PROJECT RENEW, DONG HA

Dong Ha is a cluttered little town situated at the crossroads of National Highway 1A and Road 9, the northernmost town in the former South Vietnam and the location of a strategically important U.S. Marine Combat Base during the war.

Today, as the capital of Quang Tri—among the poorest provinces in Vietnam—it reflects a certain poverty.  Nevertheless, there are some remarkable things happening here.

We visited Project RENEW on March 5.  This an American-funded nonprofit organization dedicated to mine clearance and UXO (unexploded ordnance) education for children.  One of mostly hotly contested areas of Vietnam due to its location along the DMZ, a vast number of landmines were laid here, and thirty-five years after the war’s end, they still pose a danger.  Over 7000 people have been killed since 1975, many of them children, since the various mine configurations often resemble balls, which are picked up innocently as toys.

The afternoon that we stepped into the small Project RENEW office, it was crowded with young men in military uniforms undergoing medical training for treatment of explosive wounds.  All live in Quang Tri and have been affected by the results of both the war and UXO. 

According to administrative manager Nguyen Hieu Trung, less than a month prior to our arrival, a man cutting weeds was killed when his hoe struck an M79 grenade.  Nguyen Hieu Trung is quick to point out that not all UXO are American in origin; plenty were left by the NVA. 

“Still,” he says sadly, “After all these years, it hardly matters whose ordnance it was.  This man was preparing for TET, and for his family this year, there will be none.”