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Hanoi, Vietnam – Last fall, Vietnam opened a vast new military museum here, and among thousands of crafts in the four-storey building and courtyard filled with tanks and aircraft, the exhibition quickly became a star attraction: the flag of South Vietnam.
The government violates laws relating to objecting the three red-striped yellow flags as signs of resistance to the communist regime. With a few exceptions, it doesn’t appear.
The reaction to the rare sightings quickly became word of mouth. Young visitors to the Vietnamese Military History Museum frowned deep eyebrows, fell thumbs down, and posted photos of themselves next to the flag with their middle fingers. When the photo attracted unwanted attention, the flag was resolved from the wall and folded inside the display case. Social media content featuring rude hand gestures has been rubbed from the internet.
However, this phenomenon persisted.
Flag of the former Republic of Vietnam at Vietnam Military History Museum in Hanoi. The three-stripe yellow flag was used by southerners lined up in the US during the Vietnam War, and the exhibit prompted lightly parraging comments on social media.
A few weeks ago, school children on the tour made it a point to check the flag. Every few minutes, a new group became crowded around the banner – known online as the “Kali” flag – lifting the middle finger or crossing the hands to form an “X”.
In Vietnam, Cali is sometimes written as “cali”, but it is a reference to the Vietnamese diaspora in California, where many Vietnamese Americans still fly the flag of the South, representing the battle between communism and the nation they lost in the war.
But it is likely that people living in Vietnam will see it as a symbol of American imperialism, and as the nationalistic sentiment here has been escalating in recent years, evoking the Golden State is a shunt to criticise those enemies.
“They use it as a label for people who oppose state policies,” says Nguyen Khac Giang, a researcher at the Yusof ishak Institute in Singapore, known for political and socioeconomic studies on Southeast Asia.
There have been signs of nationalism growth over the past year, but in many cases it corresponds to a perception of American influence. In addition to hostility towards the “Cari” flag, a US-backed university in Ho Chi Minh City was attacked for alleged foreign interference. And the ambitious Vietnamese pop star, who was a contestant for “American Idol,” was stolen on social media last summer after footage of her song at an anti-communist activist US service.
According to Jang, Vietnam’s nationalism is strengthened at all levels by the rules of one party in the country.
The school group will visit the newly opened Vietnamese Military History Museum in Hanoi. The museum contains exhibits, photographs, maps and models of scale on armed resistance, from armed struggles for independence from France to weapons used during the Vietnam War.
The government controls education and public media. Independent journalists and bloggers who criticized the government have been jailed. Furthermore, the party’s ability to influence social media narratives has improved over the past few years, especially among the country’s youth.
Since 2017, Vietnamese authorities have adopted thousands of cyber forces online for police content, and in 2018 they established military forces under the Ministry of Defense, known as Force 47. The resulting one-sided discourse means that views that do not match official propaganda often attract harassment and expulsion.
Sometimes the government did little to ban posting about the South Vietnam flag to quell the enthusiasm at the museum, but the government also used its power to develop its power to an extreme extent.
Some visitors who made the hand signs said Vietnamese people were expressing their disapproval of the government they were being taught. One teenager lifted up a yellow star and a red flag, spread out for the photo.
“It’s hard to say whether or not you agree to a rude gesture,” said Dang Thi Bich Hanh, a 25-year-old coffee shop manager among the visitors. “The gestures of these young people weren’t quite right, but when I look at the flag and think about that part of history and what previous generations had to endure, I think they reflect their feelings.”
A bust of Ho Chi Minh at Thanh Van School in Bac Khan province, northern Vietnam. All civil servants and public schools in Vietnam contain photographs or figures of Ho Chi Minh, a respected historical figure who has become a nationalist symbol of the country.
Before she left, she raised her middle finger to take a selfie on the folded cloth.
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Five years ago, when students from the rural Mekong Delta area won a full scholarship to International University in Ho Chi Minh City, it seemed like a dream come true. However, last August, when the school got caught up in a growing wave of nationalism, he began to worry that his relationship with Fulbright University Vietnam could have an impact on his safety and future.
