Talk:Saigon Execution

Disputed

My main question, on having tried to clean up and make more readable this article, is about the name Bay Lop. History knows this man as Nguyen Van Lem, but little is commonly known about him besides his being the leader of a VC hit squad. A Google image search for "Bay Lop" does not return the Adams photo. Just my 2¢. - knoodelhed 06:53, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)

A search on google reveals the Bay Lop reference as the nom de gurre for Nguyen. Lop was the first name of his wife. One of the most common results for +"Bay Lop" is an AP article from 5/1/00, which states that fact. Other websites also reflect that fact (some of which looks to have existed before the AP article). As for the Adams picture, it's actually the first link on the google search, and is labeled Bay Lop. I don't know much of this particular situation, but based upon the research I just did, I'd be inclined to accept it as "fact". -Vina 19:03, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Good enough for me. Posted a redirect at Bay Lop. - knoodelhed 23:12, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Can't you cite some sources?

What are the sources for the reports about Nguyen Van Lem's crimes and for his boastfulness afterward? These could easily be the self-serving cover stories of those responsible for his death without trial.

The only source provided to support the claims he murdered, an article in VietCatholic News, civilians is clearly unreliable. Not only is the political bias clear, but the author doesn't appear to be an expert. Escaphist (talk) 07:31, 22 November 2017 (UTC)

Biased?

This article seems to be biased towards an American/RVN point of view - that the man executed was a murderer and somewhat implies that he "deserved" to be executed in the middle of a street without a trial.--FarQPwnsJoo 10:14, 17 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Suspected?

If his widow confirmed that he was in the VietCong, why the weasel word? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 21:18, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

I don't consider it a weasel word; he was executed as a suspected war criminal. Nevertheless, a) it's hearsay, b) it applies to the word "guerrilla" as much as "Viet Cong", and c) it's almost certain that the war crimes allegedly committed were wildly exaggerated given the inconsistency among sources. Given the lack of any legal proceeding it's unlikely the truth will ever be fully known. --Dhartung | Talk 21:32, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

If you want to say he was suspected of the war crimes, fine... but I think there's a better way of wording it than this. The way it reads now, you might imagine that he was just some guy, not even affiliated with the VC. I'm making a change that should clarify things. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 22:01, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

Don't be too hard on me, dude. Look into the history and see how horribly POV this article was before I cleaned it up. I thought the wording I had was a reasonable way of stating the truth, as well as being concise. The wording you've chosen certainly makes for more clarity but is much less readable, in what's a short article to begin with (i.e. you don't read much farther before it's explained).

As far as the "some guy" issue, I'm struck by the fact that there isn't a Nguyen Van Lem Day in Vietnam or a Nguyen Van Lem State Memorial celebrating his killing all those policemen and capitalists. If he were really everything that the ARVN said he was, you'd think that he'd be more celebrated by the Communist government. Certainly, I can't believe 100% the differing and highly melodramatic accounts given even in the reliable sources out there. --Dhartung | Talk 07:44, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Hey, I'm just trying to have an article that's as clear and factually accurate given the information that we have. It seems undisputed that he was a member of the VietCong, so I made sure that it was clear from the intro that this was the case. As for the war crimes and active combat, as you rightly point out, we only have the word of the people who summarily executed him... not the most unbiased sources. Sorry if you felt I was being "hard on you", I don't really have a strong opinion on this or anything. I don't typically hang around the Vietnam War articles looking to start controversy. :) I just happened across this page through some links and thought that the intro sounded weird, that's all. If you think my new intro is too kludgy, by all means edit it. This is a wiki after all. :) --Dante Alighieri | Talk 18:38, Apr 23, 2005 (UTC)

I edited the intro a bit for readability. Also, I referred to him as "Lem" (keeping in line with the rest of the article). Is this appropriate? Is Lem a surname? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 18:45, Apr 23, 2005 (UTC)

It's better now, but I may mull it over a bit. No guarantees. ;-) There's a problem with the names -- both men's last name is Nguyen (a very common Vietnamese name). Lem and Loan are given names. It should be fixed but it's going to be awkward. --Dhartung | Talk 22:40, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, I figured as much. We had several kids in my school named Nguyen. I suppose we could refer to him as Bay Lop in the article body, having introduced that name in the introduction. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 23:51, Apr 23, 2005 (UTC)

Geneva Conventions

I decided to correct the point about the Geneva Conventions. It had previously said:

Though Loan's execution of Lem violated the Geneva Convention's norms for treatment of prisoners of war, the execution had been attributed to war crimes committed by Lem.

The Geneva Conventions are a hot subject nowadays. But back then it was decided to treat Viet Cong as POWs only if they were captured in legitimate combat. (Note that the picture shows him in street clothes.) I don't know if Lem should have been given a trial, but it would have been a civilian one and they were likely under martial law at the time. In any case, the Geneva Conventions don't apply.

Here's a reference.

