Given its tradition of 75 years’ building and development, the Military Branch of Criminal Investigation has been adopting synchronous, drastic measures to successfully fulfil its functions and missions and strictly comply with discipline and rules, contributing to building an adept, compact, strong military, advancing straight to modernity and capable of firmly safeguarding the socialist Vietnam Fatherland in any situations.

Facing the pressing demand of the resistance war against the French colonialists, on 19 November 1948, President Ho Chi Minh signed Decree No. 258/SL on the “Organisation and missions of the Military Law Public Security in the resistance war against France,” marking the birth of the Military Branch of Criminal Investigation (MBCI) today. Over revolutionary stages, MBCI has developed ceaselessly and become a complete system, including investigation agencies, jails, and remand centres. Given its role as the leading criminal investigation agency in the military, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) is under the absolute, direct leadership of the Central Military Commission (CMC) and Ministry of National Defence (MND). The General Staff exercises its military, defence, and administrative management of the CID. The CID has a system of criminal investigation agencies directly subordinate to the General Staff, general departments, military regions, services, the Border Guard Soldier, army corps, and arms.

Maj. Gen. Huy speaks at the launch of an emulation movement of the Criminal Investigation Department

To meet political demands and missions of the revolution in each period, MBCI has been tasked with presiding over advising the CMC, leaders of the MND, party committees, and commanders of departments and units about policies and measures to prevent and combat violations of law and criminal crime, manage violations and crimes relating to the military; directly investigating crimes within their competence; managing military personnel on remand and enforcing criminal judgements in the military; managing the MND Criminal Technical Expertise Agency; acting as the Standing Agency of the MND 1389 Steering Commission on implementing the National Programme for Crime, Drugs Prevention and Control in the Military; developing and managing the corps of criminal investigation cadres throughout the military; and performing other missions. Additionally, in certain historical periods, MBCI was assigned to supervise discipline compliance; control the military police; manage and re-educate prisoners after the end of the war; investigate reactionary crime; investigate military personnel who had surrendered the enemy in the resistance war against U.S. for national salvation; instruct fire and explosion prevention and control; search and return remains of American soldiers missing in action by the MND.

During the course of 75 years’ building, combat, and development, generations of the MBCI cadres and soldiers have constantly shown their boundless faithfulness to the Fatherland, Party, State, and people; been dedicated to their work and ready to overcome hardship and to sacrifice their lives; been united, creative, ingenious, and flexible in the fight against violation and crime; obeyed the law, respected justice, and exercised public-mindedness and selflessness in order to create overall power to successfully accomplish all assigned tasks. Given these outstanding achievements, MBCI has been awarded many noble prizes by the Party and State as well as many certificates of merit by the Government, MND, Ministry of Public Security (MPS), Supreme People’s Procuracy, Supreme People’s Court, and other commissions, ministries, and branches.

In the coming years, our country continues to implement reform in the context of rapid, complex developments in international, regional security and politics. Imperialism, hostile forces, and reactionaries make every effort to depoliticise the military. Adverse effects of the market economy and problems pertaining to rural security, nontraditional security, and social evils on the military environment make violation of law increase and evolve in a complex manner. The situation requires strengthening of discipline, rules, and military, political institutions in the military, including the Organ of Justice, which aims to promote legislation, maintain discipline and regulations, enhance combat power of the military, and defeat the plot and act of “peaceful evolution” of hostile forces. Therefore, with its assigned functions and missions, together with the entire military, MBCI needs to focus on implementing the following major solutions successfully.

