The Brigade 71 under the Army Corps 4 was founded on June 15^th, 1971 as our first main air defence unit on the Southern battlefield. Over the past 50 years of construction, combat and development, cadres and soldiers of the Brigade have fought the enemies all over the Southeastern and Cambodian battlefields, building up the tradition of “resilience, courage, unity, coordination, self-reliance, and invincibility,” greatly contributing to the nation’s general victory. With its achievements, the Brigade has been given the title of Hero of the People’s Armed Forces and many other noble rewards by the State. Over the years, the Brigade’s Party Committee and Command have promoted the synergy for the building of a comprehensively strong unit and obtained a lot of positive results. That has provided a solid foundation for the Brigade to be selected as a role model for the building of an “ exemplarily, typically comprehensively strong unit.” It is an honour, a heavy task, and an opportunity for the Brigade to develop itself to meet the requirements set by the Homeland protection in the new situation. Therefore, the Brigade’s Party Committee and Command have designed a specialised resolution and action plan with specific objectives to perform this task in tandem with training, combat readiness, and the defence of airspace in the Southeast to deserve to be the main air defence unit of the Southern main, mobile Army Corps.

First of all, emphasis has been placed on building an “exemplarily, typically” politically strong Brigade. Building a politically strong unit will provide a foundation for raising the synergy and help encourage cadres and soldiers to surmount all difficulties and fulfil their assigned task. For air defence troops, it becomes extremely important as they always have to maintain combat readiness at a very high and strict level. Hence, the Brigade has continued enhancing the Project on “renewing political education at military units in the new period.” Significance has been attached to educating troops, particularly cadres and party members to grasp the Party’s military-defence strategies, distinguish between partners and opponents, master enemies’ plots, artifices, and hi-tech warfare, and keep their faith in our materiel and combat method as the basis for building up air defence troops’ combat resolve and sprit of “daring to fight, being determined to fight, and being determined to win.” In the process, the Brigade has closely combined task-related education with history education, while effectively executing the Campaign entitled “promoting tradition, devoting talent, deserving to be Uncle Ho’s soldiers” in the new period and the Determination to Win Emulation Movement via practical models, such as “one political question everyday and one typical situation on a weekly basis,” and “one piece of Uncle Ho’s teachings on a daily basis.” Doing so has enabled the Brigade to improve its cadres and soldiers’ political zeal, revolutionary vigilance, and determination to weather all hardships and successfully fulfil all duties.

The Brigade’s Party Committee for the 2020-2025 tenure

The Party building serves as the key to the building of an “exemplarily, typically” politically strong Brigade. Being fully aware of that task, the Brigade’s Party Committee has frequently consolidated all-level party committees and organisations, especially at grass-roots level, strictly maintained party meetings, widely exercised democracy, and enhanced the efficiency of the inspection and supervision work, while building a contingent of cadres and party members as  role models in their work, morality and lifestyle. In this regard, importance has been attached to improving cadres and party members’ ability to concretise higher echelons’ resolutions and develop resolutions at their own level, particularly action plans for realising all-level party congresses’ resolutions for the 2020-2025. Due attention has been paid to studying and grasping the 13^th National Party Congress’ Resolution to arouse the aspirations for a powerful Military, wealthy nation, and the people’s happiness as an incentive to the Brigade’s task performance. Cadres and party members of the Brigade have exercised “self-review” and “self-correction” in line with the 12^th Politburo’s Directive 05-CT/TW, dated May 15^th, 2016 via specific models and deeds to make contributions to the Party building and rectification. Doing so has allowed the Brigade to opportunely identify and rectify its cadres and party members’ weaknesses in their leadership, direction and task performance. In 2021, all cadres and party members of the Brigade shall fulfil their task, 95% of them and all key cadres shall successfully fulfil their task, and the Brigade’s Party Organisation shall “excellently fulfil its task.”