-- Randy 20:21, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

One reason to make the point is to underline why people found it shocking. Legal or not, it violated expectations. Note the debate over battlefield combatants or whatever we're calling them from Afghanistan. There probably were thousands of martial law executions, but they weren't on television in broad daylight. --Dhartung | Talk 01:45, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps it's more important that people not find it shocking. If they're unwilling to demand that terrorists respect the actual laws of war then those laws become unworkable. It may very well be that the public's high tolerance for atrocities by the Viet Cong is what led to the current situation. -- Randy 15:55, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

Dude, welcome to Wikipedia. You'll want to read up on Wikipedia:Neutral Point of View, which is official policy around here. I have no problem with you bringing the facts to the table, but if you're going to color them with what should be, you're going to run into a lot of brick walls around here. Also, chill. These editing Talk pages deal with serious matters and lots of attitude gets in the way. --Dhartung | Talk 16:46, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

I didn't want to get sidetracked so I appreciate the thought very much. You should note that I'm not the one who brought up the subject of current events. The edit I made to the topic page (with a reference in this section) was an attempt to correct a misperception while recognizing that the misperception was too common to ignore. Like you said, people did find it shocking. -- Randy 17:20, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

The South Vietnamese and to a lesser extent the American soldiers also committed many atrocities so your claim of atrocities is kind of irrelevant. Also, perhaps you misunderstood the Geneva convention but the Geneva convention does not require the parties involved to actually respect the Geneva convention to be subject to legal rights offered under the Geneva convention. The simple fact is, atrocities by one side does not justify atrocities by the other. If you claim to be civilised and you claim to respect human rights and the Geneva convention then show it. Don't claim you don't have to simply because the other party doesn't. This is childish and just proves you are not civilised and don't respect himan rights or the Geneva convention. You should note there is no clear evidence Nguyen commited any atrocities. Just as there is no evidence many of the people detained as unlawful combatant have committed any acts or terrorism let alone even been combatants of any sort. Indeed there is strong evidence to suggest a number of them were misidentified, perhaps because the people who detained them didn't realise Muhammed is actually a very very common name Nil Einne 06:56, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

The atrocities may or may not be relevant, as it's beside the point. This is not really about human rights either, no matter how much we could argue about which side actually respects them. In this case it's about the Geneva Conventions, and whether or not they legally apply. You haven't shown any reason why they would. Wishing will not make it so.

Your POV is ironic given that one of the complants about Bush is that we're not giving full constitutional rights to terrorists captured elsewhere.

Lem was captured in civilian clothes in a city of South Vietnam. Clearly, South Vietnamese law would have applied. That would include their laws of evidence under (at the time) martial law. Comparing it to western standards under peacetime would be ludicrous. Geneva doesn't do that either. (It demands legal standards equivalent to a country's own military justice system -- not necessarily an Anglocentric one that you seem to be asking for.) But if you want to make such comparisons, I'd suggest looking at North Vietnam.

-- Randy2063 13:50, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Tell me where does it say on the Geneva Convention on the treatment of POW [1] does it say you have to be in uniform to be treated as a POW? Now, regarding your argument, if he was regarded as an enemy combatant, the Geneva Convention should be applied, I don't see why it shouldn't be. If he was not regarded as an enemy combatant, he should still be treated humanely according to South Vietnamese law at the time. During the war, in both South & North Vietnam there is no law that permit soldiers/policemen to summarily execute a handcuffed man without trial in the way Nguyen Van Lem was executed. Whether he commited war crimes or not is beside the point. Moreover, even if VC did kill all of Loan's deputy family, there is no proof that Nguyen Van Lem was in that group of VC, in fact, Loan only claimed that Nguyen Van Lem was captured near a ditch full of victims' bodies, Loan didn't know if Nguyen Van Lem was the murderer or if he was just happened to be there.--lt2hieu2004 07:10, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't see this one until just now.

GC's Article 4 shows militias and volunteers need to be "having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance."

In this case, the text says:

Terrorists, spies, and saboteurs were excluded from consideration as prisoners of war. Suspected Viet Cong captured under circumstances not warranting their treatment as prisoners of war were handled as civilian defendants.

You can argue that South Vietnamese law accorded the right to a trial, and that that might possibly have remained in force even during an emergency situation like the Tet Offensive, but that's a separate issue having nothing to do with the GCs. Eric Robert Rudolph doesn't qualify for the GCs either.

It would be interesting to find parallel situations during the Civil War, and see how they'd have handled it. I wonder if those troops would even take it up as high as a general.

As for proof that Nguyen Van Lem was in that group of VC, I'd guess that the soldiers who captured him would have served as witnesses. It's a moot point, however, given that we know he was a captain in the Viet Cong.

-- Randy2063 04:25, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

See the Nguyen Ngoc Loan talk page. I replied to you there. As for your so called proof that Nguyen Van Lem was in that group of VC. As you can clearly see from this Wikipedia entry as well as any other well established sources, he was caught in a ditch full of bodies of South Vietnamese civilians and that's the only justification for his murder. Does lying in a ditch full of dead bodies in time of war automatically make you a murderer and justify summary execution?? He was a VC captain, but that doesn't mean he did kill all those people. Especially when who was really the executed prisoner is still debated.--lt2hieu2004 21:10, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

Reference material

I removed the link to of Nguyen Van Lem's execution because YouTube had already deleted it due to use violation. Perhaps someone can clarify this reference.

Nguyen Van Lem or Le Cong Na

• Nguyen Van Lem in vi Wikipedia (Bay Lop)
• Le Cong Na in vi Wikipedia (Bay Na), and see
• Film The Picture (Tu mot tam anh). (use:wikipedia; pass: wikipedia).

Thank. 222.252.244.44 14:44, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The video, first of all, is not working for me, second of all, we should not use registration-required sites, third, we should not link to copyright infringement. The video is just an illustration of the article, thus not strictly necessary. As for "Lê Công Nà", a Vietnamese speaker will have to translate that. Certainly it returns 0 useful Google results. --Dhartung | Talk 16:02, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Film The Picture (Tu mot tam anh) is "illustration" ?.

It is "Film Documentary".

