The strong female lead character propels the story for me
Guest Review by Judy George
I started reading “Escape from Saigon” on a Friday and couldn’t put it down until I finished it on Sunday.
As a woman who broke into the male-dominated business world during the Vietnam War, I felt the novel created the perfect archetype of the women’s liberation pioneers with female protagonist Lisette Vo. Lisette is the first female correspondent to become the face of a major US TV network in what became known as, “America’s television war.” She also happens to be a Vietnamese-American, who like many Americans came to Vietnam early on.
Judy George
She is the daughter of a prominent Washington D.C. family of Vietnamese and French heritage, who graduated from Georgetown University in the 60’s and flew to Saigon with no job, but a desire to get at the truth about a distant war that would define our generation. Lisette is smart, tough, knows Vietnamese politics inside-and-out and is accomplished. She also confronts her own struggles and vulnerability throughout the novel, and hints at the future of women in media and the advent of 24/7 cable news in the epilogue.
This story a must for anyone, especially millennials and twenty-somethings, who want to better understand their parents and grandparents and how the decision to “go to war” shapes the lives of ordinary people. While much of the tension is between Lisette, a rising TV talent, and her friend Sam Esposito of The Washington Legend, the novel gives the reader a feel for life in the French colonial city of Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh City. There is a French expatriate bar owner who runs the unofficial watering hole for the press corps, a just-married Vietnamese couple who work for the Americans and fears reprisals, and a GI who returns to rescue his Vietnamese family before enemy tanks roll into the city. There are also diplomats, CIA agents, spies, and countless Vietnamese seeking to escape the desperation of war and decades of misguided decisions by their political leaders.
While the action takes place during the final 30 days of the war, the authors weave historical references through flashbacks and recollections. I not only got a better sense for how it all ended on April 30 of 1975, but also for the decades that led up to a war that dragged on for a quarter of a century and ended with barely a whimper. This a superb novel in which the history is accurately recounted, but does not intrude on the compelling story.
I’m looking forward to reading more about Lisette Vo in the next novel.
Judy George founded Domain Home, a 35-store furniture retailing chain in the 1980s and is the author of “The Intuitive Businesswoman." She lectures on women’s empowerment and is featured on the cover of this summer’s Grand Magazine. Escape from Saigon is available on Amazon and at independent bookstores.
The Continental Palace Hotel figured into "Escape from Saigon." This classic hotel has been modernized but lacks the famous veranda where journalists and diplomats mingled during the War
My coauthor and I are often asked, "Where did the characters in "Escape from Saigon" come from?"
Pat answer. Aside from famous political and military leaders whose names remained unchanged in the novel, such as Ambassador Martin or South Vietnam President Thieu, the characters were created out of whole cloth. They are no more real than Saigon-based journalist Thomas Fowler or CIA operative Alden Pyle in Graham Greene’s Vietnam War novel, The Quiet American,
But the creative process is complicated. Some characters, though bearing no resemblance to actual people, were inspired by snippets of my experience in Vietnam over the years. So I thought it would help to pair a scene in Escape from Saigon, to one of those experiences to illustrate how real life can evolve into fiction.
The incident occurred when I returned to Vietnam years after the war had ended and visited the Cu Chi Tunnels; the subterranean labyrinth of passageways, offices, barracks, hospital, and conference rooms where the Viet Cong were hold up until they emerged during the 1968 Tet Offensive.
During the visit our group sat down in one of the tunnels’ conference rooms for a briefing by a former Viet Cong officer who had lived there during the War. He explained how they subsisted for years, mostly on a root similar to cassava. During the briefing he told us, “We used everything the Americans brought here. If a parachute fell to the ground, we used it for mosquito netting, if a bomb didn’t explode we turned it into a new weapon, we forged metal into everything from bayonets to cooking pots.” He went on, “When we camoflaged the tunnel entrances with leaves and undergrowth we added bits of fabric from American Army uniforms to throw the MP dogs off their scent.”
During the briefing, I realized that he spoke perfect English but with a distinct New Jersey accent. When I asked him about the accent he told me, “I learned English from Armed Forces Radio and TV. Like I said, we used everything the Americans brought here.”
Here is how I played out that real life dialogue in a verbal exchange between our hero, war correspondent Sam Esposito and his North Vietnamese source who called with a news tip for him and his friend Lisette Vo, of NBS-TV.
The Cu Chi Tunnel incident was recast in the novel as an argument over baseball.
From Escape from Saigon - a Novel
“Sam, we’ve done it. We did our job. It’s over. We can go home. You and me. Today. We put on our clothes, walk out the front door and catch a ride to
The Continental Palace Hotel
Tan Son Nhut. We’d be on a flight within the hour. It’s that simple. What do you say Sam? Let’s go home,” Lisette implored.
Sam caught himself smiling broadly over the thought of leaving without a moment’s hesitation, skipping the heartfelt goodbyes and vows to keep in touch. He wanted to be with Lisette. But then a thousand obstacles crowded his mind. He hadn’t been back to the world in ten years. Where would he, they live? Would The Washington Legend want him? But mostly he thought, would covering Washington politics or writing ponderous editorials bore him to death.
All the while he absentmindedly caressed Lisette, and when his eyes met meet hers, it brought him back to the present. He now wondered, am I ready for another go? But just then the phone rang. He fumbled for his glasses and put them on as he clumsily reached for the receiver.
“Hello?”
“Ha, ha, Ong Esposito! You and lady friend have good time?” came the voice on the line. “This your friend from the North.”
“Christ! Don’t you guys have anything better to do than follow reporters around? Who the hell is this?”
“You remember me? This is your news source I gave you a big story tip at the Cyclodrome a couple of weeks ago.”
That got Sam’s attention. “Lise, give me something to write with, quick!” She fumbled around until she located a ballpoint pen and hotel stationery pad and handed them to Sam.
“Yes, I remember you now. What—no more secret meetings? Now you call me? Brave North Vietnamese fellow talking to a decadent American?”
