1. See Hue-Tam Ho Tai, Introduction, this volume.

2. The North Vietnamese state's agenda accords with the actions of other nations. With the rise of the nation-state, the glorification of dead soldiers and war death through tombs of unknown soldiers, military funerals, memorial days, shrines for war dead, and other commemorative sites and activities has grown more elaborate. For examples, see Helen Hardacre, Shinto and the State, 1868–1988 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1989); Eric Hobsbawm, “Mass-Producing Traditions: Europe, 1870–1914,” in The Invention of Tradition, ed. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 263–307; Bruce Kapferer, Legends of People, Myths of State (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1988); George L. Mosse, Fallen Soldiers: Reshaping the Memory of the World Wars (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990); and Nina Tumarkin, The Living and the Dead (New York: Basic Books, 1994).

3. Thinh Liet commune is located approximately ten kilometers south of the center of Hanoi and is composed of the three villages of Giap Nhat, Giap Nhi, and Giap Tu. I conducted field research there from March 1991 to August 1992, from December 1993 to February 1994, and in July 1996 and July 1998.

4. See Mark Bradley, this volume.

5. Elements of resistance to state commemorative rites can be seen in the Vietnamese case in Shaun Kingsley Malarney, “The Limits of ‘State Functionalism'and the Reconstruction of Funerary Ritual in Contemporary Northern Vietnam,” American Ethnologist 23 (August 1996): 540–60; or, in the Chinese case, in Rubie Watson, ed., Memory, History, and Opposition under State Socialism (Sante Fe, N.M.: School of American Research Press, 1994).

6. Douglas Pike, PAVN: People's Army of Vietnam (New York: Da Capo Press, 1986), 13.

7. Ibid., 28ff.

8. Vietnam, Institute of Philosophy, Dang Ta Ban Ve Dao Duc [Our Party Discusses Ethics] (Hanoi: Uy Ban Khoa Hoc Xa Hoi Viet Nam, 1973), 269.

9. Ibid., 289.

10. Dang Chan Lieu and Le Kha Ke, Tu Dien Viet-Anh: Vietnamese-English Dictionary (Hanoi: NXB Uy Ban Khoa Hoc Xa Hoi, 1971), 371.

11. Vietnam, Dang Ta, 275.

12. Ibid., 272.

13. Ibid., 275.

14. Ibid.

15. Ibid.

16. Nguyen Q. Thang and Nguyen Ba The, Tu Dien Nhan Vat Lich Su Viet Nam [Dictionary of Vietnamese Historical Figures] (Hanoi: NXB Khoa Hoc Xa Hoi, 1991), 269.

17. Ho Chi Minh quoted in Pike, PAVN, 313.

18. Translation of the term pho ban chinh sach xa is difficult because technically, by designating the official as a “deputy” (pho), there would be a corresponding superior. However, this was not the case with this position. Since the position was devoted exclusively to the government's social policies for families with members in the military, I have chosen to translate it as “social policy officer” in order to reduce confusion.

19. The militia commander had a number of important responsibilities during this period, including organizing a local militia composed of men who were not serving in the military, ensuring that young people entered the military, and propagandizing about the honor of military service. It is important to note, however, that at least at the beginning of the American War, the military still enjoyed tremendous prestige. Part of this derived from its defeat of the French, but it had also been augmented by its high profile in postwar reconstruction. Phillip B. Davidson, Vietnam at War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 284.

20. See also Pike, PAVN, 315.

21. Ibid., 318.

22. For a discussion of the revolutionary reforms of funerals, see Malarney, “The Limits of ‘State Functionalism.'”

23. Ninh Binh, Cultural Service, Cong Tac Xay Dung Nep Song Moi, Con Nguoi Moi va Gia Dinh Tien Tien Chong My, Cuu Nuoc [The Task of Building the New Ways, the New Person and the Progressive Family in the War of National Salvation Against the Americans] (Ninh Binh: Ty Van Hoa Ninh Binh, 1968), 64.

24. Ibid.

25. Government of Vietnam, Nhung Van Ban ve Viec Cuoi, Viec Tang, Ngay Gio, Ngay Hoi [Documents on Weddings, Funerals, Death Anniversary and Public Festivals] (Hanoi: NXB Van Hoa, 1979), 24.

26. Those who died but were not martyrs would also receive these certificates.

27. Rendering the expression to quoc in English is difficult because literally it can be read as the ancestors'land or country, but it can also be fairly translated

28. The example of vinh du in a Hanoipublished dictionary reads, “Hi sinh cho To quoc la mot vinh du: It is an honour to lay down one's life for the fatherland” (Dang and Le, Tu Dien Viet-Anh, 762).

29. See Arthur P. Wolf “Gods, Ghosts, and Ancestors,” in Religion and Ritual in Chinese Society, ed. Arthur P. Wolf (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1974), 131–82.

30. In cases in which a young person dies but is thought to be of particular sacred potency, an altar might be built inside the family home to worship that spirit and bring its blessings onto the family. In Thinh Liet commune, no such altars have been built for dead soldiers. Concern about the depredations of wandering malevolent spirits is evident in the placement of a tray with bowls of rice porridge outside of the home during all funeral rites. This practice feeds the wandering ghosts but keeps them outside of the home and ancestral altar.

31. If a person dies outside of the home, the corpse and casket cannot be brought into the home, and all rites must be conducted in another location. Dying outside the home is such a concern that terminally ill Vietnamese are often granted permission to leave the hospital so they can return home to die.

32. This concern for the wholeness of the corpse is seen in other mortuary rites, such as the obsessive concern shown during the secondary burial ceremony (cai tang) to collect the deceased's every bone, including all hand, finger, and toe bones.

33. Bao Ninh, The Sorrow of War (London: Secker and Warburg, 1991), 21.

34. One interesting question raised by these innovative rites is why, given Vietnam's long history of warfare, they did not emerge earlier. Given a lack of historical materials on the subject, no answer can be given.

35. The Vietnamese government has never released figures for the number of its soldiers killed in the American War. During the war years, Vietnamese had no precise knowledge of the number of their soldiers killed. Conversely, the government did publish grossly exaggerated figures for the number of Americans killed during the war; such figures were prominently displayed in the Army Museum in Hanoi.

36. See, for example, Toan Anh, Nep Cu: Tin Nguong Viet Nam, vol. 1(Saigon: Hoa Dang, 1969), 62–63.

37. See Malarney “The Limits of ‘State Functionalism,'” for a fuller discussion.

38. Paper votive objects were not present in all ceremonies because the government suppressed their production. Some families still used them, despite official regulations. Food items, however, were universally present.

39. See Shaun Kingsley Malarney, “Ritual and Revolution in Viet Nam” (Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan, 1993), 308–59.

40. The fifteenth of the seventh lunar month is the Vietnamese All Soul's Day.

41. Such spirits can also be described with the term tho dia, in which the

42. One number frequently mentioned is three hundred thousand missing, but this can never be verified.

43. Xuan Cang and Ly Dang Cao, “Tim Mo Liet Si bang Phuong Phap Moi?” [“Discovering the Graves of War Dead by a New Method?”], The Gioi Moi, October 1996, 8–11.

44. Maurice Bloch and Jonathan Parry, “Introduction,” in Death and the Regeneration of Life, ed. Maurice Bloch and Jonathan Parry (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 4.

45. See Nina Tumarkin, Lenin Lives! The Lenin Cult in Soviet Russia (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1983).

46. See Shaun Kingsley Malarney, “The Emergent Cult of Ho Chi Minh? A Report on Religious Innovation in Contemporary Northern Viet Nam,” Asian Cultural Studies 22 (1996): 121–31.