Artillery Brigade 168 (Military Region 2) is tasked with maintaining training and combat readiness and improving its synergy and manoeuvrability for both regular and irregular missions. In the process, a part from advantages, the Brigade has been faced with a lot of difficulties. Its cadres, particularly at platoon and company levels, have yet to be experienced in managing and commanding troops; its soldiers are mainly ethnic minorities from different religions, different educational backgrounds, and difficult family circumstances. Political security and social order and safety within its stationed areas are confronted with potential destabilising factors. The dark side of the economy market, the Internet, and social networks have been making multidimensional impacts on troops’ awareness, ideology, and lifestyle. Against that backdrop, in order to enable its cadres and soldiers to comply with the Military’s discipline and the State’s law, make its Party Organisation pure, strong, and build an “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong Unit with great synergy and combat readiness for successfully fulfilling all assigned tasks, the Brigade has stepped up law dissemination and education work as a highly effective solution.

A media program designed by the Brigade to raise public awareness of HIV/AIDS prevention and control (photo: qdnd.vn)

To that end, party committees and commands of the Brigade and its affiliates have strengthened their leadership and direction and promoting a sense of responsibility among key cadres at all levels over law dissemination and education. Under higher echelons’ guidance, resolutions, and directives on law dissemination and education, regularity building, discipline management, and safety assurance, particularly Directive 08-CT/ĐU, dated 26 June 2023, by the Military Region Party Committee Standing Board on raising the quality of law and discipline education and safety assurance within the Military Region’s armed forces and Conclusion 244-KL/ĐU, dated 7 November 2023, by the Military Region Party Committee Standing Board on tightening discipline and ensuring safety within the Military Region’s armed forces, party committees and commands at all levels have developed specialised resolutions on regularity building and discipline management associated with law propagation, dissemination, and education, while including measures of leadership over this work in their annual, half-year, and monthly resolutions. Party committee members have been assigned to direct this work in a close, scientific, uniform, effective way. Regular inspections and evaluations of the performance of this work have been conducted to opportunely supplement measures relevant to situational developments and troops’ tasks and awareness.

Grounded on yearly and quarterly plans for coordination in law dissemination and education by the Military Region’s Law Dissemination and Education Council, the Brigade has directed its political bureau to design and execute action programs and plans for all groups of troops. Keeping a close watch on situational developments, offices and units across the Brigade have supplemented content of law dissemination and education in a comprehensive but focalised, proper way. To handle the starchy nature of law propagation, dissemination, and education, make this work more attractive, and instil law and discipline into all troops, the Brigade has attached great value to improving knowledge, competence, and methodology of communicators and rapporteurs as the core force and deciding factor in the quality and effectiveness of this important work. The Brigade has selected cadres with proper qualities and capabilities from its offices and units to organise refresher courses for this force; the political bureau has strictly maintained regulations on approving lesson plans and lectures to ensure that each propagation campaign would be in accordance with each group of troops and easy for troops to understand, remember, and realise. Contests, final and preliminary reviews, and evaluations at each level have been carried out closely to draw lessons, seek new approaches, and opportunely reward and commend collectives and individuals with effective and creative ways for successfully fulfilling the task.

Additionally, the Brigade has attached significance to renewing and flexibly employing forms of law propagation, dissemination, and education relevant to the characteristics and mentality of troops, particularly its ethnic minority soldiers. Offices and units have stepped up the application of forms and measures of visual propagation and education; troops have been gathered together to watch videos and programs, such as “Military Region 2’s armed forces promote tradition, strictly maintain discipline, forever deserve to be Uncle Ho’s Soldiers”, “Uncle Ho’s Soldiers - Soldiers of the people, glory and responsibilities”, “A deserving sentence and belated confessions”, “Culture - the foundation for building troops’ dignity”, along with live television program on the launch of database of legal documents on military and defence work; troops have been also encouraged to take part in the art show in response to the “Legal Day of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam” and the model entitled “One legal question on a daily basis”. At the same time, law dissemination and education have been included in meetings, news briefings, club gatherings, organisations’ routine activities, internal broadcast programs, and the forum entitled “Discipline is the Military’s power” from company to brigade levels. The Brigade has frequently promoted the role of cultural institutions, such as library, reading room, Ho Chi Minh’s hall, and legal bookcase in law propagation and education. Up to now, all battalions of the Brigade have established their own legal bookcase under regulations, with nearly 200 legal books, thereby meeting their troops’ demands for legal study. The Brigade has effectively maintained the Political and Cultural Day and the Legal Study Day on a monthly basis. It has also well organised monthly democratic dialogues between all-level commanders and soldiers to grasp troops’ aspirations and opportunely settle emerging ideological issues.

To bring about a transformation from awareness into action among its troops, the Brigade has stepped up measures to make itself “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong. While thoroughly grasping relevant orders and directives, offices and units across the Brigade have stringently maintained regulations on regularity building, discipline management, guard, military courtesies, and traffic safety, especially with the prohibition of any alcohol levels when taking part in road traffic. The building of comprehensively strong units has been aligned with the building of pure, strong party organisations; every individual has been required to write their commitment to well performing their assigned tasks and not to violating traffic regulations or social evils. Besides, the Brigade has enhanced the study and following of Ho Chi Minh’s ideology, ethics, and lifestyle, the Campaign on promoting tradition, devoting talent, deserving to be “Uncle Ho’s Soldiers” in the new era, and the Determined to Win Emulation Movement to create strong spillover effects on its troops’ law-abiding awareness and culture. As the Brigade is equipped with a large quantity of weapons and technical equipment, its troops regularly work on military hardware and explosives, with strict safety regulations, especially during training and exercises. Thus, all-level party committees and commands have always focused their leadership and direction on inspecting and stringently maintaining regulations on weaponry management and safety assurance, stepping up the Campaign on “managing and exploiting weapons and technical equipment effectively, sustainably, safely, economically, and ensuring traffic safety”.

In response to negative impacts from the outside, the Brigade has collaborated with the Military Region’s Procuracy and Military Court to conduct law propagation, dissemination, and education for its cadres and soldiers, while providing information about crime situation and disciplinary violations across the entire Military and within the Military Region’s armed forces to orientate its troops’ ideology and raise its troops’ law-abiding awareness. At the same time, it has coordinated with local party committees, authorities, and sectors as well as its twinning units to sign and implement Project 1371 on “promoting the role of the People’s Army in conducting law dissemination and education and encouraging the people to observe law at grass-roots level for the period of 2021 - 2027” via diverse, attractive forms; art exchange programs have been co-organised to create a joyful atmosphere and a favourable environment for troop management, education, and training.

Thanks to those above-mentioned measures and approaches, the Brigade has achieved high effectiveness in law dissemination, making a solid positive change in its troops’ law-abiding awareness, instilling the rule of law into each cadre and soldier; there has been a reduction in disciplinary violations committed by its troops; no serious disciplinary violations have been recorded; the rate of normal disciplinary violations has been below 0.2%. The Brigade Party Organisation has been rated pure and strong, while the Brigade has been recognised as an “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong Unit for many consecutive years. The Brigade has been given Emulation Flag in the Determined to Win Emulation Movement by the Military Region Command and the Ministry of National Defence. That is an important foundation for the Brigade to continue to well perform all assigned tasks and bolster the image of “Uncle Ho’s Soldiers” in the new era and its tradition of “unity, discipline, manoeuvrability, victory”.

Sr. Col. NGUYEN HONG TIEN

Political Commissar of the Brigade