Fenway Park
“Your friend Captain Trung, he wants to say good-bye to you. He gives me instructions. Be at Tan Son Nhut before dusk. Hide outside the fence west of the runway. Take your TV friend with you and tell her to bring her camera. Trung promises to have a present for her, a special show for Walter Conkite, your American uncle you call him Uncle Walter!” Sam covered the mouthpiece and turned toward Lisette.
“Hey, Lise!” he whispered. “He’s got a news tip for you that he says will get you on the NBS Evening News, maybe then Cronkite will know who you are!” Sam then added incredulously, “How is it that these fuckers know so much about us and what we watch on TV, and we don’t know shit about them?”
To prove his point, Sam asked the caller, “Hey, asshole—who’s a better pitcher, Catfish Hunter or Bill ‘Spaceman’ Lee?”
“What?”
“Catfish Hunter or Bill Lee. Who is the better pitcher?”
“Of course, Catfish Hunter, he win Cy Young last year. But I still root for Red Sox!”
“How do you know this shit?”
“I listen to your American baseball on Armed Forces Radio and TV.
Learned English, too, from your guy who say ‘Goood Morning Vietnam,’ and DJ Chris Noel—she is one hot babe!” The caller hung up.
Excerpted from Escape from Saigon - a Novel, by Michael Morris and Dick Pirozzolo, Skyhorse Publishing, New York, 2017. All Rights Reserved. For more information about this Vietnam War Novel set during the final days of the War. please visit www.escapefromsaigon.com.
“No one ever tells you when the last plane leaves,” ~ Escape from Saigon
Review by Ann Connery Frantz, Correspondent for The Worcester Sunday Telegram
Dick Pirozzolo and fellow Vietnam vet Michael Morris joined forces to write a novel about the final moments of the devastating war. Titled “Escape from Saigon,” it creates fictional characters in very real events — soldiers, civilians and news correspondents trying to cope with the crumbling of the last stronghold before the U.S. evacuated personnel, Americans and Vietnamese sympathizers and the Viet Cong took over the city and signaled the conflict’s end.
Though each of them moved into careers after their return in 1975 - Pirozzolo to journalism, working for the Telegram & Gazette’s Southbridge and Webster news bureaus, and then to public relations and writing, and Morris to writing and editing as a journalist - they met as writers and formed an idea. Pirozzolo, a captain in the Air Force, often worked with the press corps there. “Around the mid-’90s, a movement started to recognize Vietnam and to reconcile with Vietnam. I’ve returned there a number of times, writing about the current state of affairs.” Some of his articles appeared in the Boston Herald and on the op-ed pages of the Washington Times.
“I started working with Mike,” Pirozzolo said. “We wrote two books about home building together. We were both veterans, and we talked about maybe someday doing something about Vietnam.” They realized pretty quickly, though, that a definitive history would be better left to the historians. And, he said, “we would be 90 before that was done. So we settled on the very last 30 days of the war and structured the book day by day, with flashbacks to play with time a little, give readers a chance to see what it was like to live in Saigon before the war, to be a journalist there for 10 years.”
Younger Americans never experienced the first televised war, in which daily videos and newscasts brought slaughtered civilians and soldiers into American homes each evening, terrifying parents and changing many Americans’ minds about the ambiguous jungle war being fought thousands of miles away. It was a horrific, unwinnable war, killing 60,000 U.S. soldiers and countless more civilians and Vietnamese soldiers.
In April 1975, the war was finally collapsing as North Vietnamese troops moved into the last stronghold, Saigon. The city’s fall would end any hope for South Vietnam. As conquering troops moved in, thousands of U.S. personnel and civilians who had worked with them sought to flee rather than be slaughtered by the North Vietnamese. They flooded the U.S. embassy and other departure points, filling military planes and helicopters.
This is where “Escape from Saigon” is set.
They tell the story through the lives of war correspondents Sam Esposito and Lisette Vo, sandwiched between a terse narrative about the final decline of opposition to the north. Sam returns to Vietnam as a Washington, D.C., newspaper correspondent after the Kennedy assassination, wanting to get away from the U.S. He’s remained there for 13 years. Lisette is half-French, half-Vietnamese, and American, working for a broadcast news company. “She portends the rise of women in the media,” Pirozzolo said. They remain until the bitter end because of their work. “They’re journalists,” Pirozzolo said. Read More
After promising a decision by November 1, the VA tells ailing Vietnam vets to keep waiting.
News comes right before Veterans Day
Charles Ornstein, ProPublica
In a ProPublica article by Charles Ornstein, published days before Veterans Day, the Veterans Administration told Vietnam Vets who suffer from bladder cancer, thyroid disease, hypertension and Parkinson's like symptoms associated with exposure to Agent Orange to keep on waiting to find out whether they will be compensated for exposure to the deadly defoliant used throughout the protracted war in Southeast Asia.
Ornstein tells his readers that Vietnam Vets "...have been waiting eight months for a decision to compensate. Yet more than eight months later — and after his department promised a decision by Nov. 1 — the VA essentially punted, issuing a statement late Wednesday saying it would “further explore” the issue and pushing its decision to some undisclosed point in the future."
In an official statement, "The VA said the department would now work with others in the Trump administration to conduct a legal and regulatory review of conditions for awarding disability compensation to eligible veterans." according to ProPublica.
"Many veterans said they thought that was exactly the review that has been ongoing since March 2016, when the National Academy of Medicine, then known as the Institute of Medicine, said there is now evidence to suggest that Agent Orange exposure may be linked to bladder cancer and hypothyroidism. The National Academy also confirmed, as previous experts have said, that there is some evidence of an association with hypertension, stroke and various neurological ailments similar to Parkinson’s Disease," Ornstein continued
Air Force Capt. Dick Pirozzolo on the Saigon River
ProPublica quoted me in an article on the Veterans Administration’s latest stall on expanding benefits to Vietnam Vets who were exposed to Agent Orange. The VA was supposed to rule on linking hypertension, thyroid disease, bladder cancer and Parkinson’s-like symptoms to the deadly defoliant. That’s been kicked down the road.
Ornstein caught me by surprise when called with the bad news. My initial reaction: “'Son of a gun,'” said Dick Pirozzolo, 73, when he was informed of the VA’s decision to delay. Pirozzolo served as an information officer in the Air Force in Vietnam and has had bladder cancer and a thyroid condition called Graves’ disease. 'That sucks,'"
“The politicians all talk a good game about the VA, but then when it comes down to making a decision, they drag their heels.”
