Military Library was founded on November 15^th, 1957 under a directive by the General Military Commission, serving as a state-level professional library in the military and defence and Fatherland protection field. It is the leading professional agency of the Military’s library system, functioning as a consultant  to Chiefs of the General Political Department (GPD) on library and publication work in the Military. It is tasked with collecting and archiving military and defence books and newspapers, receiving copies of publications across the Military, providing information and documents, serving scientific research work, supplementing books in a focalised manner, orientating book reading, developing the book reading movement in the Military, improving troops’ cultural and mental life, and providing professional instructions and training for cadres and employees of the Military’s library system. Over the past 65 years, under the direct leadership and direction of the GPD, thanks to their proactiveness and creativity, the Party Committee, Board of Directors, cadres, party members, and employees of the Military Library have always strived to overcome difficulties to successfully fulfil all assigned tasks. Doing so has helped widely and deeply disseminate viewpoints, guidelines, and policies of our Party, State, and Military, build the movement on reading, studying, and following books and newspapers, create healthy and wholesome cultural activities, orientate troops’ ideology, and promote patriotism and national pride amongst troops and citizens. With those achievements, the Military Library was given 2 Military Exploit Orders (Third Class in 1982, Second Class in 1984), 3 Fatherland Protection Orders (Third Class in 2022, Second Class in 2007, First Class in 2017), 1 Second-Class Labour Order (1992), 1 Second-Class Feat-of-Arms Order (2002), and many other noble rewards by the State.

Deputy Chief of the GPD visits a book exhibition of the Military Library

The building of a revolutionary, regular, highly-skilled, gradually modernised Viet Nam People’s Army (VPA) in the period of knowledge-based economy development and international integration necessitate the Military Library making itself increasingly modern, promoting its role as the leading professional agency of the VPA’s library system, and acting as a sharp instrument in the party and political work to contribute to building a politically strong VPA for Fatherland construction and protection in the new situation. Bringing into play the achievements in 65 years of construction and development, the Military Library’s Party Committee and Board of Directors will focus their leadership and direction on building a comprehensively strong agency capable of successfully fulfilling all assigned tasks via synchronous measures.

First of all, building the Military Library a politically strong agency as a core, consistent, decisive measures. Grounded on higher echelons’ guidance, the Military Library’s Party Committee and Board of Directors will concentrate their leadership and direction on sufficiently implementing political education plans and programmes for all staff members. Emphasis will be placed on rendering all cadres, employees, and soldiers fully aware of the Party’s viewpoints and guidelines on Fatherland defence in the new situation and tasks of the VPA and the Military Library. Political education will be closely combined with orientating, managing, assessing, and classifying troops’ ideology. In addition, great value will be attached to fighting against distortions of our Party, State, and VPA as well as the “peaceful evolution” strategy by hostile forces. Party committees and cells will strengthen their leadership over the building of typically pure, strong party organisations, a contingent of cadres and party members, and strong mass organisations and soldiers’ councils. At the same time, due regard will be paid to enhancing the Determination to Win Emulation Movement, the study and following of Ho Chi Minh’s ideology, morality, and style, the Campaign “promoting tradition, devoting talent, deserving to be Uncle Ho’s Soldiers” in the new period, and other campaigns and emulation movements launched by sectors and authorities. Doing so will contribute to improving political zeal and ideological steadfastness without “self-evolution” and “self-transformation” amongst cadres, party members, and the masses within the Military Library and making them clearly understand advantages and difficulties, build up their resolve, professional ethics, and working method, remain united, responsible, and enthusiastic, readily undertake and successfully fulfil all assigned tasks.

Being imbued with Uncle Ho’s teachings that “cadres are at the root of every work”, the Military Library’s Party Committee and Board of Directors will give priority to training, retraining, and training cooperation to improve cadres and employees’ knowledge of information technology, foreign languages, and library work to master modern technology equipment. Besides, greater importance will be attached to training human resources capable of building and administrating digital libraries and a lean, compact, strong force specialised in cyber administration and security as a supplement to the VPA to meet the requirements set by combat and combat readiness in information and cyber warfare. While closely following steps of personnel work, the Board of Directors will attach significance to improving working environment and remuneration policies to attract talents and encourage its cadres and employees to devote themselves to the VPA, thereby making contributions to smoothly, effectively running every work of the Military Library.

To meet the more demanding task requirements, the Military Library’s Party Committee and Board of Directors will focus on directing, guiding, managing, and effectively implementing activities within the Military Library and its affiliates across the VPA. This is the central measure aimed at asserting the Military Library’s role as the leading professional agency within the VPA’s library system and creating a solid premise for building the Military Library into a modern digital library and key data centre of the military library network. To do so, the Military Library’s Party Committee and Board of Directors will direct party committees and cells to adhere to functions and tasks of the Military Library and its affiliates to focus on developing and executing plans to supplement information resources in accordance with Viet Nam’s military and defence practice. Great weight will be added to raising the quality of contents of materials, diversifying sources of materials, particular books and online newspapers, proactively exploiting and sharing information resources with information agencies and libraries both inside and outside the VPA. At the same time, the Military Library will strive to standardise its work process and achieve national and international technical standards relating to library work to guarantee uniformity and scienceness.

In response to multidimensional information nowadays, the Military Library’s Party Committee and Board of Directors will direct its subordinate departments to proactively adhere to the situation on domestic and global scales and carefully compile publications in a good-quality, topical, and political orientation. The Military Library will well maintain its services for readers and combine on-the-spot traditional services with modern, remote services. It will diversify its information resources, services, and forms of introducing books, newspapers, and materials. It will increase the number of target readers and intensify the circulation of books and newspapers to grass-roots level units to satisfy troops’ needs. It will proactively advise Commanders of the GPD on applying information technology and digital transformation within itself and the VPA’s library system towards data link and integration as well as the common exploitation of information resources, while strictly conforming to regulations on information safety by the State and the Ministry of National Defence. At the same time, it will concentrate on supplementing books under regulations of the Ministry of National Defence on standards of cultural and mental life in the VPA, maintain political orientations, and ensure the quality and quantity of materials. In the process of book dissemination, it will proactively cooperate with competent offices in closely appraising contents of books prior to reception and quickly distribute materials to units. It will advise and coordinate with units to improve the quality of book dissemination and introduction on the annual Book Day of Viet Nam (April 21^st) and anniversaries of the Party, the State, and the Military.

In addition to professional work, the Military Library’s Party Committee and Board of Directors will focus their leadership and direction on military standard order building and discipline management. To that end, they will direct departments and committees to regularly grasp and strictly follow the VPA’s regulations on military standard order building and discipline management. The Military Library will stringently maintain regulations on work, daily and weekly meetings, and headquarters, command, and professional duty. It will resolutely prevent and strictly settle violations of the VPA’s discipline and the State’s laws. It will strive for zero violation of discipline and traffic safety, which has been achieved for many consecutive years. It will actively upgrade the system of panels and slogans relating to discipline management in a synchronous, uniform manner, improve its barracks, and build an exemplary cultural lifestyle as the basis for making itself “regular, green, clean, scenic” and creating the synergy for the successful fulfilment of all assigned tasks.

Those above-mentioned measures for building an “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong agency will continue making a huge positive change in the Military Library’s synergy and task performance and contributing to orientating troops’ ideology, developing reading culture, raising political, cultural, spiritual awareness of cadres and soldiers across the Military, and building a politically strong VPA.

Colonel MAC THUY DUONG, Director of the Military Library