Please see it. Thanhk. 222.252.248.143 04:10, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, when I used the word "illustration" I meant something closer to "example". In any case, I have tried several times to watch the movie, and I cannot view it using Firefox or Internet Explorer. I always get the Windows Media error "C00D1197: Cannot play the file", which means that Windows Media Player "cannot connect to media". My guess is that I can't see it because the stream is distributed to a limited geographic region. This is another reason that an international encyclopedia like Wikipedia should not include it as a link. Since I cannot watch it, I cannot find out if it is a good source or a bad source, or whether it is biased. --Dhartung | Talk 05:56, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Using "Internet Explorer" and "Windows Media Player". If you cannot view it, please contact chungcudntt@gmail.com; I'll send email and attch this film for you . Thank. 222.252.244.196 04:14, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Why should I do that? If the film is in Vietnamese, how could I evaluate it? Is there further information about this anywhere else? What important information is in the film? --Dhartung | Talk 09:58, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Citation needed

Why is this that a citation is needed for this sentence: "However, even if he wasn't regarded as a POW, Loan's action still violated South Vietnamese laws at the time"? It's whoever added this tag who must provide evidence that South Vietnamese laws at the time allow the summary execution of VC prisoners. This is ridiculous, find me any source that say South Vietnamese laws allow their soldiers to kill people without trial whether VC or not. It doesn't matter how hard I tried, searching through all kind of South Vietnamese laws textbook, I couldn't find a single sentence that even go anywhere near as allowing soldiers to kill people without trial. It's common sense, get it? Get your head out of your ass and start thinking reasonably for a change.

Everything must be cited. Deal with it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.146.24.165 (talk) 08:03, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Trivia

Why is the trivia section deleted? I don't see any reason why it should be. In fact, it is much more relevant to include his daughter name, especially considering it coincide with his executioner's name and she was born 2 years prior to the event than stuffs like LeMay and UFO, LeMay and Sports Car Racing, Mae West is a slang, etc. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.27.201.179 (talk) 17:25, 5 January 2007 (UTC).

Fair use rationale for Image:Execution of Nguyễn Văn Lém.jpg

Image:Execution of Nguyễn Văn Lém.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.BetacommandBot 23:17, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Richard Lee Nicholson

Explaining my reverts: Aside from lacking sources, this addition is POV ("an awful picture of war ... one must understand the duress [Loan] was under") and the entire second paragraph is irrelevant to this particular article. Nufy8 19:46, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Staged media event

No mention this was a staged media event - that the execution was only carried out then & there because there was a group of journalists & photographers present? Quite significant when considering the footage or image, surely? I don't have a primary source, but it's mentioned at 7:10ish in this video: [2] & there's numerous other secondary sources easy to find on the net. In the unlikely event there are no primary sources, surely it's still worth a mention that there's a lot of conjecture about it? HuwG 203.208.86.101 (talk) 11:19, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

A staged media event? It's far-fetched to think that even the South Vietnamese government could be that tone-deaf. While it's obvious that Loan, under the circumstances, didn't care about cameras being present, such a public relations disaster can hardly be believed to have been staged for public consumption.--

If the general decided to shoot they VC guy so that the cameramen would catch it on film - then its a "staged media event", right? Even if its a pretty lame one that defeats its purpose?

172.191.152.188 (talk) 21:01, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Last sentence

"Though military lawyers have yet to definitively decide whether Loan's action violated the Geneva Conventions for treatment of prisoners of war (Lém had not been wearing a uniform; nor was he, it is alleged, fighting enemy soldiers at the time), where POW status was granted independently of the laws of war; it was limited to Viet Cong seized during military operations."

I'm I just having a thick spell, or is this sentence unclear? It doesn't seem to make any clear sense to me, so I'm not sure how I'd re-write it....

Can anyone improve it so that it's meaning is more evident?

Sorry if I'm being obtuse, I'm not trying to be snarky. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Adkins (talk • contribs) 23:10, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

background summary in intro

The statement that "The execution was explained at the time as being the consequence of Lém's admitted guerrilla activity and war crimes, and otherwise due to a general "wartime mentality"." is a peculiar and pointless thing to say. Why not say that Lem was summarily executed without trial (which is true). And that the photo of his execution was widely disseminated and used against the South Vietnamese government and American involvement in Vietnam (which is also true).

There is also a mention on the page of the General Ngoc, that VC Van Lem was accused of stabbing to death a south vietnamese officer, his wife, his six children and his 80-year old mother. That is also interesting background, not?

Geneva Conventions

I would be very surprised if any real military lawyers have ever said that Lem's summary execution did not violate the Geneva Conventions for treatment of prisoners of war. Of course it did - if he was a prisoner of war. If he was not a POW then the Geneva Convention would not have been violated, but civil law would have been. Summary execution is not legal, it should not be necessary to add.Royalcourtier (talk) 23:07, 27 April 2016 (UTC)

I don't believe he could be considered a prisoner of war as he was an unlawful combatant. However, you are correct that domestic laws against murder would have applied. An unlawful combatant is a criminal suspect subject to imprisonment, trial and, if domestic law permits, capital punishment. Did South Vietnamese law explicitly grant high-ranking military officers the legal right to impose capital punishment on anyone they saw fit who was not subject to international treaty? If the answer is "no", then it was murder, plain and simple. You can argue it was morally justified if you want to, but that wouldn't make it legal. 100.40.6.156 (talk) 16:17, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

• During WW2 there were only 3 Geneva Conventions. It is the Third Geneva Convention that defines "Lawful combatant", and the protections POWs are entitled to.