Pirozzolo is a Boston Communication consultant, media relations manager for the Michael Dukakis Institute and coauthor of "Escape from Saigon" a novel about the end of the war.
“In Saigon, we don’t ask many questions… where people came from, who they are or …were.” from Saigon Singer by Van Wyck Mason
Saigon, like Casablanca, Shanghai or Istanbul, is a city synonymous with intrigue, mystery, danger and romance.
Perhaps that is why so many novels, movies, theatrical productions and even comic books and graphic novels are set in Saigon—once known as the Pearl of the Orient and celebrated for its Parisian boulevards, French colonial villas, intimate piano bars and of course brothels. Most folks can tick off The Quiet American by Graham Greene, Good Morning Vietnam by Adrian Cronaur, The Lover by Marguerite Duras and the musical classic Miss Saigon. I would hope the Mike Morris - Dick Pirozzolo novel Escape from Saigon will one day rank with the classics.
Additionally, Apololypse Now, the 1979 Francis Ford Coppola Vietnam War allegory, opens with Martin Sheen as Captain Benjamin L. Willard, peering out at a bustling street scene from his seedy Saigon hotel room, as he waits for his mission — assassinate Col. Walter E. Kurtz who is burrowed deep inside the Cambodian jungle.
Good Morning, Vietnam
Though Escape from Saigon includes shades of my personal experiences and recollections from my life in Saigon as a press officer for the Air Force, I always felt a kindred spirit with Good Morning, Vietnam, the 1987 American militarycomedy-drama film, screenplay by Mitch Markowitz and directed by Barry Levinson based on the novel by Armed Forces Radio DJ Adrian Cronauer.
Recounts Wikipedia, “Set in Saigon in 1965, the film stars Robin Williams as a radio DJ on Armed Forces Radio Service, who proves hugely popular with the troops, but infuriates his superiors with what they call his ‘irreverent tendency.’” Cronauer insists he never took such liberties on air, and indeed much of Robin Williams antics are pure ad-lib. Cronauer also goes on to explain that he wrote the book to raise enough money to pay for law school, which he completed and later went into practice. He's told interviewers that potential clients get squeamish when they make the connection between him and Williams thinking he's too wild and crazy to be their attorney
There are plenty of less-well-known works set in Saigon, officially renamed Ho Chi Minh City in 1975, though locals, expatriates and insiders persist in calling their city Saigon. Here is a rundown based on summaries from promotional pieces, Wikipedia and International Movie Database IMDB.
Saigon
Among the classics is Saigon, the Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake noir film set in the French colonial port city. Ladd, as Army Air Corps pilot Larry Briggs, takes on a flying assignment for $10,000 to raise money needed to show his terminally ill friend a good time before he succumbs to his illness. But things go awry when, right before takeoff Susan Cleaver, payed by Veronica Lake, boards his plane. I started watching it, hoping for the perfection of Casablanca—close but not quite.
The Quiet American, Graham Greene’s 1955 antiwar novel about the French Indochina war and genesis of U.S. involvement in Vietnam, was first adapted for the silver screen in 1958. That film turned Greene’s antiwar message into a virtual pro-colonial—anti-communist propaganda film with a heroic CIA agent Alden Pyle, played by WW II hero Audie Murphy. Hollywood was still reeling from the era of blacklisting at the time and Greene was furious over having his novel turned on its head, says Wikipedia.
The 2002 remake was close Greene’s original novel. The film starred Michael Caine, as journalist Thomas Fowler and Brendan Fraser, as the mysterious Pyle, both of whom vie for the heart of the beautiful young Vietnamese woman Phoung, played by Do Thi Hai Yen. There is no shortage of deception, betrayal, and love gone horribly wrong in this film adaptation. Journalist Fowler, who is desperate for his paper to keep him in Saigon, where his character foreshadows the life of the Saigon-based journalists who populated the city during the war—around 400 accredited correspondents at any given time.
The Lover (L'amant)
Based on the autobiographical 1984 novel by Marguerite Duras, The Lover–original title L’amant, is the story of a fifteen and-a-half year old French girl played by Jane March and her older, wealthy and overpowering Chinese lover played by Tony Ka Fai Leung. Though her character is a minor, Jane March turned 18 during the filming thus avoiding legal issues over filming simulated sex with a minor.
Vietnam Historian Tim Doling in Tim Doling’s Heritage Portal has done a masterful job of collecting and posting photos of the locations French director Jean-Jacques Annaud used for the fim. Says Doling, the director went so far as to have a Cyprus-based ocean liner the Alexandre Duma brought to Saigon for key scenes.
Saigon Singer
“In Saigon,” the lovely English girl said, “we don’t ask many questions… where people came from, who they are or …were,” from Saigon Singer
This novel by Van Wyck Mason was first published in a hardbound edition in 1946, and I’ve managed to get a paperback copy on eBay, which I'm now reading. Mason was born into a diplomatic family in 1901. He traveled the world, became an ambulance driver during WWI, joined the French Army and later traded in rugs and antiques. Eventually college professor John Gallishaw, encouraged him to start writing and he found his calling. Mason, who died in 1978, wrote and published 78 novels during his life according to Wikipedia.
From the book jacket, “Saigon where the mysteries of the Orient are hidden beneath a veil of international sophistication…where criminals and traitors of a dozen nations are found and where Major Hugh North came to hunt a beautiful, deadly, unforgettable woman, the Black Chrysanthimum, traitor, spy and blackmailer!”
Escape from Saigon - by Mike Morris and Dick Pirozzolo
The reader is immediately pulled in by the heroes, secret agents, turncoats, romance and danger in Escape from Saigon, the fast-paced saga of bravery, intrigue and the human spirit that follows the lives of diplomats, journalists, CIA agents and Vietnamese refugees who are trapped in Saigon—their beloved city, about to fall to the advancing enemy army.
