What Matters is What Moves Us

When it comes to stories of long-lost loved ones being reunited, I am a proud sentimentalist. The classic movies Casablanca and Dr. Zhivago come to mind as does the TV series A Town Like Alice, based on the Nevil Shute novel, and the recent movie Lion, in which an India-born man never gives up hope of finding his mother, from whom he was tragically separated as an illiterate child in a place he can barely remember. My novel Double Happiness (1997) was about the reunion of a mother and daughter given up for adoption as an infant. I cried writing some of the scenes.

But even more moving are the stories describing the reconciliation of longtime enemies, led by Gandhi, Dr. King, and Nelson Mandela. I would add the story of Eric Lomax, whose autobiography The Railway Man became a movie starring Colin Firth as the World War Two POW in Malaysia tortured by the Japanese, who overcomes hatred to meet his former torturer, now wracked with regret, and forgive him. Yes, that too much neglected Christian virtue of forgiveness, and Love Thine Enemy. It is the opposite of hate, bullying, enslavement, lynching, cruelty, and all the related dark impulses.

On May 13, 1981, Pope John Paul II was crossing St Peters Square when he was shot. The would be assassin Mehmet Ali Ağca was caught and incarcerated. In 1983 John Paul went to his cell and forgave him. They had a private conversation, and emerged as friends. The pope stayed in touch with Ağca’s family during the latter's incarceration, and in 2000 requested that he be pardoned. The request was granted. Ağca was released and deported to Turkey, where he was imprisoned for the life sentence he had fled decades prior. He converted to Christianity while incarcerated, and was finally released in 2010. In December 2014, he returned to Rome and laid two dozen white roses at the pope’s tomb.

Apparently there is a thing called reconciliation and reunification therapy for families. Anyone who knows more about this, please share! There are other reconciliations, like between different races, ages, orientations. I am struck by marriages where the age difference is “large”. Or how about height difference? Some couples are almost 2 feet apart in height. Love conquers all.

In South Korea, there is an International Consultation on Peace, Reconciliation and Reunification of the Korean Peninsula. The terms show up in a number of websites related to Korea. In one, Lincoln is cited as a model of reconciliation (Second Inaugural Address, and the story of Lincoln in a hospital shaking hands with a wounded Confederate colonel who was forever moved by that moment). When he came to Appomattox to surrender to General Grant, General Robert E. Lee noticed Colonel Ely Parker, a Seneca from New York who served as Grant’s adjutant and greeted him saying, “I am glad to see one real American here.” To which Parker replied, “We are all Americans.”

In March 2020 (just before Covid), my friend Eric Pape told me of a remarkable story of reconciliation, reunion, and forgiveness. Decades pass before an American vet finds a way to meet the daughter of the Vietnamese soldier he killed and return to her the only photo ever taken of her with her dad in 1968. Online, the story is in Vietnamese, (https://maybienvh.wordpress.com/2019/02/25/noi-am-anh-tu-1-tam-hinh-trong-chien-tranh/), roughly translated below:

Obsession From 1 Picture In War

North Vietnamese soldier and little girl

In 1967, Rich Luttrell turned 17, living in a poor family in Illinois. Rich volunteered to join the army and went to Vietnam in 1968, in the 101st Airborne Task Force. The story begins on a hot day when Rich is present in an operation. Rich did not know that he and the enemy were in a position a few yards apart in the middle of an old forest

From the corner of his eye, he suddenly saw a movement and realized a CS soldier was leaning against his AK 47. Rich was within range of the enemy and death was only a heartbeat away. He felt as though his entire body froze in the eyes of the CS soldier as they stared at each other. That was when Rich’s finger pulled the trigger, and the enemy soldier collapsed.

Immediately the whole forest was shaking with the rain of bullets...When the battle ended, the soldiers spread out to search for memorabilia on the enemy corpses. A piece of paper fell from the wallet of the soldier shot down by Rich. He bent down to pick up a picture that was only the size of a postage stamp showing a soldier and a little girl. The two in the picture were definitely father and daughter, too solemn, too sad. Did they take this picture just before they said goodbye?