WW2 revealed huge weaknesses in the 3 existing conventions... in particular, they did not protect civilians in warzones. They did not protect their cities from indiscriminate bombing, like the London Blitz and the far more extensive Allied bombing of German and Japanese cities. They did not protect Jewish, Roma and homosexual civilians, in captured territories, from being rounded up and sent to death camps. And they did not protect civilians who the occupiers suspected of being members of, or sympathetic to, underground resistance groups, from being rounded up, tortured, and being given summary executions, without ever facing charges, or being tried.

In 1949 a Fourth Geneva Convention was signed, which corrected the huge gap in the previous conventions, and added explicit protections for civilians. It defined the term "protected persons" - any civilian in a war zone. They were given protections very similar to those given to POWs, the key difference being POWs, who had been lawful combatants, are protected from being charged or tried for hostile acts.

So, the 4th convention prohibits both torture and summary execution of everyone who was not already protected because they were a lawful combatant.

I am not that trusting of edits made by IP addresses, but I support this edit, which removed the claim that the Geneva Conventions allow summary execution. Geo Swan (talk) 23:24, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

Requested move 29 November 2016

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: MOVED —UY Scuti ^Talk 20:40, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

---

Nguyễn Văn Lém → Execution of Nguyễn Văn Lém – The title doesn't reflect the article's subject, Nguyen's execution in Vietnam War. Also, the article weighs more on Nguyen's execution than on the person himself. More is explained at Discussion section. George Ho (talk) 03:55, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's policy on article titles.

• Support, no evidence that Nguyen was notable by himself. Daniel Case (talk) 05:27, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Discussion

Any additional comments:

More likely the execution is more notable than the person himself. The iconic image of Nguyen's execution during Vietnam War went worldwide via the media. The present title may meet criteria of an article title and may meet WP:Common name per sources. However, the name of the person might violate the spirit of WP:AT. The policy's spirit is naming an article to reflect the significance of the article's subject. The article's subject may not be reflected by the title. Not one of core content policies, like WP:verifiability, can adequately handle this either. The guidelines instead might. WP:BIO1E (not WP:BLP1E) should apply; the person himself is not as notable as his own execution. Also, WP:notability (events) and WP:notability might apply as well. Of course, WP:POLCON says that we can use an appropriate advice page, especially when policies and guidelines conflict, like WP:AT and WP:BIO1E. However, it also says that changes to any rule are recommended. For now, we are deciding on the naming of this article. We can discuss the rules at another time. --George Ho (talk) 04:02, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Daniel, can you move your vote to Survey section? Or the separation of Survey and Discussion is annoying? George Ho (talk) 05:32, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

No problem. Refactoring now ... Daniel Case (talk) 05:58, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Blatantly biased source

The main source for all the gruesome details about the alleged war crimes of the victim on the photo is an article by a former South Vietnamese judge and former professor of South Vietnam's National Police Officer Academy, on the site vietcatholic.net. The article doesn't even try to conceal the fact that its main point is to defend the US engagement in Vietnam and to attack Communist Vietnam. This is as biased a source as it could possibly get. You only hear one side, namely the executioners (or their apologists) and what they assert about the confessions of the victim and the circumstances of the victim's capture. At the same time, the author does not explain where he got his information about the victim's actions; the Horst Faas article gives several contradictory stories told about the same person ("Lt. Colonel Loan had said that the man had killed many South Vietnamese and even Americans. Vietnamese photographers said that he was a traitor, working for both sides - the Vietcong and the South Vietnamese police. Others said he was a small-time Vietcong who had put on a fresh shirt hoping to slip away."). Note that even Loan isn't quoted as talking specifically about women and children here. Even if Adams tells the same story as the judge's article, he could only have got it from the South Vietnamese executioners again, as he didn't witness it. Since the victim was never tried, anything his executioners can say about him can be regarded as hearsay or self-justification at this point; yet it is presented as the doubtless truth. The only fact that is quite obviously true and for which the man is notable is being summarily executed in public in front of journalistic cameras; yet the lede begins, instead, with what (some of) his executioners assert about his prior actions.--94.155.68.202 (talk) 02:49, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

You are welcome to present other WP:RS that show that Nguyễn Văn Lém was "a small-time Vietcong who had put on a fresh shirt hoping to slip away" Mztourist (talk) 03:07, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, but there is already an RS (Horst Faas) for this ('small-time' is a matter of definition, I suppose). This isn't really the point, though; the point is that the source that is used here is definitely not reliable. To add to what I've already written above, it seems that the South Vietnamese sources cited by Horst Faas somehow weren't so aware of the victim's drastic actions; instead, the only thing that all of the contradictory accounts have in common is that they would have seemed likely to make the execution at least a little bit more acceptable or justifiable.--94.155.68.202 (talk) 03:15, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

See [3] and [4] regards Mztourist (talk) 05:20, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

The Daily Mail is a tabloid. The BBC article says 'Lem was believed to have murdered the wife and six children of one of Loan's colleagues.' and 'South Vietnamese military caught a suspected Viet Cong squad leader, Nguyen Van Lem, at the site of a mass grave of more than 30 civilians.' In other words, that's what somebody (who? presumably the South Vietnamese military) believed or at least said, but we (the BBC) can't actually say that it's true. I suppose that they forgot to add 'allegedly' also to 'caught him at the site of a mass grave' (did any journalist actually witness his capture and see just where and how it took place, or is that, too, something the South Vietnamese military sources have said at some point after the event?). This seems like rather sloppy journalism - such vague weasel words would be deemed unacceptable by Wikipedia's standards. For all I know they could have used this very wiki article or Vietcatholic as a source. If this BBC article is used as a source here at all, at least the statements should be qualified with the same cautious wordings that it uses.