As the main air defence force of the Army Corps, the Brigade has considered training and combat readiness as its central political task and the most important criteria for the building of an “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong unit. Hence, it has frequently stringently maintained the order for combat readiness duty at all levels, closely managed the airspace, proactively developed, completed, and practised the system of combat plans and projects, and sufficiently prepared personnel and means to opportunely deal with situations and avoid passivity. It has closely collaborated with other air defence units in organising battlefields, reconnaissance patrols, and air warning systems as well as receiving and releasing intelligence sufficiently and opportunely. Great value has been attached to forming a solid, inter-connected, flexible, in-depth air defence posture capable of successfully handling situations in the air. Additionally, the Brigade has renewed and improved the training work according to the Central Military Commission’s Resolution 765-NQ/QUTW and Conclusion 60-KL/QUTW as well as the Resolution 278-NQ/ĐU by the Army Corps 4’s Party Committee on “raising the quality of training in the period of 2015-2020 and beyond” via various measures. It has required its affiliates to renew the management, operation, contents, and forms of training and exercises according to the Party’s new military-defence thoughts. In the training process, it has always adhered to the motto of “basics, practicality and thorough grasp,” while organising synchronous, intensive training relevant to combat reality. Great weight has been added to improving the capabilities in giving advice and directing training and exercises among cadres of the Brigade’s offices. As for detachment-level cadres, emphasis has been placed on enhancing their ability to deal with situations on the battlefield. Concerning combat groups and teams, due attention has been paid to training individual skills and combat coordination, “taking tactical training as the centre, considering technical training as the basis, and ensuring that troops would be capable of closely managing the airspace and dealing with situations in the air.” Units and offices of the Brigade have been asked to train their troops to master independent combat and operations within the ground-force formation, practise projects to protect targets, organise exercises with other air defence forces within defensive zones, and combine military training with political education and discipline management. In 2021, all staff members and units within the Brigade shall pass training tests, 80% of them shall achieve merit or distinction, and the Brigade shall earn the title of good training unit.

Being stationed in the area with a lot of industrial zones, in addition to advantages, the Brigade’s cadres and soldiers have been impacted by the dark side of the market economy and social evils. Therefore, to build an “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong unit, the Brigade has focused on military standard order building and discipline management. To that end, it has grasped resolutions and directives by higher echelons on military standard order building and discipline management. Superiors and offices have been required to set good examples for subordinates and units to follow. Besides, due attention has been paid to implementing the law education programme, maintaining the Legal Study Day and building the law-abiding culture and awareness amongst cadres and soldiers. In the process, the Brigade has adopted methods and models of visual, easy-to-understand, easy-to-remember education, such as “one article of law on a weekly basis,” “team of legal and psychological consultation,” and forum. Units have proactively cooperated with families and localities in managing their staff members, assigned cadres and party members to help soldiers in difficulty or with poor task performance, and closely managed troops on national holidays, after each training period, and during business trips. At the same time, they have promoted the role of Youth Unions and Women’s Unions in organising sports and artistic programmes in rest hours and days off.

In addition to the above-mentioned measures, the Brigade has improved the quality of technical and logistics support. There is a fact that the Brigade has a large number of weapons and equipment which have been in use for ages. Thus, the Brigade has directed its technical office to strictly maintain the regulations on decentralising technical support and the order for maintenance and repair. Refresher courses have been held to improve skills of technical staff and drivers. Due attention has been paid to executing the Campaign titled “managing and exploiting weapons and technical equipment effectively, sustainably, safely, economically, and ensuring traffic safety.” All vehicles of the Brigades have always been ready for manoeuvre, particularly for the A2 mission. As for the logistics work, the Brigade has maintained reserves of materials at each level, while stepping up animal and crop husbandry to create resources for building “bright, green, clean, scenic” barracks and taking care of troop health.

Bringing into play its heroic tradition, the Air Defence Brigade 71 will strive to accomplish the building of an “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong unit, increase its synergy and combat power, and ensure the absolute safety in the air to make contributions to improving the Corps’ task performance in both peacetime and wartime.

Sr. Col. NGUYEN DINH DAO, Commander of the Brigade