Please tell us your name, rank, and the date of your entrance into the army.

My name is Dang Van Son. I was born in 1941. My rank was major in the Special Forces. And I entered the army in 1963 and remained there until 1975.

Please identify your army unit.

From 1963 to 1969 I was with the Special Forces. And from 1969 to 1972 I was with the Special Unit stationed at C-4 in Can Tho and Moc Hoa. And finally, I was transferred to the Police Intelligence Service.

Please tell us about the military activities in the area under our control in Moc Hoa as well as those of the Communists beyond the border in Cambodia. And your encounters with the Communists. Did they attack from Cambodia and did you cross the border in order to seek revenge on them?

At first, when I was with the Special Forces I...The Special Forces were mobile combat forces which were extremely strong and which belonged to the ARVN. And...when I was serving in the frontline areas as well as in Combat Area D, the Special Forces were already having extremely high combat spirit and were very enthusiastic. Therefore, they were able to neutralize all Communist forces, including their regular forces. As far as Moc Hoa was concerned, as you already know Moc Hoa was next to the Cambodian border. And the Communist units in Cambodia – among them were the Red-Flag units – frequently invaded the Vietnamese border areas and frequently attacked inhabited Vietnamese areas along the border. Therefore, a fighting force like ours had the responsibility of conducting military operations to wipe out enemy units infiltrating from the other side of the border. And sometimes we also received orders to conduct operations several kilometers beyond the border in order to annihilate the Communist units which had been withdrawn to the other side.

Please tell us how you conducted your military operations: by helicopters, by vehicles, or on foot?

As far as the unit in Moc Hoa was concerned, my battalion was stationed in Binh Tan Thanh which was only 500 meters from the border. Therefore, sometimes we conducted our operations on foot and went across the border. However, sometimes we also used helicopters in order to land troops in Communist areas in order to seek them out.

A while ago you mentioned that at one time you went to Can Tho in order to work in the Phoenix Program. Please tell us what the Phoenix Program was like and, in your opinion, whether the Phoenix Program was good or bad.

During the period after I got transferred to the Police Intelligence Service in the IV Corps area, and especially in the province of Can Tho – Can Tho was a very big province where all the nerve centers of the IV Corps area were located and where Communist infrastructures were strewn all over the province – especially during the period I served in Can Tho the Police Intelligence Service was able to immobilize nearly 3,000 Communist infrastructures. As for the Phoenix Program, I want to say it very clearly because some Americans now in the United States may misconstrue that this Phoenix Program was an extremely vicious program designed to neutralize various Communist fractions by means such as assassination and illegal arrests, for example. However, I must say that the Phoenix Program was an extremely effective program and one which enabled us to distinguish clearly which was a nationalist and which was a Communist by intelligence methods which we had...organized. For example, there was the people intelligence network which we organized. And the people informed us who were nationalists and who were Communists. There were also intelligence structures which we were able to organize an unit of Tien Nga (Swans) which was composed of high school girls who were young and beautiful. We infiltrated these girls into the Communist infrastructures and they were able to disclose many Communist infrastructures. For this reason, during the time I served in Can Tho, almost all Communist infrastructures and support units were neutralized. This was thanks to the Phoenix Program.

Let’s return to this question for a while. You had been with the Special Forces and also with the Phoenix Program, and so did you find out that the Phoenix Program was helpful to the military units on the battlefronts?

As I have said, the Phoenix Program was an extremely ingenious and effective program. It was successful in distinguishing the nationalist and Communist elements. And also it made it impossible for our government to arrest the wrong person. Therefore, the Phoenix Program helped the Army of the Republic of Vietnam immensely by wiping out all the Communist elements at the lower level.

A last question. During 1975, which was the last year of the war, what were the military activities of the Communist as well as the nationalist forces in Vietnam? Please tell us the battlefield situation until March 1975.

