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From: Bettina Lily Mcneil <294049@soas.ac.uk> Dear List,
I'm trying to find any original sources for the Viet-Cong atrocity story which is described most famously by the character Kurtz in Apocalypse Now, but is also recounted by Slavoj Zizek in 'Iraq: The Borrowed Kettle' as fact:
"...a well-known incident from the Vietnam war: after the US Army occupied a local village, their doctors vaccinated the children on the left arm in order to demonstrate their humanitarian care; when, the day after, the village was retaken by the Vietcong, they cut off the left arms of all the vaccinated children..."
The majority online opinion seems to be that this story is fictional, but I haven't been able to find any firm evidence of this. One interesting theory I've read on a message board is that it is actually a perversion of the story of King Leopold II's actions in the Belgian Congo (which would be ironic considering the setting of Heart of Darkness):
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/35/181.html "As more villages resisted the rubber order, Leopold's agents ordered the Force Publique army to raid the rebellious villages and kill the people. To make sure that the soldiers did not waste the bullets in hunting animals, their officers demanded to see the amputated right hand of every person they killed."
However, I can't find any authoritative source on this. Does anyone on the list know of the Viet-Cong story's origin? Was it invented by the writers of Apocalpyse Now and misquoted by Zizek?
Many thanks, Bettina McNeil
This seems like a "no-brainer" to me. It is well-known that Francis Ford Coppola based his movie Apocalypse Now on Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness and this scene would've come from that or his own imagination. While there were plenty of stories -- and allegations -- of atrocities by the Viet Cong during the war, none ever reached such an extreme telling. As an on-scene aid worker and correspondent for the entire period of the war, I never heard any story like this, or even allegations.
Of course, if you are that curious, why not approach Coppola himself or those who wrote the movie script? Or ask Michael Herr -- of Dispatches fame -- was also closely involved when the script went off the rails and did much to bring some discipline into it?
Finally, Apocalypse Now is full of such allegories which are more symbolic than real and it's being so 'over-the-top" is what I've always found so attractive about the film. Does anyone really believe that the US staged attacks using loudspeakers blaring out Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries? Or that a remote US firebase would be staging a Playboy bunny show? Or even its basic premise of a rogue colonel up a creek somewhere in Cambodia?
Best regards,
Carl Robinson USAID South Vietnam, 1964-68; Associated Press, Saigon '68-75.
Dear Bettina,
If Marlon Brando is narrating the story in the movie, then indeed one wonders whether it is a bow (by the director and/or scriptwriter) to Joseph Conrad and Edmund Morel, the activist against King Leopold.
Are there books on the making of Apocalypse Now, or the director’s comments in some special edition DVD (for instance of Apocalypse Now Redux) that could help you answer the question?
Does Conrad’s Heart of Darkness contain such a scene, or a similar one?
On Edmund Morel, the anti-Leopold activist, see Adam Hochschild, King Leopold’s Ghost. Parts of the book can be read on Amazon (and presumably google books too).
Plus wiki, of course: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._D._Morel (the other key figure is Roger Casement)
The following slides also show a child that had been mutilated (right forearm and left leg missing): http://www.wea.org.uk/download.aspx?id=192
My recollection is that the cutting off of limbs was not just a proof of killing, but also a punishment of workers perceived to be recalcitrant. That such measures would not increase productivity apparently was not fully considered.
Best regards,
Tobias
Tobias RETTIG, Ph.D.
Sorry, but why the go-around here for secondary sources when you can contact Francis Ford Coppola, Michael Herr and others still alive who were involved with the movie Apocalypse Now and its script? The director is still alive -- as is Mike -- so why be so oblique?
No need to be shy or reticent here.
Cheers,
Carl
On the Viet Nam side, it would seem incredibly easy to verify the existence of this "incident." An entire village of one-arm-persons who are now in their 40s and 50s would surely not escape the attention of the Lonely Planet's travellers? Perhaps someone among the myriad of aid workers who travel to some of the most remote places in Viet Nam would have seen and wondered about a village of right-arm-only persons of about the same age? I grew up in the South during the war. Although I did not hear about My Lai until after 1975, I did learn about the massacre of civilians in Hue during Tet 1968 and lesser known school bombings elsewhere attributed to Viet Cong, but this is the first I have heard of an one-arm village. I would find it hard to believe that the South Vietnamese media would fail to pick up such story; or if they did, would fail to broadcast such atrocity. Sincerely, Dieu-Hien -- Hoang t. Dieu-Hien, RN, MN, MPH
Many thanks for all your replies.
