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The Massacre at Hue was the name given to describe the civilian casualties that occurred during North Vietnam's capture and occupation of the city of Hue during the Tet Offensive, considered one of the longest and bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War. The civilians killed during the battle fall into two broad categories: 1) those killed as a result of the battle itself and 2) those killed as a result of summary executions committed by communist cadres. The Massacre at Hue focuses on the latter category, though estimates vary greatly from a few hundred to several thousand. In addition to accusations of propaganda from all sides, the military battle itself compounds the confusion. For example, forty percent of the city was destroyed during 26 days of intense combat, and 116,000 of the Hue's 140,000 population were left homeless. The U.S. and South Vietnamese forces claimed over 5000 communist forces were killed within the city, and another 3000 in the immediately surrounding area. On March 2, 1968, the battle for Hue was officially declared over. During the months that followed, several mass graves were discovered in and around Hue containing the bodies of 3000 men, women and children. A number of US and South Vietnamese authorities contended the discoveries were proof that a large-scale communist atrocity had been carried out during Hue's occupation.

Background

In the early morning hours of January 31, 1968, during the Lunar New Year celebrations, the North Vietnamese Army and National Liberation Front, or Viet Cong, troops simultaneously attacked 70% of the major cities and villages in South Vietnam, including Saigon and Hue. While the communist forces saw initial success, their assaults were quickly turned back in all areas except Hue.

The NLF set up provisional authorities shortly after capturing Hue, and was charged with removing the existing government administration from power within the city and replacing it with a revolutionary administration. Working from lists of "cruel tyrants and reactionary elements" previously developed by VC intelligence officers, many people were to be rounded up following the initial hours of the attack. These included South Vietnamese soldiers, civil servants, political party members, American civilians and other foreigners. These individuals, according to VC documents captured during and after the seige, were to be taken out of the city and held and punished for their crimes against the Vietnamese people. The disposition of those who were previously in control of the city was carefully laid out, and the lists were detailed and extensive. Those in the Saigon-based government police apparatus at all levels were to be rounded up and held outside the city. High civilian and military officials were also removed from the city, both to await study of their individual cases. Ordinary civil servants working for "the Saigon enemy" out of necessity, but did not oppose the revolution, were destined for reeducation and later employment. Low-level civil servants who had at some point been involved in paramilitary activities were to be held for reeducation, but not employed. There are documented cases of individuals who were executed by the NLF when they tried to hide or otherwise resisted during the early stages of Hue's occupation.

Within days of the capture, US Marines and Army as well as South Vietnamese infantry were dispatched to counterattack and recaptured the city after weeks of fierce fighting, during which the city and its outlying areas were exposed to repeated shelling from U.S. Navy ships off the coast and numerous bombing runs by U.S. aircraft.

File:Hue Massacre.jpg

South Vietnamese officials untie a victim and remove the body from a mass grave

In late February 1968, acting on reports by Vietnamese Communists and POWs, local South Vietnamese authorities found several mass graves. In each site, hundreds of bodies of the missing were buried. There were reports that many of the victims were tied to each other by ropes, electrical or telephone wires and that they displayed signs of having been shot, beaten or stabbed to death. It was inferred that during the Marine and ARVN attack, North Vietnam's forces had rounded up those individuals whose names it had previously collected and had them executed or sent North for re-education.

It was determined that a large number of people had taken sanctuary from the battle in a local church. Several hundred of these people were order out to undergo indoctrination in the "liberated area," and told after which they would be allowed to return home. After marching the group south 9 kilometers, 20 of the people were seperated, tried, found guilty, executed and buried. The others were taken across the river and turned over to a local communist unit in an exchange that even included written receipts. It is probable that the remaining captives were to be re-educated and returned, but many were apparently shot days later when American or ARVN units came too close.

The mass graves within Hue itself were largely of those who had been picked up and executed for various "enemy of the people" offenses, or resisted the occupation. There is considerable doubt that the NVA/VC had planned these executions beforehand.

Aftermath

The interpretation of the findings as a communist mass slaughter against political opponents has been disputed, and the credibility of the initial reports questioned. A first summary was published for the U.S. Mission in Vietnam by Douglas Pike, then working as a Foreign Service Officer for the U.S. Information Agency in 1970. Some later authors often relied on his account, while others regarded it as a piece of propaganda intended to support the U.S. war effort. Other early sources include front-line reporters serving under a strict code of reporting conduct imposed by U.S. forces and agencies. Later studies contending with these earlier accounts, most prominently D. Gareth Porter's examination, were highly critical of the initial reports and sought to defend North Vietnam against perceived propaganda and exaggeration.

Marilyn B. Young in The Vietnam Wars, 1945-1990 contends, "In the early days of the occupation, there were indeed summary executions ... and as the occupation ended in the firestorm of artillery and aerial bombardment, retreating NLF troops executed many of those they held in custody (rather than either releasing them or keeping them prisoner), not in the numbers Saigon and Washington charged, but certainly enough to have posed troubling questions for the people of Hue who survived..." By contrast, Douglas Pike's account referencing the government of So. Vietnam's estimated civilian casualties states: "The story remains uncompleted. If the estimates by Hue officials are even approximately correct, nearly 2000 people are still missing. Recapitulation of the dead and missing:

Total estimated civilian casualties:
7,600   -  Combined dead and missing
Battle related:
1,900  -  Wounded (hospitalized or outpatients) with injures attributable to warfare
  944  -  Estimated civilian deaths due to accident of battle

Partly or wholly related to mass killings:
1,173  -  First finds-bodies discovered immediately post battle, 1968
  809  -  Second finds, including Sand Dune finds, March-July, 1969 (estimated)
  428  -  Third find, Da Mai Creek find (Nam Hoa district) September, 1969
  300  -  Fourth Finds-Phu Thu Salt Flat find, November, 1969 (estimated)
  100  -  Miscellaneous finds during 1969 (approximate)
1,946  -  Unaccounted for (as of late 1970)"

In November 1974, when a documentary film produced by South Vietnamese reporters about the Tet Offensive was shown to an American audience of more than 200 US Army officers in Fort Benning, Georgia, almost no one in the audience had ever heard of the full details of the atrocity. Many afterwards said that had they known the savage slaughter at the time, they would have acted differently while serving in Vietnam.

Since April 1975, the Vietnamese Communist government moved many families related to the victims out of Hue City. People in the city however, still commemorate them every year. Because the people are mingling the rites with Tet celebrations, Communist local authorities have no reason to forbid them.

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