'City without joy' – Hue: 1968

NARRATOR: The only bridge across the Perfume River from the south bank of Hue to the north bank is by way of these flimsy pontoons. In the past few days, thousands of refugees have flocked across it, escaping from the furious battle which has turned the ancient imperial capital of Vietnam into the shattered shell of a once proud and graceful city. The city, its inner citadel and its university are at the heart of the Vietnamese tradition, and they harbour strongly nationalist feelings. Because of this, Hue was the ideal place for the Communists to make what was, in essence, a political move when, at the end of January, two regular units of North Vietnamese infantry infiltrated the city and captured the citadel. How much support they received from the population is impossible to estimate. The price of that support has been the almost total destruction of the city and the deaths of nearly 4,000 civilians.

NARRATOR: Here at the Imperial Palace, the lily-ponds are full of debris, the trees have been smashed, the gardens full of shell holes and the courtyard here a litter of mortar fragments, stones, bricks, all thrown all over the place, but the palace could be in worse shape. It could have been more heavily damaged, and one of the reasons for this is that the Americans and the South Vietnamese deliberately restrained from throwing everything at it as they could have done, but at a price. The cost to the Americans: 119 dead and nearly 1,000 wounded. The cost to the South Vietnamese about 400, over 400 killed and something like 2,000 wounded.

NARRATOR: The palace survived, but many humbler houses didn't. Without a roof to keep off the rain, hundreds of homeless continued to cross the Perfume River in search of refuge on the south bank. It is the last journey for some. For others, like this woman, wounded and perhaps the only survivor of her family, life itself must seem to have come to an end.

NARRATOR: When the French were here, they used to call the road that runs from Hue northwards towards Hanoi the Street without Joy. Well, the city of Hue itself has now become a city without joy.

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