The Shadow of Arms

by Hwang Sok-Yong

  “It’s impossible to go by water? A ship from a neutral country would be ideal.”

  “Every so often a third-country vessel—India, Burma, Japan—comes in. But as soon as you try to book passage they might turn their back on you or, worse, turn you in. Unless you can find somebody in Da Nang to hook you up with the AWOL network in Saigon, then the land route to Saigon is your only bet.”

  Yong Kyu explained the results of his inquiries over the past few days. As he mixed them some drinks, Stapley displayed a strong resolve. “I have three thousand dollars. For half that amount, I bet I can get a passage to Burma at least. Or maybe to Bangkok.”

  Sang and Ran perched on the wooden bench side by side like a pair of birds and waited for the conversation to end. Leon gulped down a few drinks and murmured with a yawn, “I’m getting sleepy. It’s been a hectic day.”

  “Go in and get some rest. The boys all are doing OK, I hope?”

  “We made a wager—I bet twenty dollars on your successful getaway.”

  “Who’s on the other side?”

  “Everybody but me. Nobody thinks you’ll make it.”

  “You’ll be the winner, I’ll see to that.”

  “You crazy bastard! I’m going in to take a nap.”

  Leon stood and looked at the two girls. “Who’s going to be the mommy to sing a lullaby for me?”

  Ran smiled and followed him inside. Stapley held up his glass to Yong Kyu. “Let’s drink to my homeland.”

  Yong Kyu quietly observed Stapley, thinking. What will become of the two of us? Will we always be able to propose a friendly toast like now? His fate and mine could be completely opposite. He’ll end up being a good American citizen, grimacing at his monthly bills. By then bombs may be raining on my homeland and the ragged corpses of my fellow countrymen will be strewn all over a war-ravaged land. Reading the newspaper over breakfast some morning, he may happen upon an article about devastation in a foreign land far away. Yong Kyu realized that for the first time he was getting to know an American as an individual.

  “Do you not want to go home?” Stapley asked as they drank. Yong Kyu answered in a somber tone.

  “You don’t have to return to America if you don’t want to, but I have to go back to Korea even if there’s no home to go home to.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Our country is divided, like a body severed in half. My real home is in the North. It was only after I came to Vietnam that I began to see my homeland objectively. You people here . . . you taught me to do that.”

  Stapley shook his head, waving the glass in his hand. “Not true. I don’t know. Not me, but they must, in Washington or on Wall Street. It’s them, not me. Me and my brother were living in a dark basement studio, no sunlight through the windows. We didn’t even have cash to buy a new shirt. They’re the ones who made all the bombs and established the order of this filthy world. That’s why I’m splitting for good from that goddamned wonderful place, America.

  “Hear me out. When napalm is dropped, it burns up the grass, burns up the rocks on the ground, too. As it burns, the napalm sucks away all of the oxygen in the area, so if people don’t get burned to death, they die from suffocation. Bombs explode below the surface when they hit bottom in swamps or rice paddies. Everything alive in the water is disintegrated, blown to microscopic bits, by the pressure of the shock that instantly blasts in all directions. Then there are the white phosphorus shells. When one of those hits, whether on land or water, whether there’s air or not, it burns on to the core at an incredible temperature. CBVs—they have compressed air inside that upon explosion sprays thousands of pieces of lead everywhere, cutting down everything within several square yards. You can set them for delayed detonation, so a mass of people, thinking they’re safe, come out of their hiding places and gather around the beehive before it goes off. Even if the wounded survive, the lead fragments will rot the flesh and soon that part of the body will have to be amputated.

  “They have a gigantic three-thousand-pound bomb that bursts in the air, showering down hundreds of little bombs. You name it, high-velocity aircraft rockets, sidewinders, sparrows, shrikes, all kinds of tear gas and chemical bombs, defoliants that dehydrate and kill entire jungles, just to name some of the arsenal dropped from the sky. They may not be nuclear weapons, but they violate the Geneva Convention rules on weapons of war. Sitting up in my helicopter, I’ve seen countless bombs explode, shelling saturating the landscape, razing villages and annihilating people.