The action is set during April of 1975, the final 30 days of the Vietnam War as the city's inhabitants look for any way to escape. Among them are Matt Moran, a soldier searching for his Vietnamese wife's terrified relatives; Lisette Vo a Vietnamese-American TV reporter who risks her life to chronicle the events of that fateful time; an American businessman who adopts 300 of his employees in a bid to sneak them out. All this while the enemy army tightens its stranglehold on the city in a novel that reveals the plight of ordinary people swept up by the mistakes and folly of their leaders on all sides of the fight.
Escape from Saigon is ideal for anyone who plans to visit Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh City, and wants to know how the city evolved from a French colonial oasis to a popular travel destination.
Casey Sherman, The New York Times Bestselling Author of The Finest Hours called the book "... a sweeping saga that places you dead center in the tumultuous final days of the war in Vietnam. Authors Mike Morris and Dick Pirozzolo carry on the tradition of Michener and Clavell in that they make history come alive through rich, compelling characters in a pulsating narrative."
And, Winston Groom, author of Forrest Gump notes: "Escape From Saigon brings to life the war-torn lives of the men and women, soldiers and civilians alike, each trying to escape the fall of Saigon before it engulfs them all. A vivid, unvarnished vision."
Escape from Saigon by Andrea Warren
Also under the same banner of Escape from Saigon, comes Andrea Warren’s young adult novel. Her Escape from Saigon tells the story of the over a million South Vietnamese children were orphaned by the Vietnam War. This true account tells the story of Long, who, like more than 40,000 other orphans, is Amerasian—a mixed-race child—with little future in Vietnam. Escape from Saigon allows readers to experience Long's struggle to survive in war-torn Vietnam, his dramatic escape to America as part of "Operation Babylift" during the last chaotic days before the fall of Saigon, and his life in the United States as "Matt," part of a loving Ohio family. Finally, as a young doctor, he journeys back to Vietnam, ready to reconcile his Vietnamese past with his American present according to the author. Available on Amazon.
Graphic Novels
With the city falling, government employees and military personnel raced to escape by foot, by car, by boat — and, in the case of pilots like Ba Van Nguyen, by helicopter.
The story of Ba’s escape with his family is told at the end of Rory Kennedy’s Oscar-nominated documentary “Last Days in Vietnam,” which PBS produced as part of its American Experience series. Recently, WGBH, the PBS member station in Boston, commissioned the artist Eoin Coveney to retell Ba’s tale in graphic form, which is beautifully reproduced in full color by The New York Times
Marcelino Truong's first book about the early years of the Vietnam war, the graphic memoir Such a Lovely Little War was published in 2016 and named "one the best graphic novels" of the season by The New York Times. In the sequel, Saigon Calling, young Marcelino and his family move from Saigon to London in order to escape the war following the assassination of South Vietnamese President Diem, for whom Marcelino's diplomat father was a personal interpreter.
Says the promotional copy, “With its audacious imagery and heart-rending text, Saigon Calling is a bold graphic memoir that strikes a remarkable balance between the intimate chronicle of a family undone by mental illness, and the large-scale tragedy of a country undone by war.
Marcelino Truong is an illustrator, painter, and author. He earned degrees in law at the Paris Institute of Political Studies and English literature at the Sorbonne.
Comic art interpretations of Vietnam abound in the Marvel Database. Here is Tan Son Nhat Air Base, Cartoon art style
The ‘Nam Vol 1 1 we meet Private First Class Edward Marks
Private First Class Edward Marks landed at Tan Son Nhut International Airport when he arrived in Vietnam. In late October, 1996, he returned to the airport with his squad to defend it from enemy attacks. In February, 1967, he finally departed from the air base to return home.
From the Marvel Database: In this issue we follow Ed Marks through his rude awakening of basic training. He then is posted to the 4/23 Mechanized Infantry .
After a misunderstanding over a bribe with the Top Sgt. he is assigned to platoon of Sgt. Polkow and his band of misfits. There he befriends Mike Albergo prior to venturing out on his first patrol where the guys get ambushed by the Viet Cong in a local village. After the shooting dies down Ed vomits after seeing his first dead body.
As they walk back to base, they accompany an armoured column which falls victim to a booby trap. They are then attacked by a sniper from a hidden bunker, which is part of a wider tunnel system. They clear them out with grenades and request helicopter transportation back to base. Ed finds this difficult as he has issues with flying. On their return the guys go to watch a movie, Major Dundee, while the rest of the base comes under rocket attack. Ed panics but Mike reassures him that the VC will not hit the movie screen because they like to watch too, according to the publisher
From ComiXology Commando #5035: Escape Saigon! In the final bloody hours of the Vietnam War, the P.A.V.N. were at the gates of Saigon. The U.S. embassy was the last refuge for the South Vietnamese who worked for the American government. But as the final choppers ferried the last of the workers to safety, Bill Evans realized that his best friend, Van Thieu, would not make it to the facility in time to evacuate - meaning certain death…
By DICK PIROZZOLO with credit to Wikipedia, IMDB, Marvel and publicity material provided by the works covered here.
When we embarked on “Escape from Saigon – a Novel,” the authors focused much of the story on the journalists who risked their lives to deliver the good, the bad and the ugly events of what was then America’s longest and certainly most controversial war. Our fictional characters Lisette Vo, NBS-TV’s first female war correspondent and the first Vietnamese- American on-air journalist portends the future of broadcasting and the emergence of cable. Sam Esposito, her colleague and friend, was with The Washington Legend. Sam is the archetypal cynical Ivy League reporter who cuts through layers of military obfuscation until he gets the story.
We also strove to give our readers, especially those who grew up taking the internet, cell phones, IM and Skype for granted, an appreciation of how hard it was to deliver the news halfway around the world only four decades ago. In those days 16mm sound-on-film cameras were the latest technology and satellite transmission was in its infancy and spotty.
While Lisette Vo and Sam Esposito are fictional, Tony Mariano’s story is real. Tony recalls the people who brought the Vietnam War into our living rooms in as close to “live” as possible. This included most especially his father ABC-TV’s Frank Mariano. His relationship with his dad, whom he joined in Saigon in 1973 as a high school age teen, gave him a ringside seat to the war.
