Squeeze Through That Tunnel

Talk about guerrilla warfare.  When it came to jungle fighting, the Vietnamese were prepared.

One of the many hidden entrances

Around the late 1940s, Vietnam was making progress in freeing itself from France.  In anticipation of resistance to French occupation, the Vietnamese in the south began digging a complicated network of underground tunnels throughout the biggest city in southern Vietnam, Saigon (renamed Ho Chi Minh after the reunification of north and south Vietnam).

When I say tunnels, I am talking tiny, narrow passage ways dug well underground with no daylight coming through - most of which I could never fit through (and I swear I haven't been eating THAT much sticky rice over here).

A little surprised I fit through...

The tunnels were built, then continually extended from the late 1940s through the end of the Vietnamese war in the 1970s.   During the Vietnam War, the tunnels were used as the headquarters of the Viet Cong (the communist party that rose up in southern Vietnam to support northern Vietnam during the war).  Although the US, Australia, and other countries supporting the non-Communist southern Vietnamese army knew about the Cu Chi tunnels during the Vietnam War, they were so extensive and so narrow that understanding them and getting inside to the depths of the Viet Cong headquarters took years.

Camouflaged well... 

Visiting the tunnels was sobering.  The intro video to the touristy part of the tunnels referred to Americans as "crazy devils" and praised certain individuals, giving them "American Killer War Hero" awards.

Regardless of which side you were on during the war, life must have been rough.

There are 3 "levels" of tunnels systems - and I struggled a little getting through the deepest layer of tunnels!  AND that was just the tunnel open to tourists - AND parts of the tunnels had been widened for big 'ole tourists!

Another hidden entrance to the tunnel system

Reunification Palace in Ho Chi Minh - used when
the North and South came together as one country