  “The M60 machine gunners call themselves ‘monkey hunters.’ Even when there’s no operational situation, they think it an entertaining sport to spot targets and take them out. Sitting up there in an armored helicopter with a machine gun in their hands, they feel like millionaires out on a leisurely safari in the jungle. No shit, even if your helicopter malfunctions and drops from the sky, we have so many aircraft around, you can be picked up within ten minutes. Just think of it, in order to strike down a single farmer running like hell in the furrows of his field, they’ll fire hundreds of rounds, shoot rockets, and if that doesn’t work, they’ll call up for artillery.

  “After I came to Turen, life became even harder to bear. Look at all that stuff stacked high in the supply warehouse. I can recite the names of all the big corporations who deliver all of those military supplies. And now, what’s the point of my struggle here?”

  Yong Kyu interrupted him. “You were up in the sky. Well, I crawled in the jungle. You can see much better down on the ground.”

  “Your soldiers also wonder about all this?”

  Yong Kyu could not help but laugh. “When we look at you, you all look like hairy baboons, you all look the same. And I’m sure it’s the same with you when you look at us.”

  “Us?”

  “Yes, Asians, I mean. The whites think we are humans without any souls.”

  “I see what you mean.”

  “We’ve long been living in conditions like this,” Yong Kyu muttered bitterly, and, glancing back at Sang, went on. “Ask her, this girl should know all about it. The Korean War broke out when I was eight years old. Well, a few years after my birth, we were released from colonial status. But my parents’ generation was forced to serve in armies of colonials and many were killed, just like now, all over Asia and the Pacific in wars fought by the imperialist powers. At that time, you people were already involved. Your government partitioned our country and occupied it.

  “As I work with Americans, the one thing I hate most is to listen to you people say how alike we are, how I’m no different from an American, and other garbage like that. In the same breath I hear you guys whispering how filthy the Vietnamese gooks are. ‘Gook’ is the label American soldiers picked up in the Korean War from the word ‘Hanguk,’ mispronouncing it ‘Han-goook.’ Americans used it to make fun of us. But I tell you, it is the Vietnamese that I am like.

  “These conditions we’re living through now are the same exact conditions almost all Asians have endured for the past century. On many continents whites have fought each other with bloodied teeth and claws, like predators fighting over prey. Don’t pretend to be shocked. Even if you refuse to take part in this lousy war and succeed in escaping, you’ll have to live the rest of your life burdened by what you’ve seen and heard on the battlefield. It’ll be the same with me, of course, but I’ve made up my mind to make up for it when I go back home.

  “In your newspapers I saw photos of demonstrators carrying picket signs that read: ‘We don’t want to die for Vietnam!’ What could be more absurd and hideous than that? What? Die for Vietnam? Your soldiers were dragged over here from the back alleys of filthy slums, from the dark bars where they were drinking, from the supermarkets where they rushed with discount coupons, from greasy floors beneath automobiles. You ask me why? Because the children of the wealthy were not about to come, that’s why. Ask your businessmen and their salesmen who conduct po
litics. It’s for them that you’ve been dying like dogs in the swamps of Vietnam.”

  “Even I know that much,” Stapley replied. “Our armies go around the world taming people to our ways, making them docile so they can be devoured. The idea that we are fighting for Vietnam or for their unification is a moronic sentimentality from our government. The capitalists are trying their best, according to their interest-based policies, to keep from losing this little foothold.”

  Yong Kyu felt drunk. In such a locale, the simplest expression, as simple as a military song, was best. To be sure, the lyrics of a military song seemed to fit very well the spectacle of this war. “Proud and brave, to protect freedom and the peace of Vietnam, you take part in this sacred war as a glorious crusader of freedom.” Yong Kyu set down his empty glass. “It’s getting late. Are you trying to make me talk the whole night away?”