Tony Mariano
The elder Mariano started out as an Army pilot, flying helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft and training South Vietnamese aviators, so Tony grew up first as an Army “brat” for the first 12 years of his life. Eventually Frank Mariano, shocked by the My Lai Massacre and other events became disenchanted with the Army. He left active duty, and launched his career in broadcasting as a stringer—freelance reporter—for ABC- News Radio then TV before he was later elevated to Saigon Bureau Chief by the network.
While in Vietnam, his son often worked as a sound technician and field producer with network news crews and, as the war came to a close, he wound up in Manila during the evacuation of Saigon where he played a pivotal role in transmitting reports of South Vietnam’s collapse to the world. Tony's life was an adventure, but he also paid a price for living in a family where journalism came first. Here is his story.
Tony Mariano in his words
Frank Mariano, pre ABC-TV as an Army Pilot
As an Army brat, The Vietnam War experience has been a personal and integral part of my awareness from the time I was a seven-years old Army brat living at Camp Wolters, Texas, where my father Frank A. Mariano was a 34-year-old captain. He was there training South Vietnamese helicopter pilots when he received orders to deploy to Nha Trang, Vietnam in April of 1964 with the 339th Transportation Company whose motto was “Always in Good Hands” — something my father sincerely took to heart as he was a piloted “Big Daddy” and the “Octopus” Ch-37 Mohave— the largest helicopter in the Army’s inventory.
He was shot down more than once and three AK-47 rounds barely miss his head while piloting a DHC-4 Caribou cargo plane. This was his re-introduction to Asia since leaving Seoul, South Korea, where in 1954 as a young artillery officer he met my mother Vee “Rusty” Russell. She was a beautiful Red Cross SRAO worker, a “Donut Dolly,” at a MASH unit. They were reunited stateside, got married in Carmel, CA and I was born at Camp Gary AFB, TX in 1956.
Dad loved flying, but he also wanted to become a writer. So the Army assigned him to editor of the Army Aviation Digest at Ft. Rucker, Alabama. which was and still is the home of Army Aviation. His second tour in Vietnam was as a public information officer. During his second tour in Vietnam he was as a public information officer with the 1st Avn Brigade Headquarters in Bien Hoa, which began in January of '67 and entailed flying members of the press to the battles, writing for the brigade magazine The Hawk and briefing the press. He represented the Army aviation with pride, perspective and his own opinions. But the growing number of journalists he met, and those with whom he flew, countered much of the positive information he was getting and putting out for public consumption. At the time American casualty rates had become twice the number from the year before.
When his tour came to an end and he was ready to come home. It was January of 1968. He was at Tan Son Nhut airfield getting ready to board his flight home to rejoin me and my mother in La Jolla, when the Tet Offensive erupted and shook my family to its core. Viet Cong sappers had breached the walls of our embassy in Saigon while armed conflict broke out around the country. I imagined it was to be his last overseas tour before serving out his 20 years and retire with an Army pension and move on. What was a young son’s desire for that to happen after so long was not to be.
At home, the Tet Offensive began a paradigm shift that would tear our society’s fabric into many factions. Then Dad learned about the My Lai massacre in March of 1968. He realized he could no longer remain in the military full time so we left San Diego and La Jolla to go back up the coast to Monterey and Ft. Ord where he flew his last military helicopter and then left the reserves as a Major.
He and my mother bought a house in the quaint village of Carmel where they had been married 12 years earlier in 1956. My mother and I would call that house our home for the first time and we were there all together as a family again. But my father, now a civilian, was compelled to return to Vietnam. He arrived with about $1,500 in his pocket in late ’68 figuratively trading in his grip on a helicopter’s cyclic and collective to hold a microphone and begin a new career as a stringer for ABC News Radio at age 39. Though he was away from home, I was comforted by the fact that I could hear his voice on the radio and see him on TV.
Then during the later part of 1969 he surprised when he flew from Vietnam to California to join me on a three-day Boy Scout hike in the mountains of Big Sur. I was so proud to have him share an insider’s perspective of the war with the other fathers as we sat around the campfire.
1970-72
Dad paid his dues in Vietnam for a year and came stateside again to join the ABC affiliate KGO-TV in San Francisco as its political and war reporter, covering many of the protest marches, moratoriums and other anti-war demonstrations around Northern California as the tide and sentiment turned further against the war and our nation’s began to rip, tear and split along so institutional, generational, political, religious, patriotic, racial and class lines.
By now, my parents were separated and would soon divorce. During that time I often joined him in San Francisco where I saw the professional news gathering process up close and was fascinated by it.
He would soon marry Ann Bryan at Sutro Park near the city's famous Cliff House and Sutra Bathhouse on the beach. Ann was now my stepmother and I also gained a new sister to love as my own at the same time—a beautiful 18-month old
Anna and Katie
Vietnamese baby girl Thai Ngoc Bich nicknamed “Buttons” who Ann, as a single woman living in Vietnam, had adopted when she was six-weeks old. Ann had first arrived in Saigon in 1966 to start up the Pacific Edition of the Overseas Weekly as its editor and reporter and successfully sued the Pentagon to allow her publication to be distributed side-by-side with the Stars and Stripes.
Our life together as a family lasted only a few hours after their wedding that day because that same evening my father, Ann, little Buttons and with a small entourage of friends in tow, took the short drive to SFO to board a flight back to Saigon where they would live for the foreseeable future. When the boarding call came we tearfully embraced each other and waved goodbye. My head and my entire world were left spinning at the departure gate as I watched them take off westward over the Pacific into the fading light of dusk. I headed back to an empty house and the next day returned to Carmel and to my mother who was also dealing with what had just happened.
Soon afterward my parents agreed I could join them in Saigon as long as I got my focus back on my schoolwork—the last thing on my mind. It was September 1972.
Things moved pretty quickly after that as The Peace Accords had been signed, our POW’s had been repatriated and all American combat forces had left the country. For them the war was over. Though when I arrived in Saigon there was still a significant contingent of Marine security personnel for the US embassy and other government agencies, American contractors and ex-patriates who would set the stage for what was going to be an exciting time to be there.
I arrived in March and started my senior year of my high school studies through the University of Nebraska, Lincoln Extension, which was an accredited school for American dependents in Saigon. I attended my classes until I had satisfied the minimum requirements for graduation in 1974 and took the GED exam.
