Remembering the Defeat of a Nation

With patriotic Vietnamese songs blaring from speakers at the Cultural Court in Little Saigon, hundreds gathered waving flags Sunday to mark the 26th anniversary of the fall of South Vietnam.

Political and religious leaders took the podium to remember the April 30 surrender of the Saigon Government in 1975 and to call for religious freedom and basic human rights. In Vietnam last year, said Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton), he heard firsthand accounts of the lack of religious freedom from leaders who have been under house arrest since the end of the war.

“I heard how people from certain parts of Vietnam are being forced to sign documents that renounce their faith,” Royce said. “They told me how the sacred Buddhist texts were being changed by the Communist party, how things were being removed and rewritten and how people were forcibly being told not to go to religious services.”

Local Catholics, Protestants and two Buddhist sects, Hoa Hao and Cao Dai, lit incense at an altar during the program. Early on, a plane flew overhead with a banner of the former Vietnamese flag and the statement “Religious Freedom. Democracy in Vietnam.”

The audience cheered as speakers called for the overthrow of the Vietnamese Communist government.

“The Communists see religion as an enemy,” said Hung Quoc Ngu, 56, of Costa Mesa, dressed in the uniform of the former South Vietnamese army. “To them, religion is like a person holding a gun. The leaders in Vietnam are persecuted, executed and assassinated.”

Cu Tran, 52, of Westminster passed out paper versions of the South Vietnam and U.S. flags to passersby. He referred to April 30 as the “Fall of Freedom Day.”

“It is a very hurtful and sad time for us every year. And now there are still nearly 80 million people in Vietnam being harassed by the government,” Tran said.

Some expressed fear that in time, the passion for freedom may die. Quynh Van Ho, 55, of Irvine, who teaches Vietnamese to youths at the Hue Quang temple in Westminster, said it is important for religions to band together and strengthen their fight for freedom.

“We have to do this every year so the youths can have an understanding of why we are here,” Ho said. “They grow up with freedom, and they can’t understand what their parents went through.”

Nguyen Phuong Hung, a former Vietnamese army ranger, said it is getting more difficult to keep the momentum going.

“After 1975, people were still homesick, and they were still feeling the pain, but after 26 years, a lot have given up,” said Hung, who bears a scar where he was shot through the elbow with an automatic rifle in 1968. “People are growing older and they will die, while the younger generation, who were born after the war, will never understand or believe the pain.”

A parade through Westminster was canceled at the last minute because people had left at the end of the program.