South Korean Troops Committed a Massacre 55 Years Ago. A Court Finally Found Them Responsible.

SEOUL — In a landmark ruling, the South Korean government was ordered by a court on Tuesday to compensate a Vietnamese survivor of atrocities committed by Korean troops during the war in Vietnam.

The decision marks the first time a South Korean court has acknowledged the nation’s culpability over mass killings in the 1960s in the villages of Phong Nhi and Phong Nhat in Central Vietnam.

In 1968, 8-year-old Nguyen Thi Thanh witnessed South Korean marines descend upon her village of Phong Nhi, killing over 70 civilians, including five members of her family. Thanh was shot in the stomach but survived the massacre.

Largely ignored by both South Korean and Vietnamese authorities, it would take more than 50 years before Thanh received justice for the brutality she experienced that day. 

This week, the Seoul Central District Court granted compensation to the 62-year-old, adding that the soldiers’ actions were “clearly illegal.” The court also rejected arguments made by government lawyers that the statute of limitations for Thanh’s case had expired.

“I couldn’t be happier that the souls [from those killed in the massacre] can now rest in peace,” Thanh said in a video clip her lawyers shared with reporters after the judgment.

In April 2020, Thanh filed a lawsuit against the South Korean government for their role in the massacre, seeking an official apology and some 30 million won ($23,900)—the minimum amount required to receive a written judgment from the court.

In August, Thanh and her 82-year-old uncle, Nguyen Duc Choi, became the first Vietnamese to testify in front of a South Korean court for these crimes. At that hearing, Thanh delivered emotive testimony recalling the moment she heard that her mother was found dead among a pile of bodies.

“It was too painful,” the 62-year-old said in tears, struggling to speak. “It was so unbearable that I blamed [myself]; why didn’t they kill me with my mother?”

Despite decades of calls from activists, the voices of Vietnamese survivors have been brushed aside by both the Vietnamese and South Korean governments as the two countries seek to deepen economic cooperation.

While Seoul has issued apologetic statements in the past, expressing regret “for the unfortunate history between the two countries,” it has fallen short of explicitly acknowledging the massacres. In 2019, the Ministry of National Defense even claimed that it had no records of civilian massacres conducted by its forces.

But Lim Jae-sung, Thanh’s lawyer, told VICE World News last year that he was confident he would prove South Korea’s culpability in the mass killings.

“There are victims’ testimonies and a perpetrator’s testimony, eyewitnesses, photos, and materials from the U.S. military,” he said. “On top of it, there are official documents in Vietnam because this was an unusual case.”

Seoul deployed some 320,000 South Korean troops to Vietnam between 1964 and 1973, constituting the largest foreign force, besides the U.S., backing South Vietnam against the communist North.

During the South Korean military’s decade-long presence in Vietnam, the massacres were among the most well-documented and egregious atrocities committed by the country’s troops. Shortly after the killings, the U.S. military initiated an investigation, collecting eyewitness testimonies and photos from the scene.

The investigation was ultimately dropped after the South Korean military denied the killings occurred, but five decades on, evidence collected from that time has proven crucial to Thanh’s case.

Lim said this week’s judgment was a “complete victory” for his team. “I don’t see anything that doesn’t make sense and it doesn’t leave anything to be desired,” he told VICE World News.

He added in a briefing that the outcome was “meaningful” because the judiciary confirmed for the first time that there was an illegal act. When contacted by VICE World News on Wednesday, the Ministry of National Defense said that it will “review the next steps in consultation with relevant agencies.”

The judgment has also been applauded by rights groups in South Korea, who saw the result as a crucial first step in similar reparations for other survivors. In a collective statement issued on Wednesday, South Korean civic groups celebrated the landmark ruling—including the Korea-Vietnam Peace Foundation, an NGO raising awareness of South Korean atrocities during the war in Vietnam.

“Nguyen Thi Thanh is not the only survivor of the massacre in Vietnam who wants to know the truth,” said the statement. “We hope that Thanh’s lawsuit for state compensation for the victims of the war will serve as an opportunity for South Korean society to reflect and ponder more deeply and diversely on [other issues related to the war in Vietnam].”

Ryu Jin-seong, a South Korean veteran from the marine unit that committed the massacre in the villages, was a key witness in Thanh’s case against the government. 

He testified in a public hearing in 2021 that his troops had entered Thanh’s village after his team was fired upon from that direction.

“When I question myself if we did fight for peace and freedom in Vietnam, I feel like we did it in vain,” Ryu said in a briefing on Jan. 11.

“This is a matter of conscience as a human being. The government’s handling of the incident will define our country moving forward.”

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