Dad gave me an after-school job with the ABC bureau on the 6th floor of the Caravel Hotel. I was to monitor and record various English language radio broadcasts from Hanoi and transcribe them for others to cull for information. I also worked as a soundman on a couple of assignments out in the field as well and felt proud to have the responsibility of being a small cog in the news gathering operation. I got to know all of my father’s Vietnamese staff and began to learn how to speak the language.
Shortly after I arrived, my father introduced me to the CBC Band – (Con Ba Cu – “Mother’s Children”) a large family of talented Vietnamese who performed amazing rock ‘n’ roll and who had first started playing music together since 1963 when they won their first talent contest. They did what they had to do to support their family of nine in the slums outside the city. I quickly became endeared to them, their music and they all accepted me almost like a brother in their family. With their help, my language skills improved daily. The band left the country in 1974 and I wouldn’t see them again until 1976 in Washington, DC.
Tony Mariano, part-time sound tech for ABC
I’d also become an amateur photographer and had taken a film production course in Carmel as well as visits to television studios that helped me understand what went into producing and broadcasting a professional news story. Around that time Dad proposed a 10-year retrospective of his Vietnam experiences from 1964 through 1974, which would take about a week to shoot.
Ann and I joined him along with his ABC camera crew. It was on that trip I first saw much of countryside and the ravages of the war. Though I was never under hostile fire I was always aware of my surroundings. It took a drunken South Vietnamese officer to draw his .45 sidearm and put it to my temple to look at the possibility of my death in the face for the first time. In his rant he was frustrated over America abandoning the ARVN and the Rangers of which he was one. His immediate superior talked him down, took his weapon and the soldier lost face.
For that episode, I was given a special gift as consolation for the embarrassment which still comes back to haunt me every once in awhile. In the darkness, laying in bed next to her warm body, she and I listened to the random chatter of automatic gunfire as nervous guards shot at anything floating down the Perfume River toward the bridge. Off to the east, there was constant rumbling of artillery fire and we saw mortar rounds hit with plumes of black smoke rising out of range. The following day when we regrouped with my father and Ann. I couldn’t bring myself to tell him what had happened because I didn’t want his Vietnamese crew to take the blame for the incident. From that I learned Vietnamese don’t handle Johnny Walker Red and beer very well especially when they are pissed off.
Despite the White House talk of "Fake News," there is nothing fake about the journalists who risk their lives to cover American men and women women at war. That includes Carmen Gentile, war correspondent and author of "Kissed by the Taliban" who nearly lost his life covering the war in Afghanistan. Here is what he had to say about the President's out-of-the-blue edict on our transgender warriors who volunteer service to their country and the United States military.
Let me just jump in here and make my point quick and dirty.
I won’t address the reasoning behind President Trump’s out-the-blue transgender proclamation other than note that the President is drowning in scandal and figures he can shore up his base with some good ‘ole fashioned bigotry while securing $1.6 billion from Congress for his asinine border wall.
Now, let’s get into it.
What surprises and concerns me is about this fabricated controversy swirling around an issue that was settled by the Obama administration is the attitudes of some service men and women and veterans I know who seem to think that transgender soldiers, marines, sailor and airmen aren’t capable of performing at the same level of others.
One soldier I know from my time embedding with US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan said he was worried that transgender personnel may not be as prepared to fight on a moment’s notice while undergoing any number of medical procedures for transitioning.
Doctors who specialize in gender-reassignment surgery say the recovery time is two-to-six weeks for most operations. Say you are a Marine who blows out a knee while working out, chances are you will be laid up a lot longer. So that one doesn’t hold water.
A veteran opined that transgender personnel in the military may not be be able to handle the stress of combat operations saying they are, across the board, more emotionally volatile. Yeah, that doesn’t work either considering it’s a blanket statement about an entire group of people that just doesn’t adequately cover all of them and at its best is insanely discriminatory.
Not up to the challenge? Transgender personnel volunteer to work in the very traditional, conservative workplace that is the military. I think, for the most part, most have already proven they can handle the rigors of service.
So while we’re trading in free-ranging, unscientific assessment of the made-up “transgender military personnel” controversy, let me proffer my own:
Trump says eliminating transgender personnel from the military is a cost-cutting measure. By accounts transgenders-related healthcare account for at most $8.4 million a year in healthcare spending. And yes, by now we’ve all read the Military Times piece comparing that to the $40 million the Pentagon spends on boner pills.
You want to talk about cost? How about the price tag of yanking thousands of service people from the ranks of the military and replacing them with new one that will need to be trained to do their jobs, plus recruit new folks to those positions vacated by the replacements.
Look, I don’t know the first thing about what it’s like to be a transgender service person. But I have seen people from all walks of life serve their country with distinction and honor in life-threatening situations. I’m sure a well-trained, transgender soldier, marine, sailor or airmen will do the same if they managed to make it to the front lines of the fight.
Still not convinced? Then I suggest you express your opinions to transgender ex-Navy SEAL Kristin Beck.
She’ll do a much better job than I of convincing anyone not to lump all transgender service people together.
That’s it. I’m done. See? Quick and dirty.
Have a good day,
Carmen Gentile
Editor's note: Growing up, my Dad and I never missed an episode of "The Big Story," a weekly TV drama about real-life, crime-solving hero journalists. To this day my favorite movies, "All the President's Men" and "Spotlight," are of the same genre. Likewise "Escape from Saigon - a Novel" centers on the journalists who devoted their youth to covering the protracted Vietnam War. Among them the fictional Lisette Vo, the first Vietnamese-American woman to report for a major US TV network and Sam Esposito, the ambivalent, Yale '62 graduate, whose truthful reporting for The Washington Legend won him praise from this editors and the generals, but infuriated the vindictive Richard Nixon. In a nutshell, today's real war correspondents like Carmen Gentile, deserve our kudos for the risks they take and their willingness to speak truth to power. DP
Clay Risen, Deputy Opinion Editor of The New York Times recently profiled Dick Pirozzolo and Michael Morris authors of "Escape from Saigon - a Novel" for an article on the medical consequences of spraying the defoliant Agent Orange throughout Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
Risen asked Pirozzolo and Morris about their encounter with Agent Orange when they served in Vietnam, its effect on their health and their struggles with the Veterans Administration over benefits in connection with exposure since that time.