So, as I suspected, it looks like this incident is definitely not 'well known'! Thanks to Dieu-Hien for pointing out its full absurdity. It is interesting how powerfully persuasive even a fictional film story can be. Not only does Mr Zizek recount it as fact, but commenters responding to Zizek use it to argue their case:
Thank you for the additional references - I'll look up Dr Dooley's writings and King Leopold’s Ghost for some further context. And like Carl suggests, I will definitely try and contact Mr Coppola or Mr Milius directly (and Mr Zizek).
Best wishes, Bettina
Dear Bettina,
In case you get through to the director and / or screenwriter, it would be great if you could briefly share how, and why, they put this story into the movie.
Cheers,
tobias
Another, though even more distant and less specific but still likely source of the story is "The Quiet American" by Graham Greene. There are two brief atrocity stories that are mentioned in the book to justify conquest and colonial rule by highlighting the cruelties committed by the "natives":
Fowler: "Anyway the French are dying every day-that's not a mental concept. They aren't leading these people on with half-lies like your politicians-and ours. I've been in India, Pyle, and I know the harm liberals do. We haven't a liberal party any more-liberalism's infected all the other parties. We are all either liberal conservatives or liberal socialists: we all have a good conscience. I'd rather be an exploiter who fights for what he exploits, and dies with it. Look at the history of Burma. We go and invade the country: the local tribes support us: we are victorious: but like you Americans we weren't colonialists in those days. Oh no, we made peace with the king and we handed him back his province and left our allies to be crucified and sawn in two. They were innocent. They thought we'd stay. But we were liberals and we didn't want a bad conscience."
Captain Trouin: "The rest of the time I think that I am defending Europe. And you know, those others-they do some monstrous things also. When they were driven out of Hanoi in 1946 they left terrible relics among their own people-people they thought had helped us. There was one girl in the mortuary-they had not only cut off her breasts, they had mutilated her lover and stuffed his. . ."
While the specific story of amputated arms must have been inspired by some other work (I fully agree with the parallel drawn with the Congo Free State), this form of self-justification does appear similar to the aforesaid examples.
Cheers, Balazs
Hello again,
Tobias asked me to share any progress I made in contacting the director/writer of Apocalypse Now re the story outlined in my first email.
I did manage to get in touch with John Milius (via Francis Ford Coppola's production company). Despite poor health following a stroke, Mr Milius was kind enough to reply to my email and say that the story of the Viet Cong atrocity was based on a real-life event recounted to him by a contact in Special Forces.
This Special Forces source turned out to be Fred Rexer, who worked as military consultant on the film, was a Green Beret in Laos and took part in the Phoenix programme. He claims to have witnessed the event first hand (referenced in 'The Apocalpyse Now Book' by Peter Cowie).
Interestingly, another story that Fred Rexer also used to recount to the crew did not make it into the film (apologies for the graphic content):
"[Rexer] would regale the sound engineers with stories of how, as a CIA operative, he had executed Viet Cong chieftans by squeezing his fingers through their eye-sockets and literally tearing their skulls apart."
So anyway, as far as the writer of Apocalypse Now is concerned, the Viet Cong atrocity story was based on a real event.
Best wishes, Bettina
Thank you for this report, Bettina, and pleased you were able to get to the source. Personally, I'd still take the report with a certain grain of salt. Military guys can be amongst the biggest -- pardon me -- bullshit artists you'd ever want to meet and counted upon for enthralling tales such as these. If the original story you queried actually did happen, why wouldn't the US government's propaganda machine have made a meal of this atrocity at the time? It's precisely the sort of thing they would have done and the media would've written about it too. (I do recall one particularly brutal story about a montagnard village allegedly burned down by communist troops at the still early stages of the war and that got huge coverage.)
So, all I'm saying is the original source sounds pretty damn flaky to me.