Apparently Lem's widow is alive and well, having escaped to the North after his execution, and can confirm that her late husband was a Viet Cong officer. It turns out that she actually learnt about his capture and execution by recognising him on the famous photo, which she saw in a newspaper. I suppose that the brief biographical information about him and her in that article can be added here, too. The even briefer text here may be taken as an indication of the Vietcong/North Vietnamese version of the circumstances of his arrest during the Tet offensive: 'He was captured whilst attacking the Naval Headquarters in Saigon'. --94.155.68.202 (talk) 15:42, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

The Daily Mail has atually been ruled an unreliable source and should be removed from all articles. The BBC article is rehashing material from other sources, including it seems, Wikipedia. Several sentences seem to be pulled directly from here. If I'm right, then this calls that source deeply into question.

Now, NPR source says Lem was pulled from a building and then brought out. Their source is Adams, and an author who wrote a book on Adams and is basing that information on Adams mostly. So they have a direct witness, instead of the vagueness that the BBC cites. NPR makes no reference to any mass grave. You'd think that Adams would have mentioned that right? To date I've seen no interview with Adams where he makes any mention of a mass grave. If we go with Adams' testimony, Lem's actions are much more vague. Adams instead only references that Lem may have killed American soldiers, and that Loan told him he killed many Vietnamese and Americans.

See:

• Talk:Nguyễn_Ngọc_Loan#BBC_source
• Talk:Nguyễn_Ngọc_Loan#Mass_atrocities_by_Nguyễn_Văn_Lém?

Harizotoh9 (talk) 19:21, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

I don't think Vietcatholic is a reliable source. I've seen many sources repeat the claim that Lem had committed mass atrocities, but they are typically right wing or tabloid sources. What if they are simply repeating what they've been told? I would say these claims are contentious as of now, and they need to be challenged, and we need to restrict ourselves to academic and newspaper sources. In the article for Nguyễn Ngọc Loan, similar claims were cited to Richard Botkin's 2009 book "Ride The Thunder". I then noticed the book is published by "Worldnetdaily", a far right organization that is now a reliable source. For this reason, I removed the Vietcatholic site. This information needs a reliable source first. Harizotoh9 (talk) 22:20, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Widow:

• Photo source
• Interview
• Time (1993)
• People (2000)
• AP archive

Trying to compile sources for his widow. Harizotoh9 (talk) 19:59, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

Lem's capture:

There's multiple sources discussing Lem's capture. These sources may be conflating information and may be unreliable. Some sources like the BBC, mention Lem being captured near a mass grave. However, this information may have been copied from Wikipedia, making it an unreliable source. This information is repeated by various tabloids as well. NPR refers to Adam's testimony, and makes no reference to any mass grave, instead saying "Adams saw a soldier drag a man in a checkered shirt out of a building."

A caption of the photo of his wife says that Lem was "captured while attacking the Naval Headquarters in Saigon." This does not contradict NPR or Adams.

Tabloids and the BBC indicate Lem was responsible or suspected for killing Tuan and his family.

What to make of these seemingly contradictory sources? I think we should discount the BBC and tabloid accounts, as well as the right wing ones. NPR and Adams' eyewitness testimony seems most reliable.

Harizotoh9 (talk) 20:22, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

Most of this is conjecture. The BBC is a reliable source, so we compare and contrast what the reliable sources say, we don't pick winners. The article should explain that the circumstances of what he had been doing at the time of his capture are unclear, but there are two versions, then explain what they are and cite the sources for each one. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:00, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

BBC is typically reliable, but if they're copying text and information from Wikipedia, then they're not reliable per WP:Circular. The more cautious RS seems to just say what Loan and Adams believed, and say nothing about any mass grave. Harizotoh9 (talk) 19:20, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

Loan's various explanations:

According to Friedman in "Covert Capital (page 199), Loan told Harper Magazine in 72:

We knew this this man was. His name was Nguyen Tan Dat, alias Han Son. He was the commander of a sapper unit. He killed a policeman."

In 1976, Loan told a The Washington Post:

It happened in a war on a street where there was fighting." "But this was no fighting man. He was a civilian who robbed and killed. We were under martial law. What could I do?" Source

According to Friedman (page 199)again, in 79 Loan told Esquire:

They tell me that he had a revolver, that he wounded one of my policemen.... They say that they know this man. His is not a nameless civilian, as the press says. He is Nguyen Tan Dat, alias Han Son."

Then the 98 New York times obituary, as well as others, state that Loan felt he was justified in the execution because the man was head of a Viet Cong death-squad who killed a man and his family. So which is it? It seems that Loan changed his story over time.

The sources that Friedman consults are hidden behind subscriptions, so I have not confirmed them up close. I can't confirm that the quotes are accurate. But assuming they are, this would mean that Loan changed his story over time, and this is something that should definitely be included. It could mean that at the time of the execution, Loan did not know the man's name at all, and later was passing on information that he was given. Later, it seems that by 88, Lem's widow was found, who identified him as "Nguyễn Văn Lém" with the alias "Bay Lop". This would mean that Loan's information about the man's name is incorrect, and he was mixing up Lem with another fighter.

Complicating matters, Loan knows English but it's unclear how well he knew it. So it's possible he's mis-speaking.

Is he presenting contradictory stories, or a more consistent story? Calling him a "civilian" doesn't contradict him being a Viet Cong correct? The above quotes could be read as a consistent narrative, provided you ignore him being wrong on the name. Alternatively it could be a changing story. Harizotoh9 (talk) 18:11, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

NY times says the photographer, Adams, claims Lem murdered the family of one of his subordinate officers plus the officer. www.nytimes.com/2018/02/01/world/asia/vietnam-execution-photo.amp.html Rodnebb (talk) 20:29, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

Original research:

@Andy Dingley:, this is your opinion that this statute applies to this case. Effectively acting like a legal scholar analyzing the case, and offing your opinion of what laws apply to it. This is however, your opinion. Your opinion means nothing. My opinion means nothing. We need third party sources. What you are doing is engaging in WP:Original Research. Harizotoh9 (talk) 20:31, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

• We have such a source. You keep deleting it.

