Journalist - Martyr Dang Loan: Sacrificing oneself for a greater cause
Nearly half a century has passed, but the memory of the bombing that devastated the headquarters of the Western Nghe An Region on a Sunday afternoon in early May 1965 has not faded in the memories of the Western Nghe An Region and Nghe An Newspaper's generation today.
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The destructive war broke out, the agency was ordered to evacuate but the Provincial Party Committee member, Editor-in-Chief Dang Loan, still stayed at the editorial office. He and his liaison ate and slept, receiving the province's policy on propaganda for combat production and combat service right next to the raised bunker. During the 4 months when American planes fiercely attacked Factory 250B Phu Quy, Song Hieu ferry, and Cat Mong airport, he and his liaison did not leave the editorial office.
To have time to follow the war and direct the propaganda content of the Western Nghe An newspaper, every day he cooked rice, made it into several balls, put them on the beams, went to the base, and ate wherever was convenient. During the day he went to the base to find out typical examples, prepare documents, and at night he lit an "anti-aircraft" oil lamp in the bunker to write editorials, write about good people to encourage the movement of "good production, good fighting" of the ethnic minorities in the highlands of Que Phong, Quy Chau, Quy Hop, Nghia Dan, Tan Ky and the self-defense of the farms and forestry farms in the Phu Quy economic zone. Many times on the way to work, he was buried by bombs at Sen ferry (Tan Ky) and Dua airport (Anh Son). But he did not stay at the base because of the danger.
Editorials praising the brave fighting spirit of the militia of Thong Thu commune (Que Phong) and Lang Dong cooperative (Nghia Tien, Nghia Dan), the self-defense forces of Tay Hieu Farm and Dong Hieu Farm were the basis for the Party and State to consider conferring the title of Hero of the Armed Forces to the unit and locality in 1967.
That credit also includes the contributions of journalists To Quoc Bao, Lang Phuoc, Van Minh, Kim Tuan, and Hung Son, but it was Editor-in-Chief Dang Loan who decided the typical propaganda effectiveness in the fight against the destructive war of the US Air Force.
In 1965, the US Air Force expanded its bombing area along Route 7 and Route 48 in an attempt to prevent the North from providing support to the Southern battlefield and the Laotian battlefield. The level of bombing became increasingly fierce when, from April 1965, the US Air Force used B52s to continuously attack Route 15.
Sticking to the key points, he directed the editorial office to publish the newspaper regularly twice a week, distributing 5,000 copies of the Western Nghe An newspaper to 10 mountainous districts, and assigned the task to volunteer cadres and reporters to teach literacy to the Thai, Tho, Mong and Kho Mu people. At night, he walked nearly 10 km from the editorial office, crossing the key points of the attack to the village to teach people in remote areas.
With the style of wartime journalism, he instructed reporters to be ready to serve in combat, stick to air defense positions, factories, and agricultural cooperatives to create hot, directive, vivid, and timely journalistic works.
And until the moment of his death, he did as he told the reporter. That afternoon, May 15, 1965 (April 22 of the lunar calendar), the sky over Nghia Dan seemed to shatter in the whistling sound of bombs and the deafening roar of dozens of "ghost" F4s swooping down to attack the Phu Quy industrial park, the Western command agency, Tay Hieu General Hospital, and Factory 250B Phu Quy.
From the editorial office, Editor-in-Chief Dang Loan assigned the liaison to collect documents and then he ran to Tay Hieu Hospital. In the midst of the smoke and bombs, the treatment area collapsed. He rushed into the patient's room and carried one patient after another to the shelter. The 250B Phu Quy mechanical workshop was on fire. From the hospital, he rushed to Nghia Quang commune headquarters to call on the militia to save the workshop.
Having been to the factory to collect documents for the newspaper, he was familiar with the terrain, so he commanded the militia to focus all their efforts on protecting the generator, transformer station and the area where the reserve fuel was hidden. Thanks to his judgment and calm handling, the fire was contained. Returning to the editorial office, facing the ruins, he and his liaison Tran Thong were hastily cleaning up the documents and the only portable typewriter when the second wave of bombs fell. A bomb blew up the thatched house and took away the brave editor-in-chief, along with the devoted liaison who had always been with him during the first two years of the American invaders' mad attacks on the North.
Journalist Dang Loan was from Cat Van (Thanh Chuong), where the Nghe Tinh Soviet movement was launched in 1931. He was posthumously awarded the Medal for the Cause of Vietnamese Journalism by the Vietnam Journalists Association. The day I went to the address of Journalist Dang Loan's daughter to present the Medal and a small gift from Nghe An Newspaper, I learned that Ms. Dang Thi Yen was the Deputy Manager of the Dong Loc T-junction Relic Site. She was also a guide and an inspirational introduction that moved hundreds of thousands of visitors to commemorate the heroic martyrs who fell on Route 15, the gateway to the Southern front during the resistance war against the US to save the country.
Van Hien
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