The article, titled Agent Orange and Us is part of The Times year-long Vietnam '67 series. In this piece Risen points out that the VA is now considering whether to link four more illnesses to Agent Orange exposure as well as whether to extend benefits to Navy and Marine personnel who served offshore. The four ailments are bladder cancer, Graves' disease, Parkinson's disease-like symptoms and hypertension, all of which are more prevalent in Vietnam veterans than those of the same age who did not serve in Vietnam.
Some veterans who served stateside and flew in airplanes such as the C-123 that transported or sprayed Agent Orange may also qualify for benefits. Agent Orange is commonly used to describe a host of defoliants used during the war.
"If you have relatives or friends whom you believe might qualify, please let them know about these possible changes. Every town or county in America has a VA agent or the Disabled American Veterans (DAV) can provide details," urges Pirozzolo.
Risen points out: "During the Vietnam War, the United States sprayed some 20 million gallons of the defoliant known as Agent Orange over South Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Nearly four million people were exposed to the chemical, which the government claimed was non-toxic.
"The government was wrong: Fifty years later, approximately one million people in Asia and the United States suffer from a range of disorders, including multiple forms of cancer, that have been linked to Agent Orange exposure.
Massachusetts Author Laura Harrington Wins Praise for Her Novel on the
Environmental Impact of Vietnam and the Heartbreak of Coming Home
Right on the heels of The New York Times article on the perils of Agent Orange exposure and how it affected the authors of "Escape from Saigon," a new novel on war and its environmental consequences comes to light.
"A Catalogue of Birds," by Gloucester, Massachusetts author Laura Harrington, tells the story of a family recovering from the aftermath of the Vietnam War and the mysterious disappearance of a young woman, while also exploring the environmental destruction that accompanies war.
When Billy Flynn returns from the war, the lone survivor of a helicopter crash, he struggles to regain the life he once had. His sister, Nell, and their family do all they can to save him.
Harrington's new novel has received early praise from Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, and The Week as one of the 28 books to read this year. Rachel Kadish, an award-winning author, wrote: “Laura Harrington weaves American history and natural history into a riveting story of damage and resilience. Harrington’s voice is as clear and distinctive as a bird call.”
Harrington, a 25-year resident of Gloucester, has written extensively for theater, including plays, operas, musicals, radio plays, screenplays, television scripts, and lyrics. In 2011, she published her first novel, "Alice Bliss," which received widespread praise, winning the Massachusetts Book Award Winner for Fiction and becoming a Boston Globe bestseller.
Harrington's family is no stranger to war and service. The author, whose father served in World War II, remembers well the era of the Vietnam War and the conversations that took place around the family dinner table.
Says the author: At the heart of the novel is the relationship between siblings Nell and Billy Flynn. Nell excels academically and is headed to college and a career in science. Billy, a passionate artist, enlists as a pilot to fulfill his lifelong dream of flying. He returns home so seriously wounded he may never use his right hand again. As Billy struggles to regain the life he once had, Nell and their family will have to do all that’s possible to save him.
Harrington is the 2008 Kleban Award Winner for most promising librettist in American Musical Theatre. Harrington has twice won both the Massachusetts Cultural Council Award and the Clauder Competition for best new play in New England.
For the complete review and Laura Harrington's upcoming speaking events and books signings visit The Gloucester Times.
The Air Force C-130 Hercules cargo aircraft took off from Clark Air Base, Republic of the Philippines, in the early morning hours of April 30, 1975, enroute to Tan Son Nhut Air Base on the outskirts of Saigon. It was on a mission for which I had no prior experience to draw on. I sat quietly, wondering just what I had gotten myself into but confident that my choice was the right one.
I was on my way back to Vietnam in the hopes that…somehow…I would be able to make my way to Cholon to find and bring my Chinese wife’s family out of the rapidly-deteriorating environment and to safety ultimately in the United States. The effort was the result of several weeks of coordination both with senior officers at Clark and with my wife’s family. Dozens of quick phone calls gave us the assurance that this effort was somehow possible.
There was little idle conversation on the airplane as we made our way westward. I sat and reflected on my first meeting with my soon-to-be relatives in 1971 and the obvious close bond that my wife had with her family. I was grateful for this chance to help them in their efforts to escape the inevitable downfall of their adopted home country.
Suddenly I was aware of someone standing in front of me…the plane’s pilot. The look on his face told me immediately that something had gone wrong.
He quietly asked, “Sergeant, were you going back to Saigon to get your wife’s family?”
I responded, equally quietly, “Yes, sir, I am.”
His next words are permanently etched into my memory: “I’m sorry. We’re turning back. Saigon has fallen.”
I sat fighting a bout of nausea as the words "Saigon has fallen" sunk in. I thought of my relatives and wondered how this was going to affect them. And I feverishly wracked my brain: “How do I tell Margaret that her family members are now trapped in communist-held Vietnam?”
When we landed back at Clark Air Base, I went to my car and drove for what seemed like a lifetime (we lived off-base…a journey of about two miles in actuality) mentally preparing to deliver the worst news I had ever been forced to deliver.
As I drove slowly into our garage, I saw my wife standing at the door. The look on her face told me she knew.
I got out, rushed to her and held her tight, whispering these words: "I am so sorry."
Two years laters my tour of duty at Clark Air Base was completed, and we returned to the United States and an assignment at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia. We had no way of communicating with Margaret's family, but held on to the optimistic belief that someday, somehow, they would be successful in their attempt to leave Vietnam.
Then, in 1980 we received a collect phone call. My father-in-law was calling, from California, to say that the family had finally been able to escape as refugees and that all were now in the United States…safe…and free.
