Some stories stick with you. One of the most important article I ever wrote was the story of an Air Force priest who had escaped from Vietnam before coming to America. He saw the writing on the wall and wanted to leave Vietnam with his family, but every time he tried to leave, something stopped his escape plan and he had to find another way out.
Below is a link to the PDF of the original article and the entire article is also below.
PDF: fr-vu-escape1 and fr-vu-escape2
“I saw the Communist tank waiting for me as my ship went out.”
Father Joseph Philip Minh Vu remembers April 30, 1975, like it was yesterday, but it was the day he escaped from Vietnam.
As a law student, he was aware of international politics in 1973 and knew what would happen in his country when the U.S. troops left.
“I prepared the family,” he said. “We had to go.”
Vu’s family starting planning to leave the country – not a small feat for a family with 12 children that also wanted to include the in-laws of one of his sisters.
Plan A: Send sister to Paris
“We had a plan to take the family to France, so we sent my sister to school in Paris,” Vu said. However, while they were working the French connection, the fall came.
Plan B: Work with U.S. government
Vu had a sister working for Beacons Moving and Storage, so they asked them to consider their family when they pulled out, and they agreed. The plan involved splitting the family in two and rendezvousing with a truck where they would be put in boxes and taken to the airport. The first rendezvous was in the morning and Vu led the group for the afternoon rendezvous. However, in the afternoon, the truck never showed up. It had been stopped during and earlier run, searched and the driver and people in the truck were arrested and the truck was seized.
Plan C: The sea
Vu went to go buy or rent a ship to take his family out via the sea, but that option was deterred very quickly as the main bridge that connected Saigon was blown up.
“I went home very disappointed,” Vu said. “I looked at other areas until I was exhausted.”
Plan D: Make peace and stay
“I was ready to give up,” Vu said. “But, anticipating what may happen later when the communists took over, I wanted to make peace with the communist propaganda.”
Vu decided to throw a party at his house and invited people he had engaged in discussions on communism before.
“You saw me looking for a way out, but I’m not now,” he told them. “I’m here now, if you need me, you can use my services.”
Plan E: Obey
“This is the hand of God in it,” Vu said. “In the middle of the night, I heard the voice, ‘Minh, I want you to go.'”
He woke up, but didn’t see anyone, so he went up to his roof. There were shooting happening all over Saigon. He waited until morning to come down and checked the news on BBC London and Voice of America.
“The greatest evacuation has been complete,” the broadcasts said. “There is no more American presence in Vietnam.”
He took his cousin’s scooter and told him that if they saw him at home tonight, he was still here. He then drove to the U.S. Embassy.
“I left without saying goodbye to too many people,” Vu said, trying to hold back the sadness he still feels.
At the embassy, a helicopter landed on top of the building, but when they went up to the top to try and get on, the door was locked. He ran back down and tried to get people to clear the lawn so the helicopter could land on the ground. But even after the Marines threw down smoke grenades, the people would pile back into the empty space. So the helicopter took off.
Plan F: Vietnamese Navy
After the helicopter left, Vu ran to the canal where a South Vietnamese navy base was located. He had gone to school and was friends with some people who were stationed there.
First, though, he stopped by a coffee shop to grab something to eat. Some sailors were at the shop.
“I told them my situation that I was looking for a way out and asked, ‘Can you help me?'” Vu said. He showed them his address book, which listed addresses of friends Vu had overseas. One of the sailors told Vu that he was a gate guard and would be at the gate at a certain time at which Vu could come and be let on the base.
“I went, but the guy wasn’t there,” Vu said.
Plan G: Patrol boat
Next to the canal was a check point and Vu saw a patrol boat come in.
“As soon as it docked, I threw my stuff in and jumped in,” he said. “The captain said, ‘I’m not going anywhere. I haven’t seen my wife for six months.'”
However, Vu convinced him to take him to the other side of the canal, but when they got there, they found the communists already attacking the area. So, they picked up as many wounded soldiers as they could and went back to their starting point.
“As soon as I stepped foot on the ground, the troops shot toward me and I took cover. I took out a white hanky and waved it, yelling, ‘Civilian! Civilian!'”
They arrested him.
Plan H: Rebuild a ship
While sitting in jail, Vu told his guards about his situation and they told him that he wasn’t going anywhere.
“You don’t understand what’s going on,” he told them. “I understand.”
He even told them that he used to date one of the girls on the base whose father was a captain. Nothing worked.
Nothing until the South Vietnam surrender announcement was made public. Then they took off their uniforms and let him go.
Since he was already inside the Navy compound, he ran to the dock.
“I found a seaworthy vessel,” Vu said. He searched the ship and found enough water fuel and food. It just needed its engine rebuilt.
He asked the crew to stay, but most just wanted to go home. Only the chief engineer stayed.
“By this time, all the people outside were looking for a way out,” Vu said. “They saw the tanks and ran for their lives. They ran to the navy base and found the ship. People kept piling up and piling up and piling up. I realized we had to do something to keep order and get the people to work together.”
Vu found five colonels in the group still wearing their uniforms and asked them to try to get the group under control. However, when one of the colonels started talking, the people yelled back at him.
“Now it’s my turn,” Vu said he thought. “I prayed quickly about that and started speaking, ‘Mighty people, now is the time for us to help one another. Now is the time for you to pray. If you trust me this is what you can show to support me.'”
Vu asked them to surrender their weapons. He said that then they would search the people and if they still had weapons, they would be asked to leave. And if they resisted, they would be thrown into the water.
Then, he separated the group into mechanics, medics and soldiers and they started rebuilding the engine and preparing the ship to leave.
Then, Vu said he stopped and thought about his family.
“Should I go home and bring the rest of my family or stay?” Vu asked. After considering all the possibilities, he bargained with God that if he could get out somebody would come help the rest of his family.
At 2 p.m., after four hours of working on the ship, the engine started.
“I looked over and a tank was 200 yards away from me with its guns pointed at the ship,” Vu said. “I told the people to take cover and hide.”
They rose a white bedsheet and pointed the ship’s gun upward in surrender mode while chopping the cable so the ship could float away. They almost hit the other side of the canal before realizing that the ship needed to be steered.
On their way out into the sea, they picked up people who were escaping in small boats. In all, the ship built for 150 passengers had 5,000 people on board.
Vu realized he wouldn’t be able to feed all the people, and then someone informed him that there were two foreigners on board.
“I didn’t care who they were, I was going to say they were Americans,” Vu said. Then, he radioed an SOS to the South Vietnam Seventh Fleet.
“We’re the last ship to leave Vietnam with two Americans on board. Come and pick us up,” he said.
They came and told Vu that he was too brave to have come that far, but they transferred the people over to their ships and then sunk the original ship.
Freedom
Eight days later, Vu found himself in Subic Bay in the Philippines.
“I immediately saw my chance to get to the U.S. was real,” he said. “The refugee center was already up and processing people to go. I immediately processed.”
Three days later, on May 11, 1975, Vu was at Fort Chaffee, Ark.
“I saw God’s hand in it,” Vu said. “That I could escape without a scratch and past the 11th hour when the communists had come to take over. I was on the last ship out of Vietnam.”