First US general of Vietnamese descent recalls harrowing escape from war
By Joseph Lacdan, Army News ServiceMay 19, 2021
WASHINGTON -- On a spring day in 1975, 9-year-old Viet X. Luong huddled with his family on a hot tarmac. He trembled as bombs landed near crowds of Vietnamese who had gathered at Tan Son Nhat Airport to escape the war that tore their nation apart.
His father, an executive officer in the South Vietnamese Army, tried to comfort his seven children, as they lay flat on the tarmac ground.
“Kids don’t worry,” Luong recalled what his father said in Vietnamese. “You’ll be OK.”
His father’s words reassured him, but only for a moment. North Vietnamese forces had engaged in a full assault on the airport shortly before the fall of Saigon. Mortar and artillery fire thundered just outside of the terminals. He could hear the hum of North Vietnamese aircraft as they circled and bombed the tarmac.
https://www.army.mil/article/246563/first_us_general_of_vietnamese_descent_recalls_harrowing_escape_from_war
