Ho Chi Minh City; The War Remnants Museum

Outside the War remnants museum in Saigon stand some imposing warfare vehicles and planes. They loom over you casting a dark shadow and a certain sense of impending doom. The first exhibition I enter is outside and is a graphic depiction of conditions in prisons where POW's were kept, including the 'tiger cages' where inmates were enclosed in tiny cages of barbed wire and forced to suffer; enduring punishment and starvation. My stomach turns as I read descriptions of torture treatments the prisoners were subjected to. Removing prisoners toe nails and finger nails. There's a room with a guillotine. Burning sex organs. There's a dark, damp cell. Breaking knee-caps off. How could anyone be so desensitized to commit these acts? Burying prisoners alive. I make my way into the building under a dark cloud and up the stairs a world of terror, death and despair unfolds before my eyes through images from war photographers.
"Platoon 1 led by Lieutenant william Colley overwhelmed to seek for civilians with the aim of killing anyone they found. Particularly at a ditch they found at the other end of Thuan Yen hamlet. The U.S. troops massacred 170 people". Black and white prints of agonised faces cover the walls. Screaming babies. Dead bodies. "most were women and babies. It looked as if they tried to get away". An image shows a bloody heap of female bodies, some tiny, all helpless. Skin melted from bodies like chocolate dripping off a candy bar. "Victim of phosphorus bombs" it simply reads.
The next area is an exhibition of the 'Agent Orange aftermath'. "The US air force sprayed 72 million litres of toxic chemicals of various types on Vietnam, including 44 million litres of Agent Orange". Agent Orange was sprayed over the land with the aim of defoliating plants and crops and destroying food and water resources. The hideous chemical also had the effect of directly harming people causing illnesses and cancers and destroying DNA causing future generations to be born with terrible malformations, birth defects, diseases and brain problems. Limbless children. Tumoured faces. Desperately sadly deformed bodies. The US came. They tried to destroy lives. They succeeded more than they even knew. In the streets of Saigon I see the crippled bodies, I see the desperate faces, I see their agony, their need, their sadness. Why are they sitting on the streets? A hand raised for any donation. Someone should be paying for this. The museum makes me feel sick. I walk around and see dismembered bodies, burnt faces, blood, pain, terror, dead babies, mothers, pregnant women. A lump in my throat. Soldiers, guns, burning villages. What is that look in his eye? A knot twists in my stomach. How did these men look into the eyes of their victims. The innocent. The slaughtered. Fight an army not a child.
The museum is one of the best I've ever been to and I leave feeling terrible. A must see.