III. To turn the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” into a shining example to international friends forever

The virtues of “Uncle Ho” are not a self-generated or constant product. They are the result of the process of unceasing leadership, training, and self-improvement and always develop themselves to meet the requirements set by social life and the military build-up in each revolutionary period. In the current situation, apart from the tasks of training, combat readiness, and national protection, our Vietnam People’s Army (VPA) is assigned to take part in the United Nations peacekeeping, which is seen as a glorious mission. The VPA is entrusted with this new, extremely difficult task by the Party and the State as it is associated with the country’s status.

A special envoy of the UN presenting a peacekeeping officer of the VPA with the UN peace medal in the Central African Republic (photo: baoquocte.vn)

When performing the task, we are confronted with a large number of difficulties and challenges. More specifically, our force participating in the UN peacekeeping work in a multinational environment far from their country under complex natural, socio-political, and security conditions, while facing the risks of casualty. Our VPA’s units in the UN peacekeeping are under the command of the host countries’ Mission. Meanwhile, the hostile forces are stepping up the “peaceful evolution” strategy and encouraging “self-evolution,” “self-transformation,” and their trick of “depoliticising” our VPA in a bid to undermine our cadres and soldiers’ combat goal, ideal and faith in the Party and the socialist regime. All of those things have a considerable impact on the training and preservation of the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” within units of our VPA in general and our force in the UN peacekeeping in particular. Hence, it is really necessary to continue bringing into play the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” within our force taking part in the UN peacekeeping in order to turn them into a shining symbol to international friends.

To that end, first of all, we need to well conduct the work of propagation and education to raise our peacekeeping cadres and employees’ awareness of the Party’s foreign policy, their task in the UN peacekeeping, and the necessity of preserving and promoting the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” in this important task. The work of propagation and education must be aimed at rendering our cadres and employees participating in the UN peacekeeping fully aware of the Party’s foreign policy of independence, self-reliance, peace, cooperation, development, diversification, multilateralisation of international relations. The master project on Vietnam’s participation in the UN peacekeeping and the project on “the VPA’s participation in the UN peacekeeping in the period of 2014-2020 and beyond” should be introduced to those cadres and employees. Grounded on those documents, they will understand that their participation in the UN peacekeeping will greatly contribute to maintaining peace and stability on global and regional scales, and that many other countries around the world are deploying their forces to the UN peacekeeping operations in order to affirm their status and role for the international community. As a result, they will heighten their responsibility for taking part in the UN peacekeeping under the Vietnamese spirit and will and performing the VPA’s role in the international missions. To well fulfil the task and raise Vietnam’s status and prestige, it is vital to render the VPA’s peacekeeping cadres and employees fully aware of the necessity of preserving and bringing into play the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” when they perform peacekeeping tasks. The work of propagation and education must be centred on clarifying criteria for the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” in the new situation and analysing driving factors in our peacekeeping cadres and employees’ awareness, ideology, and sentiment so as to set out measures for preventing the bad factors from impacting the VPA’s prestige and the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers.” Moreover, due attention must be paid to making sure that our peacekeeping cadres and employees will all have political zeal, absolute loyalty to the Party, the country and the people, pure morality, and friendly relationships with host countries’ locals. They must remain steadfast against all difficulties and vigilant against the hostile forces’ enticement.

Second, we need to enhance the Party’s leadership over the VPA’s units in the UN peacekeeping. The Party’s leadership and education serve as a determining factor in our VPA’s maturity and victory, while playing a central role in preserving and bringing into play the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” during the process of building and developing the VPA. Hence, when deploying the VPA’s force to the UN peacekeeping, the Central Military Commission and the Ministry of National Defence always thoroughly grasp and strictly execute our Party and State’s viewpoints and guidelines on diplomacy and international integration and consider it as a political task of the VPA in the new period. Party committees and commands at all levels within the VPA formulate guidelines and measures for leadership over this task properly and effectively. Importance should be attached to carrying out the party and political work for the peacekeeping task. Consideration should be given to inspecting and supervising the task, drawing lessons, promoting good results, and settling weaknesses. In addition, due attention should be paid to selecting the form and scale of peacekeeping mission and the countries to which our force will be deployed in accordance with the Party’s foreign policy, the national benefits, Vietnam’s Constitution and law, the international law, and the UN’s Charter. Selecting South Sudan and the Central African Republic which are confronted with poverty, political instability, and ethnical, political conflicts to deploy our peacekeeping force is appropriate to the current situation. However, we must always carefully recruit staff members for the UN peacekeeping, ensuring that they have good political qualities, morality, professional competence, and knowledge of foreign languages. In the process, it is essential to express dynamism, proactiveness, and caution. We only deploy our peacekeeping force to the countries and regions which are decided by the UN, with the widespread support from the international community.