Your question is a general question about the situation in 1975 as well as the conditions of the Republic of Vietnam and its morale. So let me briefly summarize the situation in this way. The year 1975 was the most tumultuous year. The Communists concentrated all their efforts in occupying South Vietnam. Why did the Communists concentrated all their efforts in occupying the southern part of Vietnam? This was because, first of all, the Communists saw that the United States had retreated and had abandoned South Vietnam.

They realized that the United States would never again come to the aid of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam. For this reason, they wanted to quickly take over all their targets in the South. However, as you know, the fighting by the Army of the Republic of Vietnam was extremely brave and ferocious. Until the very last minute the paratroop units were still fighting. However, the withdrawal of the American troops had...It can be said that the abandonment of South Vietnam (by the United States) had somewhat demoralized the soldiers in the armed forces of the Republic of Vietnam.

As far as Can Tho province and the IV Corps area were concerned, it can be said that in 1975 the Communists were not yet able to carry out any kind of activity or to conduct any large military operation or to infiltrate the IV Corps area in any way. This was because General Nguyen Khoa Nam was a very good general who had a lot of talent and who was a very loyal person. Nguyen Khoa Nam was a person who lied to carry out military operations. And the military units in the IV Corps area were all very contentious and brave.

For this reason, they were able to defend the South...Sorry, they were able to defend the IV Corps area, never allowing the Communist to infiltrate it. This was true until the very last moment. But it was really quite painful when the order to surrender came from General Duong Van Minh. And General Nguyen Khoa Nam bravely killed himself. Colonel Ho Ngoc Can, the provincial chief of Chuong Thien , also decided to fight until the end when he was arrested and executed. These heroes of the Republic of Vietnam...Until this very moment, there are still many who are in the marquis carrying out the struggle. Their morale is very high.

During 1975 did the Communists create a lot of pressure in your area?

In 1975, in reality, the Communists were able to throw two regiments into the province of Vinh Long. This was in the district of...I am sorry I don’t remember the name of the district, but it was next to Can Tho. The Communists were so overjoyed because they thought that as soon as they arrived in the area they would be able to take over everything. But these two regiments met with a very heavy and bitter defeat only five days before the loss of South Vietnam. These two regiments were...I don’t remember what the names of these two regiments were.

But they were two regular regiments. These two regiments were attacked unexpected at night by Hoa Hao adherents with hand-grenades. And so the two regiments disintegrated. As for the other units, I don’t think any of them were able to infiltrate into the provinces of the IV Corps area. However, there were a few districts in provinces such as Chuong Thien and Ba Xuyen which fell into the hands of the Communists because we just abandoned them according to our plans.

This is a personal question. In 1975 while you were still in the army and heard the order to surrender, what were your personal feelings?

I was actually working with General Nguyen Khoa Nam. And as I have just said, the fighting morale of Lt. General Nguyen Khoa Nam was very high. And he fought until the very end. I was in Can Tho and when...On April 30th, 1975, at 11:00 am I was till there and was still in the conference room with General Nguyen Khoa Nam. After that General Nguyen Khoa Nam left the conference room.

And all the provincial chiefs charged out to find the way to...I just did not know where they were heading for. As for myself, I still remained behind until the final moment. And I...At that time the situation in Can Tho was one of confusion. The inhabitants were running all over the place. I went to the provincial chief and asked for martial law in order to continue with the fighting. But I could not find him. And I could not find other leaders either.

Therefore, when I arrived at the provincial chief’s residence at 12 noon and met with him, he told me that the government had ordered the surrender and we should either find the way to the marquis to organize the struggle or just wait around to see what the Communist policies should turn out to be. As for myself, I decided to either go into the marquis to fight or to leave the country. And my first reaction was to go to the Hoa Hao area.

But the land route had already been occupied. The land route in the Long Xuyen area had been overrun by the Communists. The second thing was that the river routes were also being controlled by the Communists. I wanted to go to the Long Xuyen area to fight because, first of all, I came from a Hoa Hao background, and secondly because during the training period I was the director of the training center in Long Xuyen. I had been able to train more than 5,000 Hoa Hao soldiers.