Alaskan Veteran Brings Humanitarian Aid to Villages in Vietnam
Neil Hannan delivering school supplies to children in the village of Nhi Ha. Photo courtesy of Neil Hannan
Michelle McAfee - CRR Staff
Copper Basin veteran Neil Hannan is heading back to Vietnam this summer, where he fought for several years in the Vietnam War and survived one of the war’s worst battles. He is bringing humanitarian aid and supplies to villages and schools where he soldiered during the war.
In 1968, 18-year-old Hannan from Ohio enlisted in the United States Army and went straight from high school to the war in Vietnam. Hannan was the youngest man in his battalion. They called him “Kid” when he got off the helicopter and joined the 196th Light Infantry Brigade because he looked like a kid–skinny with a head full of brown hair brushed across his forehead above bright blue eyes. But he grew up. “It took me about one day,” said Hannan.
Neil Hannan, Nhi Ha - 1968 Photo courtesy of Neil Hannan
In February that year, Hannan and his company were walking on patrol a few kilometers from an LZ (Landing Zone). They came across a hooch (hut) and found a young girl with a bad leg wound. The Kid from Ohio was brand new and didn’t know any better, so he nodded to the mother, who nodded back, then he picked up the delicate twelve-year-old girl and carried her back to the LZ, where he got chewed out because they didn’t want to deal with wounded villagers. But he brought her there, so they had to take her to medics. Hannan’s company moved out of the area, and he lost track of the girl.
On May 1, 1968, the Army sent Hannan’s unit to the north, where the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) amassed the largest force assembled in the war to capture the Marine Base at Dong Ha. Vietnamese Captain Tha was in command of 300 NVA men entrenched in an area near the village of Nhi Ha. Battles roared, shaking the ground with NVA artillery when Hannan’s unit arrived.
On May 6, 1968, Hannan went on patrol with a platoon from his infantry unit. They left hastily dug entrenchments and walked across a flat, open field into one of the war’s worst battles: the Battle of Nhi Ha. “All hell broke loose, with an entrenched enemy outnumbering our exposed troops 4 to 1. It was a disaster that will not be detailed by me,” Hannan recalled.
Neil Hannan’s bunker, Nhi Ha - 1968. Photo courtesy of Neil Hannan
After the war, Hannan went to college as an accounting major, bought a house in Michigan and restored it, then moved to the Copper Basin in 1999, where he started with raw land and constructed a home. He also built a successful career and said one of the effects the war had on him was feeling an intense need to stay very busy. He worked a lot at his job or on his land.
In 2010, Hannan returned to Vietnam, where he first flew out to join the 196th Light Infantry Brigade in 1968. He told his guide about finding a wounded girl. They talked to elders and community leaders in the area and found Son, the girl he carried from the hooch in ‘68. Hannan sent Son to physical rehab, rebuilt her family’s house, and gave them money for food and supplies every month for several years until Son died in 2012. He continued to send support to Lady The, Son’s mother, and her family.
Finding Son was the seed of Hannan’s Vietnam Humanitarian Program. “Now I’m in other impoverished areas where I fought in Vietnam, helping people who are missing arms and legs. I empower them with the means to help themselves,” said Hannan.
The Vietnam Humanitarian Program is in partnership with Khahn of the Hearts for Hue organization. Hannan’s program provides the funding, and Khahn coordinates purchases and logistics. The goal is to give 50 chickens with a feeder and waterer per family so they have a source of food and income.
Neil Hannan delivering chickens to a family. Photo courtesy of Neil Hannan
Chicken eggs are food, but they also hatch out and keep a family supplied with the next generation of chickens. Hannan also provides pigs that can be bred and have three litters a year, another sustainable source of food and income for families still living with the devastating effects of war.
“Helping in Vietnam balances the scales of the horrors, so it’s not just horrible memories. I have good memories now of the work I’m doing there, so it’s healing for me,” said Hannan. “It seems essential when nothing else worked.”
He had successful careers, but a cloud was always hanging over him. Ironically, Hannan said that Vietnam is where he is most at peace now because he is helping people.
On one of Hannan’s humanitarian trips to Vietnam, he met Captain Tha, who was in command of 300 NVA men during the Battle of Nhi Ha in 1968. The Captain showed Hannan a battle map from the Battle of Nhi Ha with an X where one of the members of Hannan’s platoon was captured by Captain Tha’s soldiers.
The two men discussed the gruesome battle through Hannan’s interpreter, connecting via a shared trauma. Hannan said Tha became a doctor after the war. He gave Hannan his ID badge.
“He treats me like a brother,” Hannan said. “Back then, he was just doing his job. There is no animosity in Vietnam. There are a lot of Buddhists there, and they don’t hold grudges.”
Hannan visits the monument to the Battle of Nhi Ha when he goes to Vietnam and can see exactly where he was during the battle.
“The Vietnam War destroyed me in many ways,” Hannan said, “but it gave me an opportunity to do things most people never get to experience.”
He describes a profound sense of healing from helping people now in the same areas where so much death and destruction happened. “Some people won’t go back because of the memories.”
Hannan is going back. He’ll leave his cabin near the Edgerton and Richardson with a view looking out over the Chugach and Wrangells, and fly 5,700 miles back to where he lost innocence, friends, and nearly his life.
This summer in Vietnam, Hannan will distribute 1,500 chickens to 30 families and take supplies to schools in the tiny village of Nhi Ha, the former battle zone. He also purchased lockers for these schools a few years back. Nhung of DOVE Fund coordinates Hannan’s efforts in the village, where they provided food, vitamins, rice cookers, fans, water hoses, hand-pedaled carts, bicycles, and other useful items. They also renovated dilapidated houses and built outdoor toilets and shower rooms.
Food distribution site in Vietnam. Photo courtesy of Neil Hannan
Hannan credits Son for starting this humanitarian odyssey he’s been on since 2010. He said she unknowingly helped her villagers considerably because the program wouldn’t exist without her. “I’m just a conduit. I just make it happen,” he said.
He pays for his own travel expenses and says he uses every cent of the donations he receives for the Vietnam Humanitarian Program to purchase supplies, food, and humanitarian aid for the Vietnamese people who were directly affected by the war he soldiered in.
“Sometimes, your worst nightmare can become your savior. You just have to have the guts to walk back into the throat of the dragon. I think that can apply not just to my situation, but maybe other situations in life for people.”
Donations for the Vietnam Humanitarian Program go to: Neil Hannan, PO Box 431, Copper Center, AK 99573 neilehannan2@gmail. com
Follow this summer’s blog from Vietnam: hannan2022vietnam.blogspot.com
