Saturday, March 31, 2007

My Afghan-German-Oxtralian friend sent me this link to an article headlined Lonely memorial for China's forgotten war.

Although China invaded Vietnam on February 15, 1979, launching a war that turned into a low-intensity border conflict through most of the 1980s, a look at the cemetery in Malipo reveals little of what transpired....

"When border treaties were signed two decades later, China tallied 26,000 dead combatants and Vietnam an estimated 37,000."

Me mate also told me he often talked to people in Guangxi about Vietnam and and at one dinner he attended with Viets, Chinese and Australians, he asked the Guangxi-nese if they could speak any Vietnamese.

One ex-Army guy got up and said: "Yes, I can speak some Vietnamese - 'Put your gun down, your hands up and come out slowly!"

Apparently everyone pissed themselves laughing, especially the Vietnamese.
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3 comments:

elliott said...

I see these stories all the time but I never see anyone explain what exactly happened in the war: what towns/villages were attacked, what happened in those towns/villages (was anyone there or had they all buggered off?), what defensive lines were employed, what strategic facilities were captured and retaken, where was the attack halted, where did the Vietnamese break the offensive line, once the Chinese were on the run how far did Vietnam let them back into China before calling off the chase etc etc???? I'm sure this info is probably out there but I would like to hear it from a Vietnamese/Chinese perspective. Any leads Pittstop?

5:25 p.m.
Unknown said...

Hey Elliotto-san, why don't you look up Wikipedia, the source of all knowledge?
Just kidding. Yeah I remember one day waking up and my grandmother (may her soul rest in peace) told me that be prepared, the Chinese is coming. Or maybe she said: "eat your breakfast, because even it's made up of just junk, there's millions of chinese babies are coming this way". Seriously, I remember that quite vividly for a 4 years old (did you know I was a genius 4 year old? I could read and write and calculate). I remember the adults stocked up on food and supplies. And then that summer we were sent for the "que" (country side) for a few months. And I grew up hearing all horrisble stories about how the Chinese kill people and poison wells and water streams. And now they send their chemically preserved, genetically twisted oranges and mandarins and apple to Vietnam, especially around Tet time, blocking the dyke road with huge trucks (see other pittstop work about Tet).
My two cents.

6:38 p.m.
elliott said...

Tu anh: Now that's what I'm talking about! Real stories. True stories. I can fully believe you were a genius at four. I could barely roll my arm over...

7:45 p.m.

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