Recently, the struggle of Vietnamese victims and progressive social organizations demanding that the inhuman atrocities committed by the ROK military during the Vietnam War be established and punished is intensifying. Yet the ROK authorities continue their shameless double-dealing, covering up and evading the crimes of the past.

From 1965 to 1973, the ROK dispatched about 350,000 troops to the US imperialists' war of aggression, and under the name of “anti-popular pacification operations” indiscriminately massacred innocent civilians. In February 1968, 74 residents were brutally killed in Phong Nhi village and 135 in Ha My village, and in over 130 villages some 10,000 people perished. Moreover, tens of thousands of women became victims of sexual violence, and mixed-race children suffered extreme discrimination.

The ROK military has insisted on calling this “collateral damage,” and even during the Moon Jae In administration, which professed “democracy,” it visited Vietnam while thoroughly turning its back on the pain of the victims.

Yet those who suffered from the atrocities of the ROK military are still struggling to realize true justice.

In 2020, the Seoul Central District Court ruled in favour of the plaintiff in the damages claim brought by the victim Nguyen Thi Thanh, and in 2025 even the appellate court confirmed the ruling, but the ROK authorities still refuse apology and compensation. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission also refused to investigate on the ground that the victims were foreigners. Accordingly, on July 30 last, the Lawyers for a Democratic Society and the Korea-Vietnam Peace Foundation, representing the survivors of Ha My village and elsewhere, submitted a petition to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission demanding an investigation of the case.

ROK society displays an extremely double-faced and hypocritical attitude. Recently the ROK media have been loudly denouncing Russia's special military operation to stop the massacre of Russians by the Ukrainian neo-Nazi regime, which has degenerated into a running dog of US imperialism, while at the same time glorifying as “heroes” their own veterans who took the lead in the US imperialists' war of aggression in Vietnam and maintaining silence about their country's atrocities. This double standard is reflected unchanged in the field of popular culture as well. Recently, in the second season of the popular drama “Squid Game,” a line appeared glorifying a veteran of the Vietnam War, provoking a fierce boycott by the Vietnamese people.

Even under the Lee Jae Myung regime, various bills have been proposed, but owing to the resistance of the military and the indifference of the political world, the establishment of the truth and the realization of genuine justice for the victims remain far off.

The hypocritical behaviour of the ROK authorities in seeking to cover up the crimes of the past can never be tolerated, and the blood-deep grudge of the Vietnamese people will surely lead, one day, to the stern judgement of history.