The Viet Cong, also known as the National Liberation Front, are the South Vietnamese guerrilla soldiers who oppose American presence in Vietnam (different from the North Vietnamese Army). Since the Viet Cong face a larger, better-equipped than themselves, they are experts in guerilla warfare. They are so good at hiding that though they constantly engage in firefights with American soldiers, American soldiers rarely actually see them.
Viet Cong Quotes in If I Die in a Combat Zone
The If I Die in a Combat Zone quotes below are all either spoken by Viet Cong or refer to Viet Cong. For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 1
Quotes
On the perimeter of the village, the company began returning fire, blindly, spraying the hedges with M-16 and M-70 and M-60 fire. No targets, nothing to aim at and kill. Aimlessly, just shooting to shoot.
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Chapter 7
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Later two or three more men straggled out. No helmets, no weapons. They laughed and joked and drank. The first sergeant shouted something, but the men just giggled and sat on sandbags in their underwear.
Enemy rounds crashed in. The earth split. Most of Alpha Company slept.
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Chapter 8
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[N]o one in Alpha Company gave a damn about the causes or purposes of their war: it is about “dinks and slopes,” and the idea is simply to kill them or avoid them.
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Chapter 9
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We stood straight up, in a row, as if it were a contest. I confronted the profile of a human being through my sight. It did not occur to me that a man would die when I pulled the trigger of that rifle.
I neither hated the man nor wanted him dead, but I did fear him.
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Chapter 11
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More Combat Assaults came in the next days. We learned to hate Colonel Daud and his force of helicopters. When he was killed by sappers in a midnight raid, we head the news over the radio. A lieutenant led us in song, a catchy, happy, celebrating song: Ding-dong, the wicked witch is dead.
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Chapter 13
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In the next days it took little provocation for us to flick the flint of our Zippo lighters. Thatched roofs take the flame quickly, and on bad days the hamlets of Pinkville burned, taking our revenge in fire. It was good to walk from Pinkville and to see fire behind Alpha Company. It was good, just as pure hate is good.
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Chapter 22
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“When you go into My Lai you assume the worst. When you go into My Lai, shit, you know—you assume—that they’re all VC [Viet Cong]. Ol’ Charlie with big tits and nice innocent, childlike eyes. Damn it, they’re all VC, you should know that.”
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Viet Cong Term Timeline in If I Die in a Combat Zone
The timeline below shows where the term Viet Cong appears in If I Die in a Combat Zone. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 1: Days
...their way. With their squads, they stop and prepare to search an abandoned village for Viet Cong , though O’Brien thinks it’s a waste of time. They never find the Viet Cong;...
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...night, six mortar rounds strike nearby, but no one is hit. Bates tells Barney the Viet Cong must be running out of ammunition. In all, it isn’t a bad night.
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Chapter 4: Nights
...device developed by the government. They look into the dark jungle, listening for sounds of Viet Cong . Chip jokes that he can see a peep show amid the trees. In reality,...
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Chapter 7: Arrival
...Some men shoot a machine gun out toward where the mortars are firing from. The Viet Cong see the flash of machine gun fire in the base and start aiming toward it....
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...they find two dead Americans, though they don’t belong to Alpha Company, and eight dead Viet Cong . Some men load corpses into the truck. Two soldiers named the Kid and Wolf...
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Chapter 8: Alpha Company
...like a “vacation.” They wander up and down the beaches around Chu Lai, never seeing Viet Cong or facing combat. Vietnamese women and children follow them, offering to clean weapons or give...
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...gunfire and sees flashes in the village. The patrol returns, reporting that they killed some Viet Cong soldiers standing by a well. The Kid excitedly recounts the story and shows off an...
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Chapter 9: Ambush
...ordered without actually going anywhere—but tonight, Mad Mark wants to try to take out some Viet Cong . At midnight, squad leaders gather their men, hang grenades on belts and ready ammo....
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...rifle in his lap will fire when he needs it to. He wonders if the Viet Cong will not actually ambush them and he thinks it stupid that all of the American...
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...more effective. In May, Captain Johansen leads three platoons in ambushing a village where a Viet Cong meeting is being held. The platoons stretch themselves out around the village. O’Brien carries Captain...
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An officer standing next to Johansen and O’Brien points out three Viet Cong soldiers sneaking out of a building. The three Americans take aim with their rifles and...
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Chapter 11: Assault
...villages to dodge the midday heat on the hilltop base. They don’t bother looking for Viet Cong . The rest of the day they lay around, build shade, or play chess. On...
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...clear the landing zone, and take cover. The helicopters leave. There is no gunfire, no Viet Cong there to meet them. Bates is still terrified, but most of the soldiers are “happy...
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Chapter 13: My Lai in May
When Alpha Company returns to My Khe in May, they immediately walk into a Viet Cong ambush. The villagers give no warning or hint. Gunfire sprays out of the bushes and...
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At night, Viet Cong shoot mortars, and Alpha Company spends the whole night crawling on its knees through rice...
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...a rock and shoots a farmer—but he tells O’Brien to report that they’ve hit a Viet Cong soldier. O’Brien swallows and follows orders. A mine obliterates an American’s leg the next day,...
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...a new European boyfriend, his parents are worried for him, and his siblings are fine. Viet Cong soldiers shoot at the Americans from the surrounding bushes. Three more men are hit and...
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Chapter 14: Step Lightly
Everything is absurd. Alpha Company stalks through mine-riddled territory, trying and failing to find Viet Cong and fighting a war that will never be won. The Vietnamese hate the Americans now,...
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Chapter 17: July
...the villages, taking a group of women and children along with them so that the Viet Cong will be less inclined to shoot at them. Captain Smith is proud of himself for...
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The next day, the tracks and infantrymen keep searching villages for Viet Cong . Smith orders his men to clear out a bunker. They throw grenades in, and...
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...Mortars hit them during the night, wounding two more. Captain Smith thinks he sees a Viet Cong soldier and shoots at them, but he discovers that it’s just a pig. The next...
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Chapter 19: Dulce et Decorum
...meals each day. Life seems good and “morale [is] high.” One day, soldiers chase two Viet Cong soldiers into a bunker and throw grenades in after them. One stumbles out to surrender,...
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Chapter 20: Another War
...it nearly irritates him until he remembers what a support that artillery is during combat. Viet Cong fighters attack LZ Gator once while O’Brien is there, slipping through the perimeter and killing...
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Chapter 21: Hearts and Minds
...won’t “save the baby.” The Chieu Hoi says that because he used to be a Viet Cong , the men in Charlie Company don’t even like him. Within a day, he deserts.
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Chapter 22: Courage Is a Certain Kind of Preserving
...about the morality of killing civilians. In Major Callicles’s eyes, every Vietnamese civilian is probably Viet Cong , so killing civilians shouldn’t be a problem. When O’Brien presses Major Callicles, Callicles grows...
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...meet a squad leader from Delta Company. The squad leader points to an area the Viet Cong frequent, next to another village, though he advises Major Callicles not to go. “But Callicles...
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...he clearly doesn’t know how to do it himself. Callicles talks so loudly that any Viet Cong nearby would easily hear them in the darkness, but it’s raining, so O’Brien figures the...
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