First, it is necessary to proactively advise the CMC and MND to lead, direct, and effectively promote compliance with discipline and law as well as crime prevention and control. Effort must be put into advising how to lead and instruct prevention and response to violations of discipline and law and criminal crime within competence, aiming for strengthening discipline, regulations, and combat power of the military. With its role as the Standing Agency of the MND 1389 Steering Commission, the CID continues to recommend the CMC and leaders of the MND to concretise and carry out plans and programmes of the Government on crime prevention and control; drugs prevention and control; prevention and response to human trafficking; combat of corruption, smuggling, trade fraud, production and trafficking of counterfeit products, wastefulness; practice of thrift in the military. In the short run, the entire branch should perfect, adopt, and effectively implement the sub-project on “Improving function, mission, authority, and organisational model of the Military Branch of Criminal Investigation by 2030 with vision for 2045, making it competent to conduct judicial reform and build a revolutionary, regular, elite, modern military,” and solutions to promote the effectiveness of criminal investigation activity in Vietnam People’s Army (VPA), thereby bettering its function, mission, and organisation in an adept, compact, professional, highly qualified, efficient, effective direction, meeting requirements of judicial reform and the cause of building and modernising the VPA in the current revolutionary period.

Coordinate with Lao functional force to arrest the criminal

Second, building a corps of high-quality MBCI cadres on a par with missions. The complex, highly specific, high-pressure, tense, and drastic features of crime investigation require the corps of investigations cadres to regularly improve their professional expertise and skills to satisfy the demand of crime prevention and control. To fulfil its tasks, the entire branch concentrates on developing a corps of cadres in charge of criminal investigation, who meet criteria for thorough grasp of law, good expertise and skills, political steadfastness, fine dignity, and good command of organising and practising their professional work. Accordingly, party committees and commanders of departments and units should focus on leading and directing source generation and selection well; closely cooperate with functional departments of the MND, MPS, and Ministry of Justice on cadre training, combining training, retraining, intensive training with providing refresher courses at academies and colleges both in the military and beyond; conduct exchange of experience in crime investigation with foreign militaries. The goals of these activities are to develop a corps of MBCI cadres, who act in good faith, are competent and qualified for successfully completing all assigned tasks.

Third, promoting close collaboration between the branch and functional department in the military and beyond. This is a vital solution to enable MBCI to understand and control violation and crime; work out preventive measures and adopt professional measures to investigate violations and crimes effectively. To bring cooperation to a greater depth and effectiveness, departments and units in the entire branch need to establish and well address the relationship between leaders and commanders, high echelon and low echelons, criminal investigation agencies, legal protection agencies, and relevant State agencies, and the People’s Army and Public Security. Specifically, they should strictly implement the Decree No. 03/2019/ND-CP, dated 5 September 2019, of the Government on the cooperation between the MND and MPS in protecting national security, preserving social order and safety, preventing and combating crime, and executing defence missions. This is a vital legal basis for making the cooperation between these two forces increasingly close, regular, effective, and in-depth. The two forces must promote exchange of information about violations, crimes, and social evils; cooperation in hunting suspects and initially investigating cases when the criminal investigation agencies have not arrived at the scenes.

Fourth, building pure, strong party organisations and comprehensively robust, “exemplary, representative” departments and units. Party committees and commanders at all levels of the branch need to attach importance to establish, train, and improve combat power of party organisations, focusing on enhancing the quality of formulating resolutions to lead mission performance in each tenure, year, and month, ensuring that these resolutions are close to the characteristics and practical situations of each department and unit, and highly feasible. They are to pay attention to the building and training of cadres and party members, combining the building of party members with the building of cadres, building of party committees with building of leading cadres. Moreover, the branch attaches importance to building of comprehensively strong, “exemplary, representative” departments and units; regularly manages and educates cadres; grasps and deals with ideological matters arising among cadres and employees in order to foster solidarity and unity in departments and units. It organises and effectively maintains the Determination to Win Movement; steps up studying and following Ho Chi Minh’s ideology, morality, and style as well as the Campaign of promoting tradition, devoting talent, deserving to be Uncle Ho’s Soldiers in the new era; well carries out the tasks of protecting internal politics and keeping secrets, ensuring that departments and units are absolutely safe in every aspect. Mass organisations and Military Personnel Council are regularly strengthened to promote their operational effectiveness and to create a healthy environment for cadres and employees in the entire MBCI to heighten the sense of solidarity and responsibility for performing assigned duties and tasks and strictly abiding by military discipline and State law, contributing to the building of an adept, compact, strong, modernity-oriented military with the capability to successfully complete its missions in any conditions and circumstances.

Major General NGUYEN THANH HUY, Director General of the Criminal Investigation Department