Rich felt pain and decided to keep the picture. More than once he was asked about the reason for such a decision and could only answer: I don’t know. I’ve thought a million times. But what grabbed me in the picture was the girl, and she seemed so sad.

After that first battle, Rich quickly became a fighter. However, Rich still could not avoid the calamity of the battlefield when there were only 20 days left to expire to repatriate. On that day, Rich’s unit was ambushed and while rushing to save a teammate, he was hit by a bullet in the back. When being picked up by an injured helicopter, he felt guilty for abandoning his teammates. But Rich got used to the quiet pace of life at home, especially after getting married and having two daughters. Rich’s relatives didn’t hear Rich talk about the war, but they knew Rich had a picture in his wallet and had a special attachment to the picture.

The picture didn’t weigh as much as a gram but always weighed Rich’s heart until he was over forty years old. Now the thought that always surfaced in Rich’s mind was that the little girl in the photo had no Father.

In 1989, when he visited the Vietnam War Memorial Washington DC, Rich decided to free himself by leaving the picture at the foot of the Wall. Rich sat across from the photo, looking at the man he had shot down over 20 years ago, writing a short letter:

Sir, for 22 years now, I kept his picture in my wallet. That day I was only 18 years old, when we saw each other on the trail near Chu Lai, Vietnam. Please forgive me for killing you. Many times over the years, I have looked at pictures of you and the girl I guess is your daughter. Every time my heart burns with the pain of guilt. Please forgive me.

Rich placed a picture and a letter at the foot of the Wall, naming 58,000 US soldiers killed in Vietnam. For him the action was the final solemnity. The soldier died fighting for his faith. And this was a way of honoring and paying homage to him. He was no longer an enemy, but a friend. Like saying goodbye to a friend. At that moment, Rich felt as if he had just finished a fight and dropped his backpack to rest. The burden he had carried until that day was no more.

But reality is not entirely like that.

Seven years later, in 1996, when Rich almost forgot the picture, an acquaintance, Congressman Ron Stephens suddenly found him. Stephens placed a book on Rich’s table and opened it to page 53, with the picture with the full text of the short letter Rich had written.

The picture left by Rich at the Wall had caught the eye of another veteran, Duery Felton. Duery, the gallery manager at the monument, was immediately fascinated by the photo and the letter and decided to keep it. Duery was unable to articulate why the decision had been made, but rather described it as both a natural and mysterious act.

The little girl left Rich to haunt Duery again until a publisher asked Duery to help complete a book about the Memorial Wall. Duery put the picture and letter in the book with the words: “This picture haunts me for years, though I do not know who she is.”

The book happened to be in the hands of a Friend of Rich.

So, seven years later, the picture came back to Rich. The old obsession returned. Rich contacted Duery to ask for the photo. Duery flew from Washington to Illinois to meet Rich. Two unfamiliar, never-before-seen men hugged each other because of the picture of a little girl whom they had never met.

Later, Rich felt compelled to let everyone know that he was looking for the little girl. So Rich answered an interview of the St. Louis Post Dispatch, and the story was posted on the front page of the newspaper.

Rich cut the article, stuffed it into an envelope and a letter to the Hanoi Ambassador in Washington, saying he needed help finding the daughter and soldier’s family in the photo. Of course the recipient had to move back to Hanoi, but the story was like finding a needle in a haystack when the help was just a newspaper in Hanoi reprinting the picture and story as a normal article. The article did not attract readers and the story was not taken into account by any Hanoi government.

But the lucky newspaper was used to pack things sent by a son in Hanoi to his mother’s village.

When opening her son’s package, she noticed the crumpled newspaper printed with a soldier’s picture. Strangely enough, she immediately recognized the person in the picture and immediately took the newspaper to a small neighborhood, informing a family member there that the picture was their Father.

So from the United States three thousand miles away, Rich received a letter three weeks later from the Embassy saying a man named Nguyen Van Hue wrote that he believed that the picture was the picture of his father Nguyen Trong Ngoan., and that the little girl was his sister.