You seem to want a further source which mentions Nguyễn Văn Lém by name and categorizes him as either (or not) an illegal combatant. However we make no such claim here, and we don't need to source claims that we aren't even making. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:35, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

It your opinion that this Geneva Convention Statute applies. Your opinion means nothing. You keep inserting your own personal legal analysis into this page. That is original research. The international statue is not enough for a source. Why is this statue relevant and not another one? That is your personal analysis of the case. If you do not understand this, then you do not understand how Wikipedia operates. What we would need is actual legal scholars who weighed in on the case. Right now the article has the Library of Congress and INS, which seems to think that Loan committed a war crime. That has weight. Your counter-opinion has zero weight.

This article is about the Execution of Nguyen Van Lem, not on the Geneva convention rules of warfare, therefore, all sources must discuss this incident specifically. Otherwise its original research, or even WP:Coatrack. Harizotoh9 (talk) 20:43, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

Please don't pretend you know what my opinion is. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:10, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

You're ignoring the key issue that you're adding original research into the article, which is explicitly against WP rules. Harizotoh9 (talk) 23:27, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

It is not OR. Presenting the relevant law on treatment of enemy combatants is perfectly acceptable contextual information. There is a clear implication that Lem's execution was a war crime, when that is not the case. If, as you claim above, there are WP:RS that "seems to think that Loan committed a war crime" then please go ahead and add them to the page. Mztourist (talk) 07:28, 11 January 2019 (UTC)

What is the source that this is the relevant law that applies to this case? The source is an editor on Wikipedia. The Geneva convention statue makes no mention of this incident. There needs to be a source linking this incident to that statute. So far there is no such source. If Loan or his lawyers brought this up as a legal defense, that's fine. We can record other people's analysis, but we can't add our own analysis. If international bodies or a panel somewhere analyzed this, and cited that statute in regards to that case, we can add that. But as long as it consists of what some Wikipedia editor things applies then it's Original Research. And what if some editor comes in and says another law applies here or that statue? Then you get editors warring about THEIR analysis is correct. Both would be original research and has no place on Wikipedia.

The only bodies that I'm aware of that analyzed this case so far is the Library of Congress and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which seemed to conclude it was a war crime (btw, this is already in the article). If anything, this should be expanded upon. And that might include any defense Loan used in those hearings. Harizotoh9 (talk) 19:14, 11 January 2019 (UTC)

If you're considering if something is a war crime you look at the Geneva Conventions that is WP:BLUE. The paragraph helpfully provides any reader with the relevant provisions of the Conventions. It is relevant context, not OR. Mztourist (talk) 04:10, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

I do not agree with WP:BLUE. You do need to cite that with a third party source. I cite WP:NOTBLUE.

How do we know that these are the relevant provisions? How do we know that this might have been a war crime? How do we know that we shouldn't be citing another provision or another treaty? Who says it's relevant? etc. If the answer to these are "because some guy on Wikipedia thinks so", then it's original scholarship, or Original Research. The analysis of Wikipedians are irrelevant. As I have said before, we can include the analysis of others, but not ourselves. This is textbook original research. Harizotoh9 (talk) 19:58, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Read the Geneva Conventions, if you can find anything else there that's relevant to the situation or any other relevant rules of war then please add it to the page. Mztourist (talk) 02:31, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Mztourist, you have not cited a single source connecting this case to any statutes. What you are doing is acting as an amateur legal analysist and giving your own personal legal analysis. What I can find in the Geneva conventions is utterly irrelevant. That would be my personal legal analysis, and my analysis, including yours, is irrelevant.

Also, the fact that I am challenging this means that this isn't WP:BLUE, but in fact something that can be challenged. It may seem "obvious" to you, but it does not seem obvious to me. I genuinely am not sure which treaty or provisions this falls under. I am not an expert, nor do I pretend to be one. Nor do I believe it right to add my amateur legal analysis to this page. This means you need sources. Third party sources. You have produced no such sources. And since you have produced zero sources, then this information as it stands should be removed. Harizotoh9 (talk) 03:16, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

The Geneva Conventions apply to modern war, that is WP:BLUE, if you can point to any other relevant rules of war add them to the page. Mztourist (talk) 08:12, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Some context

Found this on the net, from some True Crime outfit named Gloomy House.

The Most Misunderstood Picture in the World

Their main thesis is that the victim here was essentially a serial killer hiding within the Vietcong. ( And if that is true, he indeed got what he deserved. )

Since none of their sources are given, it is probably not fit for the article, trhough. Wefa (talk) 18:02, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

That's the common online narrative about this event. My take is that a lot of Vietnam war apologists have dominated the narrative on this story for years. And it's repeated by "did you know" online blog style sites. They present Loan as some nice guy, and Lem as a killer. Dig deeper than that. Loan is a pretty shady authoritarian character. There was no investigation, and it looks like Loan and others didn't even know the name of Lem until years later when Lem's wife was located. I've yet to see any proof linking Lem to the death squads. What we know is that Vietcong squads carried out killings, including some people Loan knew. Lem seems to have been a member of the Vietcong. He was executed by Loan. That's kind of as far as I can prove right now. Now, we have lots of sources that SAY that Lem was a member of the death squad that carried out killings of South Vietnamese officials. I don't know what they're basing it on though. It just seems to be a game of telephone where one source cites another source, and "Everybody knows" that it's true. The more partisan right wing sources that defend the war all assert this as completely true. The more cautious academic sources are more cautious.

