smoke and fire of bombs and the fierceness of the war, some diaries of the soldiers of the Liberation Army were lost and kept by American soldiers on the other side of the front. The pages of the diary filled with fire and steel have inspired, awakened and led the soldiers on the other side of the battle line to find and return priceless treasures to its owners or relatives.
The starting point of the journey back to the motherland.
Returning after the war, painful memories of the war in Vietnam are an obsession for many US veterans such as the narrative of veteran Peter Mathews: “Returning to the country after serving time in the war. In Vietnam, I faced a psychological crisis. I used to drink alcohol to try to forget the bad memories. My marriage also fell apart because of the effects of the post-war”. Therefore, after the war ended, a number of American veterans returned to Vietnam with the desire to revisit the old battlefields, make personal efforts to heal the wounds of war and also to self-treatment the psychological aftershocks they experience. Among those veterans is Paul Reed, a US veteran who fought in the Central Highlands battlefield. During a battle at Kon Tum battlefield in 1968, Paul Reed's unit collected backpacks and some items of the Liberation Army. Among them was a small book, which looked like a diary. When opened, there was handwriting on every page, the writing in it was beautiful, like a work of art. Paul Reed then said to himself, "I think I need to keep those things". After returning to the US, Paul Reed and many other veterans suffered from "psychological trauma" syndrome, his life was seriously affected, he constantly caused fights, disturbances, and his future gradually became uncertain.
In a sober moment, Paul Reed opened the box of war memorabilia to review and retrieve the diary that he brought back from Vietnam and asked someone to translate it into English. Paul Reed read it and was completely surprised by what was written in it. Through the pages of his diary, he realized that his opponents in the war were soldiers with a soul, with a deep love for their homeland, with a will and a spirit of service for the Fatherland. Paul Reed decided to find and return the soldier's diary. In 1993, Paul Reed returned to Vietnam and handed the diary back to its owner, veteran Nguyen Van Nghia. The two veterans then went back together to visit the old battlefield where they fought at Kon Tum.
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Paul Reed and veteran Nguyen Van Nghia visit the old battlefield.
Source: https://vovworld.vn/en-VN/van-hoa/nhat-ky-kontum-va-su-cuu-roi-cuoc-doi-mot-cuu-binh-my-231995.vov
After this trip, Paul Reed got rid of the guilt about the past, regained psychological balance, returned to daily life. Paul Reed's journey back to Vietnam has been remade into a movie called "Diary of Kon Tum (Kontum Diary)". After that, the film was shown widely throughout the United States and was nominated for the Emmy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 1994. With Paul Reed, more than 20 years later, the battlefield diary of veteran Nguyen Van Nghia became a treasure destined to save his life. The above diary is probably the first war diary that has been returned to Vietnam after a long stay abroad. Since then, a way to heal the wounds of war, a new mode of reconciliation between Vietnam and the United States has been opened.
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The diary was handed over by Paul Reed to veteran Nguyen Van Nghia. Photo: VOV