The Vietnamese navy has been carrying out construction on the Truong Sa (Spratly) archipelago for more than three decades now.
Retired officials and commanders recalled the times when they risked their lives to lay the foundations for fortifications amid rough seas, gales, scorching sun, and severe shortage of essential items like drinking water and food.
Commenting on the recent instances of Chinese vessels harassing seismic survey ships in Vietnamese waters, Senior Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Viet Nhat, now political commissar of the Navy’s M31 Sapper Unit, said Vietnam was never surprised by these acts.
Part 1: Recalling brutal times on Truong Sa
Part 2: Island-building village
Nhat said he would never forget Lunar New Year’s Eve in 1988 when his unit received an urgent order from the Naval High Command to move a squad from the northern border province of Quang Ninh to Cam Ranh in the central Khanh Hoa Province.
It was to join local forces and head for the open sea to build facilities and fortifications on Truong Sa.
The order was so confidential that leaders of the unit went to the houses of selected men and officers, ostensibly for the New Year, and secretly passed it on.
They were told to enjoy New Year’s Eve with their families before being picked up at home the following morning.
“I used all my cash to buy a pressure cooker [which was then a valuable item] each for my wife and parents-in-law,” Nhat recalled.
“I was 28 then. My wife had just delivered a baby. I feared it would be a difficult task and I might die.
“But I did not tell anyone since I wanted to keep a happy ambience in my family during New Year.
“And for me, the cookers were my last gift of gratitude to my beloved ones.
“I will be on duty far from home; try to take care of the children,” he remembered telling his wife before setting off.
M31 soldiers transported to Cam Ranh to prepare for heading for open sea to build Truong Sa (Spratly) archipelago (Photo: Vietnam Navy Museum)
The then chief of M31, Vu Tien Quynh, said he and his soldiers spent around a week on a ship called LTU before reaching the island.
The vessel was jokingly referred to as a “pig feeding trough” since it had absolutely no room. Its capacity was 30-40 tons and its deck was used both to store construction materials and as a living place for soldiers.
“The commanders and soldiers lived in exactly the same conditions, with each getting a hammock,” Quynh said.
“Our first challenge was to build houses on Da Lon island that could withstand the powerful winds of the open seas.
“The island was below the surface and had no trees or any other shelter.
“It was a very, very hard task to transport the steel, bricks, stones, and other things from the ship to the island since there was no pier or equipment.
“The ship had to anchor far from shore. [From there] the soldiers had to carry them with their bare hands.
“Some were blown away by the wind or rough sea.
Soldiers transport stones and bricks to prepare for the construction of houses on Nui Le island of Truong Sa archipelago in 1988 (Photo: Vietnam Navy Museum)
“Yet soldiers of M31 completed the task of building the houses within 13 days,” he said proudly.
General Hoang Kien, chief of T3, another sapper unit, remembered the other challenges his soldiers faced due to the lack of vegetables to eat.
“It was during the early days of developing the islands. The soldiers could not grow vegetables unlike now. They had to make do with canned fish and the like, and most had intestinal problems like dysentery and constipation due to the lack of vegetables.
“My gift to them during trips back from the mainland was plant stems bereft of leaves. But it was only for soldiers with health conditions. I had to call them into my room to give them surreptitiously.
“Some burst into tears.”
Soldiers marked their time on the islands not by days, months, or years, but by how many times their skins peeled off.
The scorching heat, strong winds, unseasonable climate changes, and working long hours in sea water were more than the human body could take and it seemed to react by shedding layers of skin.
All the construction work had to be done during low tide since many of the islands were submerged during high tide.
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