These sources completely leave out loan's corruption, authoritarianism, and other issues. They leave out that Library of Congress and INS concluded it was a war crime. Indeed, I didn't even find this out until someone else added it to one of the WP articles. I feel these sources give a very slanted and incomplete view of the event.

A counter narrative that fits all the evidence is that Loan found the first Vietcong member he came across, and as revenge for vietcong killings executed him. Then he and others in the south Vietamese government simply said he was connected to the killings as a means of minizing it since it blew up so badly in their faces. Harizotoh9 (talk) 01:28, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Lots of OR and no WP:RS here. This page isn't about Loan (who has his own page), its about the execution of Lem, which, under the rules of the Geneva Convention, was legitimateMztourist (talk) 02:28, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Mztourist, your personal OPINION is that under the Geneva conventions it's legitimate. You are free to believe that. I'm trying to stick to the facts. I have seen a lot of sources, especially modern online sources, which give one very slanted narrow narrative of this event, and digging deeper shows a lot more complexity. Harizotoh9 (talk) 03:07, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

As I have said, if you have WP:RS add them to the page. The Geneva Conventions are the rules of modern war that is WP:BLUE. Mztourist (talk) 08:11, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

• This page shouldn't express any judgement as to the legitimacy of the execution. It should only reflect judgements which have been given by other competent bodies. Even the LoC though can't judge Loan's guilt or innocence, it doesn't have that jurisdiction; the most it gave was a ruling on how he should be treated for his US immigration status. Maybe the IcC would have been able to make a ruling (this being its specific function), if it hadn't been founded thirty-odd years too late.

As to the Geneva Convention content, that's not here to assign guilt or innocence, but it does form a significant piece of background information on the status of illegal combatants, and thus it should stay. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:27, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Hey, some conclusions that should be easy to get to:

- Lem was in civilian clothes, and a General (Loan) says Lem is Viet Cong and has killed people

- Loan obviously cannot execute Lem without a trial, that's against south-vietnamese law

- If Loan had brought Lem to trial, it would have been legal to execute him if he had broken the law and the law specified death sentence, for instance for shooting at the police. Lem was not required to get protection as a POW. Also, even as a POW he could have legally been executed if his crime was to kill the family members of an officer.

- If Lem had been brought to trial, it is very likely that he would have been found guilty if a General had vitnessed against him. The standards of proof would probably not have been that high. Lem might have lived a few weeks longer.

- It is alleged that Lem was accused of murdering a south vietnamese officer and family members. This may or may not be true, but it is relevant if the south vietnamese officers believed this to be true. Also, if they had continued to believe this after a trial of Lem, he would have been executed.

- The problem with the execution is that it was carried out without a trial, and that it turned US opinion against the US war effort. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rodnebb (talk • contribs) 10:34, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

Vietnam Execution Photo should be the title

This is "the vietnam execution photo". Why not call the page that? The name of the people involved isnt really interesting. Its a south vietnamese police general shooting a VC soldier. Rodnebb (talk) 20:26, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

I believe that something like Saigon Street Execution would make it easier to find. Mztourist (talk) 03:24, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Bay Lops crimes

Im noticing the article takes it as a given that Bay Lop murdered the Generals family. Its only alleged and there is no citations from Hastings. ComLenBannari (talk) 16:11, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Beyond any problems with Hastings as a source, he wrote in the cited book that Lem is only "alleged to have captured" and murdered Tuan and his family. He further cites Edwin Moise that the whole story is a post hoc invention to justify the shooting, concluding that "the truth will never be known." This clearly calls for a rewrite of these parts of the article to reflect Hastings's uncertainty or else the addition of alternative sources.Shane Lin (talk) 04:19, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

A proposed reframing

This article in my opinion needs a full rewrite. All of the content is based off of news sources when more than enough scholarly coverage exists, and said coverage has a far more sensible interpretation of the events:

• The idea the photo galvanized the anti-war movement has no actual evidence and might not be true
• It was a solider killing an enemy solider, not a "summary execution", only a few humanitarian organizations at the time called it that
• The one claim that the whole thing was staged was criticized by other scholars as being baseless

Most importantly though, coverage exists because of the photo. The photo is the only reason other facts about this event are known and have been researched. Therefore, the article should be on the photo, not the event. It can (and should) still provide info on the event itself.

Here's an idea of what this would look like. Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 17:57, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

A note to watchers that this is still being worked on. Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 12:36, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

I've decided that because the film has actually gotten coverage too, the event is the appropriate thing to cover. Merging my rewrite over now. Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 18:09, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

I agree, the article should be about the photograph, and not a bio. I favour the lead you mocked up[5] which is much clearer, and most likely aligns with what readers were expecting. Please go ahead and make the change, asfaik; there are not likely many others going to wade in. Ceoil (talk) 01:49, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

I'll open an RM tomorrow. Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 02:30, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

If Eddie Adams had not taken his still photo, the film of the execution taken by the NBC-TV cameraman would still have made the incident famous. Ed Moise (talk) 17:19, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

That may have been what would've happened, but it is not what did happen. The photo is all over the place now, and the film is an extra fact that is sometimes mentioned. Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 22:53, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

The problem is that this is overly reliant on the single source of Robbins, who isn't a historian but a political opinion writer and works for a conservative think tank. It's not really scholarly coverage and has a clear bias issue. Fangz (talk) 18:44, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

Requested move 22 June 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) Queen of Hearts ^talk 00:51, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

---

Execution of Nguyễn Văn Lém → Saigon Execution – This event is notable because of the photo. The photo itself is subject to focused academic study, the photo appeared everywhere on the news and had arguable effects on public opinion, and the photo is the reason anyone even knows this happened. In addition this is a title that is commonly circulated, easier to find than the current descriptive title written ourselves. I'm also not really a fan of the article's use of the word "execution".

