In 1975, after the war, Ngọ moved to Ho Chi Minh City with her husband. In interviews in later years, she consistently stated that she agreed with the purpose of the scripts and never deviated from them she believed that the United States should not have sent troops to Vietnam and should have allowed the country to resolve its situation itself. Ngọ's broadcasts ran for a total of eight years, with her final broadcasts airing in 1973, when most of the American forces were leaving. But she was most effective when she did tell the truth and US Armed Forces Radio was fudging it. It wasn't that Hanoi Hannah always told the truth - she didn't. Armed Forces Radio lost the trust of many GIs when they were most isolated and vulnerable to enemy propaganda. According to war correspondent Don North:īy zapping the truth through an ostrich-like policy of censorship, deletions, and exaggerations U.S. Armed Forces Radio bulletins, and listened to Ngọ's bulletins for information from the U.S. It has been claimed that US forces in Vietnam distrusted the U.S. In reality, most of her information came from publications such as the US military newspaper, Stars and Stripes. There were exaggerated legends of her omniscience, with rumors that she would give clues about everything from specific future North Vietnamese attacks to soldiers' girlfriends cheating on them at home. They were sometimes impressed, however, when she mentioned the correct location of their unit (when they would "give a toast to her and throw beer cans at the radio"), named US casualties and welcomed Navy ships into port with their correct arrival details and crew members' names. įew if any desertions are thought to have happened because of her propaganda work and the soldiers "hooted at her scare tactics".
Nothing is more confused than to be ordered into a war to die or to be maimed for life without the faintest idea of what's going on. How are you, GI Joe? It seems to me that most of you are poorly informed about the going of the war, to say nothing about a correct explanation of your presence over here. One of her typical broadcasts began as follows: Then, Mailbag Time ('write us for the truth, friends'). Then a recording by an Asian soprano who sounds as if she's having her ears pierced. After the news is an editorial denouncing U.S. Ī January 1966 Newspaper Enterprise Association article by Tom Tiede described the program: She also received and played recorded messages from Americans who were against the war, saying later that she thought these messages were the most effective of all as "Americans will believe their own people rather than the adversary". US Navy ships and personnel were also targeted in her broadcasts, with Ngọ reading out the names of crew members and saying that they were all going to die.
She made three broadcasts a day, reading a list of newly killed or imprisoned Americans, and playing popular US anti-war songs in an effort to incite feelings of nostalgia and homesickness, attempting to persuade US GIs that the US involvement in the Vietnam War was unjust and immoral. Her scripts were written by the North Vietnamese Army and were intended to frighten and shame the soldiers into leaving their posts. Career ĭuring the Vietnam War, Ngọ became famous among US soldiers for her propaganda broadcasts on Radio Hanoi. At this time, she adopted the alias Thu Hương, meaning "autumn fragrance", as it was easier and shorter for her non-Vietnamese listeners.
One of her tutors and mentors at the station was Australian journalist Wilfred Burchett. In 1955, when she was 24 years old, she joined the Voice of Vietnam radio station and was chosen to read the English language newscast aimed at listeners in Asia's English-speaking countries. Her family provided her with private lessons in English. She later stated that she grew eager to learn English because of her desire to watch her favorite films such as Gone with the Wind without subtitles. Her father, Trịnh Định Kính, was a successful businessman who owned the largest glass factory in French Indochina.