Trần Quốc
Việt dịch
01 tháng Bảy, 1988/Chicago Tribune
Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh, Việt Nam- Vào ngày thứ Năm lần
đầu tiên một tướng lãnh cao cấp Việt Nam thừa nhận rằng 55.000 người lính Việt
Nam đã chết trong cuộc chiến mười năm để thiết lập và ủng hộ một chế độ cộng sản
ổn định, thân thiện ở nước Campuchia láng giềng.
Số binh lính tử trận này khiến ta sửng sốt vì chưa từng
bao giờ được khẳng định công khai, có nghĩa là người Việt đã mất nhiều lính gần
bằng số lính Hoa kỳ đã mất trong cuộc chiến tranh 13 năm ở Việt Nam trước đây.
Trung tướng Lê Khả Phiêu, tư lệnh phó lực lượng Việt
Nam ở Campuchia, đã làm cho một nhóm nhà báo nước ngoài ở phi trường Sài Gòn cũ
kinh ngạc khi ông trả lời trực tiếp một câu hỏi của họ về số lượng thương vong.
“Từ 1977 đến bây giờ chúng tôi đã mất 55.000,” viên tướng này nói. Ông ta ngồi dưới bức tượng bán thân của lãnh tụ cách
mạng Hồ Chí Minh.
“Đó là con số bị chết. Chúng tôi có số bị thương
cũng như vậy.” ông nói.
Nguồn: Trích dịch từ báo Chicago Tribune số ra ngày
1/7/1988
4/9/2015
-------------------
Vietnam Reveals Cambodia Death Toll
July 01, 1988|By Joseph A. Reaves, Chicago Tribune.
HO CHI MINH CITY, VIETNAM — A top general
acknowledged for the first time Thursday that 55,000 Vietnamese soldiers have
died in the decade-long struggle to establish and support a stable, friendly,
communist regime in neighboring Cambodia.
The startling body count, never before confirmed in
public, means the Vietnamese already have lost nearly as many soldiers in
Cambodia as the United States did during its 13-year war in Vietnam-and about
100,000 Vietnamese troops are still in Cambodia.
Lt. Gen. Le Kha Phieu, deputy commander of
Vietnamese forces in Cambodia, surprised a group of foreign reporters at the
old Saigonairport
by directly responding to a question about casualty
figures.
``Between 1977 and
now we have lost 55,000,`` said the general, who sat beneath a bust of
revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh in a room cooled by three U.S.-made air
conditioners
.
``That is the
number killed. We have had the same number wounded,`` he said.
U.S. casualty figures in Vietnam from 1963 to 1975
were 58,156 killed and 153,303 wounded.
Phieu`s surprising revelation came just hours after
a colorful ceremony in Phnom Penh marking the withdrawal of Vietnam`s top
military commanders from Cambodia, about 300 officers.
That pullout could prove to be a pivotal moment in
the future
of Indochina. It underscores Vietnam`s intention to
go ahead with long-promised plans to withdraw all troops from Cambodia by 1990.
If that happens, many observers believe it could go
a long way toward easing tensions in Southeast Asia and, perhaps, even spill
over to broader global issues such as Soviet-Chinese relations.
But some in Cambodia and abroad fear that a
Vietnamese withdrawal anytime soon will lead to renewed civil war and the
potential for wider conflict.
Vietnam invaded Cambodia in December, 1978, to oust
the communist Khmer Rouge regime of Pol Pot, who came to power in 1975 and
launched a campaign of genocide that left more than 1 million of the country`s
6 million people dead. Pol Pot fled to the border with Thailand, where he still
leads the largest of three resistance forces battling to regain power from Heng
Samrin, the man Vietnam installed to lead what is now known as the People`s
Republic of Kampuchea.
In the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh this week,
people everywhere talked openly about their fears if Pol Pot regained power.
Almost everyone in the sleepy city of 700,000 lost a family
member
during the years that led their country to be called ``the
killing fields.``
``The people here feel very nostalgic for the
departing Vietnamese soldiers,`` said Kam Haeng, an English-speaking guide for
the Cambodian Foreign Ministry who lost his father
and his grandfather. ``In many places, especially in
the remote areas, people are frightened that there will be renewed fighting
when the Vietnamese soldiers withdraw.``
Vietnam still is believed to have about 100,000 troops
in Cambodia. But as of Thursday, those soldiers are formally under the command
of Cambodian generals.
The command handover came in formal ceremonies at
Phnom Penh`s Pochentong Airport, where saffron-robed Buddhist monks and
delicate Khmer dancers gathered to bid the Vietnamese military leaders goodbye.
Thousands of schoolchildren and workers lined the
roads to the airport waving tiny red and yellow paper flags of both countries.
At intervals along the route, rock bands wailed to
entertain the sweltering crowds. One of the louder bands, featuring a quartet
of Cambodian soldiers with new electric guitars, played near the old U.S.
Embassy, which today houses the Cambodian Department of Fisheries.
Gen. Le Ngoc Hien, commander of the Vietnamese
forces in Cambodia, led the withdrawal ceremony at the airport. On the eve of
his departure, Hien received the Angkor Medal, Cambodia`s highest honor, from
Heng at a ceremony attended by dozens of foreign journalists and invited
guests.
Hien and his closest advisers boarded three
Soviet-made helicopters for the hourlong flight to Ho Chi Minh City, while some
300 other Vietnamese command staff officers filed onto five turboprop planes.
The turboprops and a Soviet-built commercial
Cambodian airliner carrying the foreign press raced
to Ho Chi Minh City ahead of the generals for a smaller, shorter arrival
ceremony.
The twin ceremonies were the highlight of what the
Cambodians triumphantly hailed as the ``seventh Vietnamese withdrawal`` from
their country.
Each year since 1982 the Vietnamese and the
Cambodians have announced the withdrawal of several thousand Vietnamese troops.
In the past, Western diplomats said those withdrawals seldom amounted to more
than troop rotations, with the total number of Vietnamese soldiers remaining
the same or declining only minimally. Last December, however, the number of
Vietnamese troops appeared to drop somewhat more significantly, to about
120,000 by most accounts.
This time, the Vietnamese have said they are
withdrawing 50,000 troops and most Western diplomats accept that figure.
Phieu said at his airport news
conference in Ho
Chi Minh
City, after leaving Phmom Penh Thursday, that more
than 13,000 Vietnamese troops already have pulled out this year. And a total of
50,000 will be gone by December.
Ngo Dien, Vietnam
`s ambassador to Cambodia, told reporters earlier this
week that about one-quarter of the 50,000 troops to be withdrawn this year had
already left. But he said the Cambodiangovernment
expressed grave concerns about the withdrawal
process.
``They were reluctant to take on all
responsibility,`` he told a small group of Western reporters Tuesday. ``There
was a very hot discussion among the (Cambodians).``
In the end, the ambassador said, the government
understood the need for the withdrawal.
The Soviet Union is believed to be pressuring
Vietnam to pull its troops out of Cambodia. The Soviets provide more than $1
billionfunding
for the Vietnamese.
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has made it clear in
recent months that he wants better
relations with the People`s Republic of China.
The Chinese
, however, have said nothing can be done to improve
relations until Vietnam pulls out of Cambodia.
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