Sources and draft replacement lead

@Ceoil Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 18:22, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

• Support per nom and my comments above. Ceoil (talk) 19:44, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Note: the second proposal, "Saigon Execution → Execution of Nguyễn Văn Lém", has been removed because Saigon Execution is a redirect, and redirects are ineligible to be current titles in move requests. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. ^{put'er there} 18:47, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

• Comment The real question here is whether the event is what's notable, or the photograph. I'm not sure that WP:RM is the best way to have that discussion. 162 etc. (talk) 20:54, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Its clearly the photograph, which often appears in coffee-table type anthologies and 100 greatest lists of famous pictures. The move should have happened years ago. The mock-up Snowmanonahoe created demonstrates this, and makes for a much less confusing lead. Commentators above (over the years) make the further point that the current title makes it difficult to search for. Ceoil (talk) 21:09, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Well the RM page says I'm not supposed to move the page if someone could reasonably disagree with it, so I'm not certain as to what I'm supposed to do. Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 21:13, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  maybe build the argument in the section above by posting examples of sources that are primarily about the photograph and its impact rather than the individual. Thats how I read 162 etc.'s suggestion, which strikes me as solid advice. Ceoil (talk) 21:35, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

  Sure:

  • Hariman, Robert; Lucaites, John Louis (2015). "Street Execution of a Viet Cong Prisoner, Saigon, 1968". In Hill, Jason E.; Schwartz, Vanessa R. (eds.). Getting the picture: The visual culture of the news. London: Bloomsbury Academic. doi:10.4324/9781003103547. ISBN 978-1-4725-2422-5.
  • Harris, John M. (2018-12-05). "Icons of Horror: Three Enduring Images from the Vietnam War". In Kerby, Martin; Baguley, Margaret; McDonald, Janet (eds.). The Palgrave Handbook of Artistic and Cultural Responses to War since 1914: The British Isles, the United States and Australasia. Springer. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-96986-2. ISBN 978-3-319-96986-2. LCCN 2018960999.
  • Malkowski, Jennifer (2017). Hill, Jason E.; Schwartz, Vanessa R. (eds.). Dying in Full Detail: Mortality and Digital Documentary (2nd ed.). Durham and London: Duke University Press. pp. 51–62. doi:10.4324/9781003103547. ISBN 9780822373414. LCCN 2016034893.
  • Zohar, Ayelet (2021-09-03). "An Exploration of the Scarcity of Asian Images in Morimura Yasumasa's Oeuvre, 1991–2010". Third Text. 35 (5): 569–590. doi:10.1080/09528822.2021.2000241. ISSN 0952-8822.

  Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 23:04, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

  wWhich makes it cut and dried. I think we should go and close the RM (by hatting) and implement the change as it seems very unlikely that anybody would want to keep the bio-focused title. Ceoil (talk) 20:58, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Modified quote

In the Photograph section, there is a problem with a quote from Eddie Adams:

"Adams later stated he regretted he was unable to get a picture 'of that Viet Cong [Lém] blowing away the [Tuân] family'."

Hastings' insertion of [Tuân] into the quote was misleading. Adams was talking about the earlier version of the story, in which Lem was said to have murdered the family of a major in the National Police. Adams' endorsement of that version of the story was probably the main reason it was widely accepted. I don't like Adams being made to seem to endorse the story about Tuân's family, which as far as I can tell was not invented until after Adams was dead.

Dealing with this seems likely to be messy, and should not be done in haste. I don't have time right now; I have major surgery scheduled for Wednesday. Ed Moise (talk) 22:52, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Do you know what the quote is from? It'd be nice if this guy cited his sources for anything... Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 22:02, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

I didn't find the exact quote, but I did find this:

Anyway, when I did this story for Parade on my return to Vietnam, I got a lot of letters. One came from a former Air Force colonel. It turns out that the Viet Cong lieutenant who was killed in the picture had murdered a police major—one of General Loan's best friends—his whole family, wife, kids, the same guy. So these are things we don't know at the time. Everyone condemns Loan for shooting this guy. But I tell everyone: "If you were General Loan and there was a war going on, and your people were getting killed, how do you know you wouldn't shoot him, too?" Cold-blooded execution? Bullshit. He was doing what he was there for—to win the war. I just happened to be there. How many times did this happen that we didn't see?

There were things a hell of a lot worse that happened in Vietnam. We had pictures that we never released. There were pictures of Americans holding heads of Viet Cong they'd chopped off. I talked to one soldier who said "Oh, you should have been here a little while ago. I cut me a heart out of one of them Viet Cong. I just buried it." Very gruesome, but this is a war. People are dying, your friends are getting blown away. In the next two minutes you could be dead. Everything is fair in love and war. There aren't any rules. It's just war.

Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 02:22, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

The original quote was in Al Santoli, ed., To Bear Any Burden. I believe the quote is both on p. xvii (in the Foreword) and on pp. 184-85 (in the main text). Ed Moise (talk) 01:52, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

In the original 1985 edition of Santoli, I believe the quote was on pp. 184-85. In the 1999 edition, I am not sure on what page of the main text it appeared, but it was also in the Foreword. Ed Moise (talk) 03:33, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

References