  “No, take Sang with you and get some sleep.”

  “Isn’t she yours?”

  “Let’s do the moving tomorrow. Good night.”

  Stapley lifted his half-filled glass. Yong Kyu followed Sang, stumbling down the hall. It was more of a tunnel lined with bamboo than a hall. At the end it opened into a small field bunker. There was a basin, a pitcher of water and a garbage basket in one corner. Yong Kyu took off his combat boots. Sang poured water into the basin and put his feet into the water.

  “Is this your home?” Yong Kyu asked.

  “No, it’s far.” She lifted one finger and pointed into the air. “My home, in country. I came here one year ago.”

  “Whole family?”

  “No, my husband didn’t come.”

  “Husband? You are married?”

  “Yes, he’s a soldier, a sergeant.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “Hue.”

  “Your child?”

  “Sleeping in there. Pretty.” Sang smiled naturally and placed both palms to her cheek, making a gesture of sleeping. She looked happy.

  “This life, is it all right with you?”

  “What do you mean? My family—father, mother, sister, and baby—is together now, that’s very good. Everything is fine.”

  Sang dried Yong Kyu’s feet with a towel and then she helped him take off his jacket.

  “Twenty dollars.”

  Yong Kyu pulled out a crumpled twenty-dollar military note. She took the money and turned to leave.

  “I’ll give the money to Madam and come back,” she said. “You need a fan?”

  “No, I’m fine.”

  “Well . . .” Sang lowered her voice and asked in a whisper, “You running away, too?”

  “Not me. You know about Stapley’s problem?”

  “Yes, but nobody can run away from here. I worry about him.”

  Yong Kyu lay back on the bed. “He’s going to make it.”

  The next morning when he woke up, Yong Kyu found that Leon already had crossed the river at dawn by the first military bus. Stapley was still knocked out by the booze, sleeping naked in the hammock in the backyard. Beneath his limp arm was an empty bottle.

  “Hey, wake up.”

  Yong Kyu shook the hammock, but Stapley only frowned. After trying a few times, Yong Kyu looked back and saw Sang standing there with a bucket of water in her hands.

  “Water is the only way.”

  “Won’t he be angry?”

  “It’s OK, we’ve done it before a few times.”

  Yong Kyu took the bucket and emptied it over Stapley’s head. Stapley shuddered and shook his head, then slowly sat up in the hammock and wiped his face with both hands.

  Yong Kyu tossed the bucket aside and said, “Sorry. It’s almost time to go and meet Toi.”

  “All right.” He then turned his blurry eyes to Sang.

  “No water to drink?”

  “You have civilian clothes, don’t you?” asked Yong Kyu.

  “Should be in the trunk.”

  “Put them on.”

  After a short while Stapley reappeared in the hall wearing work pants and a T-shirt. He had on a pair of sunglasses.

  “What do you say? Can I pass for a civilian?”

  “You look like one of our agents. Anyway, after you move to the new place, don’t even think about going outside during the day.”

  They drove the van slowly up through Somdomeh. Whenever a military truck passed by with a honk, Stapley gave them the finger to tease them.

  “Don’t do anything conspicuous.”

  “How the hell would they know?”

  “Your going AWOL has been reported up the command channels, and the investigations headquarters has your file by now. You have your ID card, don’t you?”

  “I tore it up.”

  Yong Kyu clicked his tongue and pulled the van over.

  “That wasn’t very smart! Now somebody can kill you and nobody will know about you. Look, without your ID card, what’s the point of babbling about traveling to a neutral country or hooking up with the AWOL rescue network? How can you convince anybody that you’re an American soldier?”

  Stapley just chuckled. “I don’t exist in Vietnam. Shit, they’ll believe I’m an American soldier when I show them the greenbacks in my pocket. US dollars mean US soldier.”

  “Without an ID, don’t hang out anywhere at night, just stay put in that house.”

  Yong Kyu threw both hands into the air as if to ask what else could be done, then took the wheel again. Shifting roughly, they moved into the first block of Somdomeh.