“I was scared,” said the recent alumni. He was just beginning a new job in education, and referred to his alma mater to a colleague and avoided wearing a shirt marked by the school name.
“You had all sorts of stories, especially since the disinformation spread at that point, it had some negative effects on my mental health.”
The attack included allegations that Fulbright, which was opened in 2016 with partial funding from the US government, had cultivated Western liberal and democratic values that could undermine the Vietnamese government.
Nationalists criticized the possible anti-communist tendencies in schools, including not highlighting the Vietnamese flag at its launch. Last year’s graduation slogan, “Fearless,” sparked suspicion that students could be planning a political movement.
“You certainly see new heights in nationalism, so it’s difficult to measure,” said Vu Minh Hoang, a university diplomatic historian and professor.
The crowds at the April 30th military parade in Ho Chi Minh City commemorate the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War.
Hoang said none of the online allegations were true — led to a threat of violence against the university, and that there were talks about some parents retreating their children for their children. Several students said their affiliation elicited hate speech from strangers, causing distrustful questions from their families and employers.
Scholars said the Vietnamese government likely acted swiftly to shut down its resentment against Fulbright to prevent anti-American sentiment from undermining relations with its biggest trading partner, the United States. However, some of the original accusations were spread by state media and bots associated with the Ministry of Defense, suggesting a division within the party.
Hoang said nationalism is often used as a unity force in Vietnam and beyond, but it could also create instability if it grows beyond government estimates and control. “For a long time, it has been an official policy to reconcile with the Vietnamese community overseas and the United States,” Huang said. “Therefore, this wave of online ultranationalism is seen by the Vietnamese state as useless, inaccurate and, to some extent, against the official direction.”
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Last summer, footage of Myra Tran sung in the Westminster Funeral of anti-communist activist Ly Tong’s Westminster Funeral appeared online. She won a reality show singing in Vietnam and gained some fame in 2019 by appearing in “American Idol,” but when the video went viral a few years ago, she was hit with severe criticism from online nationalists and state media.
Facebook and Tiktok users are now labelled Tran, 25 years old.
The controversy prompted a more widely-based movement, kicking out other Vietnamese celebrities suspected of conspiring against the country. Internet detectives, like Tran, washed the web for those who appeared alongside the South Vietnamese flag and attacked them.
Ho Chi Minh City entertainment writers who don’t want to be identified for fear of being targeted, say that as Vietnamese youth have become more nationalist online, musicians and other artists feel pressured to proactively demonstrate patriotism and endanger the rage of cancel culture.
He added that scrutiny of symbols like the South Vietnam flag gives people who link the US with greater reasons to worry about being attacked online or losing employment opportunities. It may discourage Vietnamese people living abroad – a demographic that the government has long tried to bring back to the country from pursuing business and careers in Vietnam.
A mob of Vietnamese people is about to reach the helicopter pickup zone just before the Vietnam War ended on April 29, 1975.
(Neal Ulevich/AP)
“There was a time before, when artists were very cold and careless, even if they knew that this rivalry and this history,” he said. “I think everyone is more sensitive right now. Everyone is nervous and trying to be more careful.”
Tran was bullied online and cut from a music television show for her “violation.” She expressed her gratitude for being a Vietnamese, denying any intentions to undermine national security and issued a public apology that promised to learn from her mistakes.
Two months later, Tran was allowed to play again. She returned to the stage at a concert in Ho Chi Minh City, where she cried and thanked her fans for forgiveness.
But not everyone was willing to make excuses for her. Several viewers jeered from the crowd, yelling at the tranch to “go home.” The concert video sparked a fierce debate on Facebook among Tran’s advocates and her critics.
“Patriotic young people are now very confused,” one Vietnamese user complained after denounced the hatred Tran is experiencing online.
Another shotback: “Then I’ll go back to Kari.”
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