RE: [Leica] General Nguyen Ngoc Loan (Was: :E. Adams & Vietnam Photo)

[D Khong <dkhong@pacific.net.sg>]

 phong wrote:
>General Nguyen Ngoc Loan died this past year in the
>US.  There was an obituary in Time magazine, among
>others,  where Eddie Adams was quoted.
>
>From my own memory of the war, on the morning of that 
>fateful day in 1968, the family of the General's aide, whose 
>very young daughter he was a godfather to, was wiped out
>by a team of Vietcong terrorists.  The man who was 
>executioned was known to be a terrorist, and suspected 
>to be the leader of that team.  It was also during the same
>(Tet) offensive that General Loan lost his leg.
>
>I met General Loan on several occasions (my father and he
>were classmates), both during the war, and after, in the States.
>He was a decent man, caught in a terrible situation.  Were I
>in the same situation, I am sure I would not fare as well,
>morally, ethically, or otherwise.
>
>

Nam was a terrible war with so much waste and loss of so many lives.  I was
at an impressionable age in the late-60s (that's when I started being
serious about photography and toted an Exakta IIb and Pancolar lens) and
used to seeing the young GIs during their R&Rs.  It was awesome to think
that some of those faces that I saw would soon be wiped out permanently
from the face of the earth. Many were such young people with much potential. 

The aftermath was equally chilling.  Cambodia ..the killing fields ... the
boat people fleeing Vietnam... more loss of innocent lives.  Much of what
happended is recorded in REQUIEM, a book very precious to me.

Dan K.  
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