Best regards,
Carl Robinson USOM/USAID, 1964-68; AP/Saigon, '68-75 Convenor: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/vietnam-old-hacks.
Sydney, Australia.
---------- I also wondered why, if Rexer had been going around for decades telling such gruesome tales, he had not heen hauled in front of a court martial.
Hue Tam Ho Tai
I am dubious about this story. But let me go off on a digression first. When digging into stories, found in various Vietnamese memoirs (e.g. By Tr?n Van trà, Son Nam . . ) about Cao Ðài cannibalism, I kept on looking for actual eyewitness accounts. So far, I have found none. Interestingly enough, when a story sounds more authentic -- e.g. giving specific places and times for an atrocity -- it may simply be a great rumor. Those who have studied the circulation of rumors about fantastic claims know this well: it is devilishly hard to pin down actual eyewitnesses.
In this particular case, note that there is no actual eyewitness account: unless, that is, the local NLF/ PAVN forces agreed to a ceasefire, invited Rexler in to watch them cut off the arms of children, let Rexler go back to his Special Forces encampment. Instead, Rexler seems to claim to have gone into a village after the NLF/ PAVN forces were there.
Re: Zizek narrating this story: in the Sublime Object of Ideology, Zizek discusses what he calls the "impossible-real": a good communist is accused of treason punishable by death by the Party. In order to be a good communist, one has to accept Party discipline, so the good communist is placed in the dilemma of being a good communist and going to his death even though he committed no act of treason, or defying the Party and thus being a bad communist. That is the dilemma of the "impossible-real." It would be interesting to see the context of this story, but here the adoring reader of Zizek is placed in his or her own minor "impossible-real" : either blindly follow the god Zizek and accept this probable fabrication as real, or challenge (gasp!) Zizek and thus become an apostate. Since I have never liked Zizek, the choice is easy for me. . . .
Shawn McHale
Shawn McHale
Hi VSGers,
The concept of ‘urban myth’ (or ‘legend) might be useful in that context:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_legend
The few ones I have been told were also quite bloody, haptic, and graphic, and always happened to a close friend of a friend (e.g. the friend of my brother visits Amsterdam by car; a Hell’s Angel offers to protect the car in return of money; the stingy / scared friend does not pay and quickly drives off, but hears a big thud on the car; at the next ‘Autobahn’ gas station, he or she checks the car and finds a knuckleduster and a torn off finger stuck in the trunk deck). Very plastic, and of course neither the friend’s friend nor the story are real!
Another version of the Zizek story (as seen in a movie playing Latin America): the atheist communists take over a church during Mas. The communist leaders asks all those who believe in God to go to one side. These people (very few) are taken outside and one hears shots. The communist leader then scolds the majority why they go to Church if they do not believe in God and in eternal life…
Happy weekend!
Tobias
Tobias RETTIG, Ph.D.
No, there were rumors of Cao Ðài AND Hòa H?o cannibalism, which I discuss in my "Understanding the Fanatic Mind" article. I would say, however, that the ones about the Hòa H?o may have been more prevalent. It just goes to show how "portable" rumors can be.
Actually, a female NLF guerrilla told Hungarian diplomats in 1965 that in the Diem era, some ARVN soldiers committed acts of cannibalism, because they believed that the consumption of the enemy's liver (or some other parts of his anatomy) would enhance their bravery and fighting abilities. In "The Best and the Brightest," David Halberstam tells a story about an American military adviser who declined to taste a pair of testicles (formerly the property of a deceased NLF guerrilla) that was politely offered to him as a treat by an ARVN officer. While the first story cannot be easily verified due to the lack of data, persons familiar with Halberstam and his sources might be able to track down the second story.
Zizek's story about the good/bad Communist was obviously inspired by Arthur Koestler's "Darkness at Noon," which in turn had been inspired by the Stalinist show trials. In my country, Hungary, the most prominent victim of the show trials, Laszlo Rajk, did find himself in such a situation. Having been brutally tortured for a substantial time, he finally met then-Minister of Interior Janos Kadar (incidentally, the godfather of Rajk's baby son_no pun intended), who explained to him in a friendly manner how his confession would help the Party and how his life would be spared as a reward. He confessed. The reward was somewhat different from Kadar's promise.
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