Editor's note: Kirk Hazlett, a Curry College professor in Boston and consummate public relations professional, contributed recollections from his Vietnam War experience to the blog for "Escape from Saigon - a Novel" set during the final 30 days of the Vietnam War. Dick Pirozzolo
The Rev. Sarah Robbins-Cole, Pastor of St. Michaels Episcopal Church in Holliston, Mass. and Protestant Chaplain of Wellesley College
Earlier last week, I was chatting with Sarah—my friend and neighbor—who is otherwise known as The Rev. Sarah Robbins Cole. She told me she was working on her sermon for Easter Sunday the theme was letting go. I suppose the idea is there cannot be rebirth without letting go of those things that tie us to the past.
"Any thoughts?" she inquired.
An apt subject as April 30th approaches— the 42nd anniversary of the end of the Vietnam! This was also a chance to plug "Escape from Saigon - a Novel," so I mentioned how "letting go" is a theme running throughout the story. The struggle with letting go is voiced by Billy Freda, the high school friend, who has to let go of the moment he scored the winning point in the championship game, US Ambassador Graham Martin who cannot let go of South Vietnam that had become intertwined with his identity, the reporters who devoted their youth to covering the war and have to find a new life elsewhere, and of course, the two Vietnam veterans who wrote the book—myself and Michael Morris, who saw combat in the Vietnam War as a young soldier in 1967.
Here is what The Rev. Sarah Robbins-Cole, Rector of St. Michael's Episcopal Church in Holliston, Massachusetts told her congregation about letting go on Easter Sunday Morning 2017.
Easter 2017
Marie Kondo of the book The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing is perhaps one of the best known books that has come our way from the field of decluttering and home organization. If you have not read the book, the basic premise of the book is to get rid of things that do not spark joy. Marie Kondo recommends taking out every item you own, in a particular sequence, and touching each item, and if it does not spark joy – out it goes. She has other helpful hints such as not buying more specialized storage containers to hold yet more clutter, and folding your clothes, for example your shirts, in a way that finding a shirt is as easy as flicking through record albums – because they all are standing on end.
The desire to hold on and to accumulate is as old as time and man. Perhaps it’s because we falsely equate accumulation with security. If I just hang on to clothes, household items, food, photos, books, I will never be in want. Who knows? I might need one of these things later.
Or we mistakenly believe that if we throw things away or recycle them – somehow we won’t remember or value what that item represented.
Or sometimes what is harder is we hold on to emotions and memories - something that has hurt us deeply. Maybe you are holding onto a grudge, or an imaginary contract with someone (that is, unless they do x, I will not forgive, move on, or be nice, etc.,). And somehow letting go would be to admit defeat.
When people have asked me this week what I am preaching on this week – and I tell them that I am working on a sermon about letting go – it has been interesting to hear people’s response.
When I told my neighbor Dick Pirozzolo, who has just published the book, Escape from Saigon - a Novel this year, he said, “funny you should say that”. He is himself a Vietnam Vet, but he said in his research and during his book tour, while he has encountered many veterans who live full and rich lives, he also said that he has met a fair number of veterans who live and breathe their days in Vietnam every day—even though the end of this month will mark the 42nd anniversary of the ending of that war. “After all,” Dick commented, “you are 19 years old, your friends are all back home working in a shoe store, and you are in a strange country, surrounded by people speaking a foreign language, and you are getting shot at.”
But he said, the problem is that what happens to some of us is that we get stuck at 19. Our entire identity is formed around being a Vietnam Veteran and that does not allow a new identity to form. Our lives are dedicated to remembering that time – from the stories we share to the social media platforms we belong to and contribute to.
Another friend of mine, who works with students, said to me, “that is such an important message” because she finds that some of her students cling to ideas, ideologies, and identities in ways that are unhealthy because they perpetuate their sense of being powerless victims in a hostile world.
Or another friend talked about a woman she knew who was the team mom of a volleyball team – and she did everything – she organized uniforms, social events, coaches gifts, the booster club – but at the end of her son’s junior year, at the end of season party, when he was not elected captain by his peers for the following year, she was absolutely devastated. She refused to talk to anyone for the rest of the party and her son never played volleyball again – so attached was she to the idea of her son being captain.
I am sure we all have examples from our own lives - elderly parents who cling to the idea of unrealistic independence, or children who can’t seem to quite realize they have actually reached adulthood, a parent who cannot let go of their adult children, etc., etc.
The subject of letting go is not just a superficial self-help issue. They are deep spiritual concerns – which come to the very heart of our gospel lesson for this morning. Jesus tells Mary – do not hold on to me. Literally – do not cling to me as I am now. I am yet to ascend to the Father. Jesus is telling her that she must not cling to him because his time on earth is done. And why that is important is that first of all, after the crucifixion they can’t just go back to the way things were – and secondly, the ascension is necessary so that the work of Jesus will no longer be constrained to his little corner of Israel – but will spread to the four corners of the earth.
And it’s not just the idea of the physically present Jesus she is going to have to let go of. If she wants to share in that resurrected life of new life and rebirth – she is going to have to let go of everything that is holding her back – she may have to let go of her anger at the Romans for crucifying Jesus, she may have to have to let go of her feelings of resentment at the disciples for handing Jesus over, betraying Jesus, and falling asleep while Jesus was praying when he very clearly asked them to stay awake. She may have to let go of her bitterness toward a world that allows an innocent man to die. She may have to let go of her wrath toward her own people for their maleficent fickleness – who on Palm Sunday lauded Jesus as King – and then jeered Jesus just a few days later when he really needed them.
But let me be clear - there is a big difference between letting go and forgetting. Letting go – means having a willingness to move forward, to not be stuck in the muck and mire of past wrongs. Forgetting is pretty near impossible, and forgiving can be a very long process indeed.
What we celebrate today is the resurrection. We celebrate that when one thing ends – and when we let go and give it to God, and trust that God will do something good and meaningful and life-giving to that of which we let go – we too will live the resurrected life.
God invites us to new life each and every moment of our lives – not to cling to the past – but to be engaged in our lives right here and right now. It is just as Joseph Campbell, the preeminent expert in comparative mythology and religion who wrote: We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the life that is waiting for us.
Along with being coauthor of "Escape from Saigon - a Novel" set during the final days of America's "first television war," Dick Pirozzolo is managing director of Pirozzolo Company Public Relations, an international communication firm based in Boston, Massachusetts.
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