Even the Women Must Fight

"Karen Turner and Phan Thanh Hao have brought scholarship and compassion to a long-neglected aspect of the Vietnam War—the contributions of Vietnamese women to the independence struggle of their nation and the terrible price they paid for their courage and patriotism."—Neil Sheehan, author of A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam.

A searing chronicle of wartime experiences, Even the Women Must Fight probes the cultural legacy of North Vietnam's American War. Unflinching in its portrayal of hardship, valor, and personal sacrifice, this wrenching account is nothing short of a revelation, banishing in one bold stroke the familiar image of Vietnamese women as passive onlookers, war brides, prostitutes, or helpless refugees.

"Karen Turner has given us a book that will change our understanding of the Vietnam War—and of Vietnam today. I found it enthralling." —Cynthia Enloe, author of The Morning After:

• Sexual Politics at the End of the Cold War.

  "A first-rate book that will add substantially to our understanding of the human tragedy associated with one of the most bloody conflicts in recent history."—Robert Brigham, Professor of History, Vassar College.

"When war strikes close to home, even the women must fight."—A proverb

Praise for Even the Women Must Fight

"This book is a genuine eye-opener. Through graphic interviews and groundbreaking archival research, Karen Turner has given us a book that will change our understanding of the Vietnam War—and of Vietnam today. I found it enthralling."—Cynthia Enloe, author of The Morning After: Sexual Politics at the End of the Cold War

"A first-rate book that will add substantially to our understanding of the human tragedy associated with one of the most bloody conflicts in recent history."—Robert Brigham, Professor of History, Vassar College

A searing chronicle of wartime experiences, Even the Women Must Fight probes the cultural legacy of North Vietnam's American War, its influence and its aftermath. Unflinching in its portrayal of hardship, valor, and personal sacrifice, this wrenching account is nothing short of a revelation, banishing in one bold stroke the familiar image of Vietnamese women as passive onlookers, war brides, prostitutes, or helpless refugees. The fighting women of Vietnam embodied the meaning of the term warrior.

The active participation of Vietnamese women after 1965 tipped the balance between victory and defeat. It is estimated that the total number of women in the regular army of North Vietnam, the militia and local forces, and professional volunteer teams was somewhere near two hundred thousand. Women with training and education operated underground communications networks, staffed and directed jungle clinics, and recorded the war as journalists. Others ran jungle liaison stations and ammunition depots, led and served in combat platoons, made coffins and burial cloths, and collected and buried the dead. Local militiawomen learned to shoot at American planes from factory rooftops and village fields, carried supplies, and treated the wounded—all the while maintaining agricultural and industrial production at prewar levels.

Karen Gottschang Turner, an East Asian scholar, traveled to Vietnam over a period of three years, researching, recording, and, above all, listening as the women warriors she encountered poured out extraordinary oral histories:

• "We had to disguise the hospital. Living in the jungle for ten years, I ran the hospital almost alone because my nurses had to go out and forage for supplies. Some of them left and never returned.
• . . . .I had to take any duty that came up. I was the chief of the hospital and there were fifty women and seven men who worked for me."
• "When we worked in the tunnels, we could go out only at night, and after a month of this, we were blinded by the daylight when we emerged, like moles, from our underground home to work on the road. It would take two days for our eyes to adjust to the light. . . .
• "One time when a bridge had been bombed and there was no time to rebuild it, we used our bodies to hold the planks so the trucks could keep moving. Sometimes people drowned in the mountain rivers and streams."

"The bombs hit a village, and the village was on fire. I was in the team that carried water to put the fire out. We got water from fishponds or anywhere else we could. . . . I will never forget, seeing through the smoke, a child stuck head down in the debris, his legs making a V-shape above the rubble."

By including military accounts, private writings, and the literature of Vietnam's American War, Turner provides a rich context for the words of those who lived it. Today, they still carry the emotional and physical scars of their shared responsibility and purpose amid the exigencies of war. Now, for the first time in Even the Women Must Fight, Karen Gottschang Turner enables Vietnam's women warriors to speak eloquently and unforgettably for themselves.