  “It’d be nice if you’d join me,” murmured Stapley.

  “Shut up.”

  As Toi had said, they came upon a souvenir shop with flags of all nations in the window. Like other shops on the block, there was a refrigerator and a couple of tables out front. When they walked up, an old man with messy hair and sleepy eyes asked, “Coca?”

  Yong Kyu nodded. He and Stapley sat side-by-side facing the street and sipped cans of Coke.

  “The lease is for one month. It’ll be hard to extend it.”

  Stapley looked sullen, then said, “All right. I understand the position you guys are in. It’ll be awkward for Leon, too. Da Nang is off-limits for him, so I guess he won’t be able to visit that often.”

  “You shouldn’t see each other again. Headquarters knows you are close and may expect him to contact you.”

  “All right. I’ll do anything to get on board a neutral country ship.”

  Yong Kyu waved his finger and said, “Well . . . you still wouldn’t be out of the woods then. Once you reached port, if you don’t have the right connections you could be handed straight over to the US embassy.”

  “What about getting help in Saigon?”

  “I’ve checked that out already. There are quite a few ships helping out AWOLs. There are quite a number of AWOLs from all over the country gathering down there. Why not try Saigon? Anyway, you still have plenty of time.”

  Stapley seemed far more dispirited than he had been the night before. His gloomy face was hanging low and he went on spinning the empty Coke can in his hands. Toi’s mercury-coated silver sunglasses came into view. With a quick glance at his wristwatch, he sat down in front of the two men.

  “Sorry I’m a little late.”

  “Say hello. Stapley, this is Toi.”

  With Yong Kyu’s introduction, they shook hands.

  “Where is it?”

  “Downtown.”

  “I know that. Where downtown?”

  “On the old market road, not far from my place.”

  They got into the van with Stapley in the back seat and crossed the bridge by the smokestack.

  “How did you find this place?”

  Toi let out a whistle as he steered. “I had a hell of a time finding it. The prior tenant was a technician from India. I know the landlord.”

&nb
sp; “And rent-free, you said?”

  “Right, instead . . .” Toi turned around and looked at Stapley, “instead he wants to cut a deal for some of the stuff coming out of Turen.”

  “I suppose that may have been your idea, too?”

  “Of course. All I have to do is deliver a few boxes at a time to him before we deposit the goods in the conex. That’s his only condition. And it’s only as long as Stapley stays there. The man said he also knows a way for a man to sneak out of Da Nang.”

  “Which road?” Stapley asked.

  “By sea,” Toi said, pointing off to the right.

  “Shit, might as well go by air,” muttered Stapley.

  But Toi said confidently, “A Vietnamese navy ship runs up here once a month from Nha Trang. The landlord’s son is a navy officer.”

  “But what about from Nha Trang?”

  “There are lots of vessels that run from Nha Trang to Saigon; the officer will set something up.”

  “How much?”

  “Ten thousand piasters, and then another five thousand when you get to Saigon.”

  “What do you say?” Yong Kyu asked, looking back at Stapley.

  “Sounds good enough.”

  The van slowly crawled along the old market road. As usual, the area was bustling with merchants. It was not an area where you were likely to see foreign soldiers in uniform. A place, Yog Kyu thought, where headquarters would be unlikely to search for an AWOL. But if Stapley were to be out wandering the streets, somebody would eventually notice him. They headed into a back alley where miscellaneous American goods were for sale. They went inside a two-story house that had all its windows shuttered. A man sitting in the hall got up to greet them.

  “He doesn’t speak English,” Toi said.

  “That’s going to be a problem,” Stapley said, concerned.

  “He knows simple phrases,” Toi said. “I’ll drop in every two or three days. Besides, he’ll call me if anything comes up.”

  The man led them up a set of squeaky stairs. He opened a door. The room inside was dark. He crossed the room and opened the shutters. Immediately the room became bright, and they saw that the room was directly visible to all the houses across the alley.