Aubade with Burning City

The Vietnam War was a 20-year battle for control of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. Widely regarded as a proxy war of the Cold War, the United States began officially providing support to South Vietnam in 1954 as it clashed with communist North Vietnamese forces, who had the backing of the Soviet Union and China. United States involvement in Vietnam swiftly escalated after the 1964 Gulf of Tonkin incident, and by 1969, over half a million US troops were stationed in the country. The official 1995 estimate by Vietnam states as many as 2 million North and South Vietnamese civilians and 1 million Vietnamese soldiers were killed in the course of the War.

The United States officially pulled its last military forces from Vietnam in 1973, although it continued to provide aid to the South Vietnamese. The last evacuation of American civilians and personnel in Saigon occurred on April 29, 1975 as North Vietnamese forces began their assault on the city. The South Vietnamese government surrendered on April 30, and on July 2, 1976, North and South Vietnam officially united to become the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

Vuong often discusses his complicated relationship with the Vietnam War, calling himself a “product of war” (Armitstead, Claire.