Third, via practical activities, we should train and improve the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” amongst our VPA’s peacekeeping force. The virtues, personalities, political zeal of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” are formed and perfected via their practical activities in the military environment. The more diverse and lively practical activities are the more brilliantly the virtues of revolutionary soldiers - “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” will shine. Therefore, our peacekeeping cadres and employees must be further assigned to training task, patrols, and mass mobilisation under the regulations by the UN and host countries. Besides, they should cooperate with local authorities in organising exchange programmes and helping locals with economic development and natural disaster, epidemic prevention and control. They should actively take part in overcoming war consequences and making peace. Our peacekeeping force shall not join coercion or military operations. We should ensure our VPA’s independent command of our peacekeeping force at the UN Missions according to the Memorandum of Understanding between Vietnam and the UN’s peacekeeping agency. Notable, the COVID-19 is sweeping the world, our peacekeeping force should actively participate in preventing and fighting this pandemic in order to minimise deaths and ensure the peaceful life of host countries’ people. In the process, it is necessary to opportunely encourage and reward individuals and collectives with outstanding achievements and fight against bad behaviours that negatively impact on the qualities of revolutionary soldiers - “Uncle Ho’s soldiers.”

Fourth, we should heighten cadres and employees’ role in preserving and bringing into play the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” when they take part in the UN peacekeeping. Peacekeeping cadres and employees should preserve and promote the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers” during the performance of their task and in their daily life. Each of them must raise their responsibility, dynamism, and activeness for training, improve their knowledge of foreign languages and international law, regulations and practices. Besides, they should enhance their professional competence. They should train and improve themselves according to the criteria set by the 12^th Politburo’s Directive 05-CT/TW and the Central Military Commission Standing Board’s Directive 87-CT/TVQU on “studying and emulating Ho Chi Minh’s ideology, ethics, and lifestyle” as well as the Campaign entitled “promoting tradition, devoting talent, and deserving to be Uncle Ho’s soldiers” in the new environment. Superiors must set good examples for inferiors to follow while cadres and party members must set patterns for employees to follow. Our peacekeeping cadres and employees must strictly observe the VPA’s discipline, the State’s law, international regulations, and host countries’ law. They should build up internal unity and help each other during the performance of peacekeeping task.

Fifth, it is important to closely cooperate with relevant ministries and sectors and the UN’s agencies. To make all necessary preparations (in our country) and successfully perform the task (at the UN Missions), the Vietnam Department of Peacekeeping Operations should proactively, closely cooperate with units taking part in the UN peacekeeping. Our competent offices, such as the Department of Operations, the Department of Politico-Military Training, and the Department of Propaganda and Training should cooperate with one another in training and equipping our peacekeeping cadres and employees with basic knowledge of the staff work and experiences in joining the UN Missions, while developing the operational plans for our peacekeeping force according to the criteria set by UN. Additionally, it is essential to enable our cadres and employees to understand the differences in nature between the UN peacekeeping force and multinational military coalitions. They must be acutely aware that the purpose of the UN peacekeeping operations is in line with the UN’s Charter and international law, for global and regional peace. Besides, we need to cooperate with relevant agencies of the UN in providing equipment, English training courses, and funds as the basis for improving our task performance. Military press agencies should actively, proactively have articles about good examples in preserving and promoting the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers.” They should conduct the work of propagation to render all Vietnamese and international people fully aware that our VPA’s participation in the UN peacekeeping will make contributions to defending our Homeland from afar by peaceful means.

To earn the title of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers,” generations of the VPA’s cadres and soldiers have surmounted a lot of difficulties and bravely fought all enemies under the leadership by our Party and President Ho Chi Minh, together with the support from our people. Bringing into play the noble virtues of “Uncle Ho’s soldiers,” the VPA’s peacekeeping cadres and employees will heighten their responsibility for improving themselves and turning those virtues into a shining symbol for international friends. (The end)

DO HONG LAM