Then Rich received a second letter, which he had to find an interpreter to translate. It was from Nguyen Thi Lan, the Little Girl in the picture, writing as follows: “Dear Mr. Richard, The child you have looked after over the picture for over 30 years has now grown up. That child went through many sufferings in her childhood because of losing her Dad and missing him. I hope he will bring joy and happiness to my family.”

So 30 years after seeing the picture for the first time, Rich knew the baby in the picture is named Lan, is 40 years old and has children.

But the good news turned hopeless when the internal investigation agency of Hanoi authorities said that Nguyen Thi Lan’s father could not be in the picture, because military records prove Nguyen Trong Ngoan died at a place different from where Rich said. The situation became even more confusing when 3 other families spoke out to receive the picture of their Father.

Rich no longer knew whom to believe, but then one of his dead teammates confirmed that Nguyen Trong Ngoan was his teammate and father of Nguyen Thi Lan.

Rich decided to fly over to Vietnam to personally place the photo in the Little Girl’s hand. It was the Spring of 2000 and the 33rd year since Rich saved the picture.

It was an overcast Wednesday in Hanoi. It seemed like it was going to rain as Rich stepped into the van to make a two-and-a-half hour trip to Lan’s village. The car drove past an unfamiliar area, past markets full of surprised faces when it saw a crowd of tourists and a silver-haired American. Then Rich walked over a stone wall and saw the woman. Facing her, Rich repeated the Vietnamese phrase he had memorized: Today I return the picture of you and your father that I have kept for 33 years. In the end it all poured out like a terrific relief, Lan hugged Rich and cried as if Rich was the Father who had returned from the war. The Brother said that they believed that their Father’s soul lives through Rich. For them today their Father’s soul has returned.

The whole village gathered to see the photo returned and the picture touched everyone. Rich thought of a solemn ceremony, but in the end was just a simple sentence for the interpreter: Tell her this is a picture I took from her father’s wallet the day I shot him, and today I bring it back.

The now 40-year-old woman buries her face in her father’s picture. This is the first time that she can see her father since she was 6 years old and Father was gone. This is also the first and only photo of soldier Nguyen Trong Ngoan.

Lan and her younger brother Hue put the picture on their parents’ altars. Rich attended a prayer service in front of the altar. Rich said their father was a brave man, and he died like a courageous soldier. He is not in pain. I am sorry.

Hours later, Rich had the opportunity to meet his victim’s comrades again, and the old enemies exchanged war memories as if they were teammates.

It was too hard for Rich to find this place, and it was too hard for Rich to leave here. Rich and Lan hugged each other goodbye and Rich cried when he got into the car.

Thirty-three years ago, Rich came to this country to fight. Today he returned to bring joy to a poor little girl, after 30 years of sorrow. Rich knows he will continue to contact Lan and her relatives.

When he returned to the US, he received a letter from Lan’s younger brother, Hue, recalling the past meeting: “During his visit to my family, everyone in the village realized that you were a very kind person. When you left Vietnam, I felt like my Father had returned.”

Rich has become a consolation for a pain in the midst of countless pains buried in oblivion throughout Vietnam. Over time, there will certainly be many questions that arise from such pain in order to understand the true cause of the pain and the heart to share.

Sample of original Vietnamese language at the website translated above:

Khi về tới Mỹ , Ông nhận được thư của người Em Trai , Huệ , nhắc lại ngày gặp gỡ vừa qua : – Trong thời gian Ông viếng thăm gia đình Tôi , mọi người trong làng nhận thấy Ông là người rất tốt và tử tế . Khi ông rời VN , Tôi cảm thấy như Cha Tôi đã trở về .

Rich đã trở thành niềm an ủi cho một nỗi đau giữa hằng hà sa số nỗi đau đang bị vùi lấp giữa lãng quên trên khắp đất nước VN . Cùng với thời gian chắc chắn sẽ còn không ít câu hỏi trỗi lên từ những nỗi đau như thế để hiểu rõ về nguyên do thực sự đã dẫn đến những nỗi đau cũng như những tấm lòng chia sẻ .

text © 2022 by Thomas M. Paine