War Remnants Museum

In front of you is the Bảo tàng Chứng tích Chiến tranh, the War Remnants Museum. It is one of the most visited museums in the country: by its own figures it receives around half a million people a year, and roughly two thirds of them come from abroad.

1A museum that changed its name

It opened on 4 September 1975, barely four months after the war ended, in a building that had been used by the United States Information Agency. Its name back then was the “Exhibition House for US and Puppet Crimes”. In 1990 the name was softened, and in 1995, after relations with Washington were normalised, it took its current one. Those changes of name are a good guide to how the official memory of the conflict has evolved.

2What it shows and how

The galleries cover the period from 1946, when the war against France began, to 1975. There are photographs by correspondents from many countries, a reconstruction of the “tiger cages” in which political prisoners were held, and a section on the effects of Agent Orange, the defoliant sprayed over forests and rice fields. The tone is harsh and the narrative is that of the Vietnamese state; the visitors' books record both deep emotion and criticism, and it is worth going in knowing that.

This is a museum people walk through in silence: many of its photographs are hard to look at.

3What to look for

• The aircraft and the Huey helicopter in the courtyard, visible from the street.
• The tanks and artillery pieces lined up along the railings.
• The bilingual sign on the façade, bearing the name the museum has used since 1995.