In the course of national history, military youths have asserted a role of utmost importance with tremendous contributions to the era of struggle for national liberation, construction, and protection. Promoting their vigour and desire for devotion, military youths are willingly pioneering the era of the nation’s rise.

Party General Secretary To Lam, Ministry of National Defence leaders, and typical youths from the Military and the Public Security

Over the past 70 years of construction, combat, devotion, and maturity, under leadership and direction by the Central Military Commission (CMC), the Ministry of National Defence (MND), and particularly the General Department of Politics, with guidance from the Central Committee of the Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union, youth unions within the Military have been quickly developed to become the political nucleus of the youth movement - the core force responsible for gathering, uniting, educating, and training military youths as well as for upholding military youths’ pioneering role in the glorious revolutionary cause of the Party and nation. Generations of military youth union cadres and members have always remained united to overcome all difficulties and challenges, courageously fighting to win glorious victories and make remarkable contributions to liberating the nation, building and protecting the Fatherland; together with the entire Party, Military, and people, they have written heroic pages of national history. In recent years, youth union work and youth movements across the Vietnam People’s Army (VPA) have been carried out in a comprehensive but focalised manner, thus obtaining significant results. The Military Youth Committee has guided offices, units, and youth unions across the VPA to well conduct propagation and education among youth union members and young soldiers in diverse forms, effectively execute Youth Union building work and revolutionary action movements, take part in activities designed by the Youth Union Central Committee, strictly maintain regulations on emulation and commendation work, and well organise young officer exchange programs with other countries’ militaries. Those efforts have contributed to cementing military - civilian solidarity and spreading the noble virtues and image of “Uncle Ho’s Soldiers” in the new era. The military youth have always demonstrated their enthusiasm, talent, knowledge, willpower, and dedication to the Fatherland and people, showing no fear of danger, readily playing a vanguard role in any tasks assigned by the Fatherland and people, making great contributions to the cause of VPA building, national defence consolidation, and Fatherland protection.

Currently, there are unpredictable situational changes throughout the world and in the region. Our country is seizing a historic opportunity to enter an era of development and prosperity; the task of protecting the Socialist Vietnamese Fatherland is imposing new, higher requirements on the whole Party, people, and VPA, including military youths. To enable the military youth to readily enter the era of the nation’ rise, it is necessary to focus on the following.

First, fostering military youths’ political zeal, willpower, faith, ideal, revolutionary morality, and desire for devotion. This is a long-term, strategic, routine, primary task in the current period. Only when the entire Party, VPA, and people have great consistency, political resolve, and faith could we take effective action and realise our aspirations for successfully fulfilling the cause of national renewal. Hence, the military youth must further raise their political steadfastness; in any circumstances, military youths must remain absolutely loyal to the Party, Fatherland, and people, while heightening patriotism, self-reliance, self-strengthening, national pride, and self-awareness to cultivate their revolutionary morality.

Moreover, all-level party committees and commands should frequently exercise their leadership and direction over the work of ideal, revolutionary morality, cultural lifestyle, and civic-mindedness education to form a generation of military youths with good qualities, mettle, and great readiness to undertake and successfully accomplish all assigned tasks. Great value should be attached to intensifying the work of cultural tradition and national history education, clarifying the fine nature of our Party and socialist regime, highlighting the traditional nature of our VPA and especially our heroic figures in history to inspire military youths with aspirations for devotion.

Commending typical military youths in the period of 2017 - 2024

Second, all-level party committees and commands should grasp and strictly execute the Party’s resolutions and directives on young people and youth work, while enhancing their leadership and direction over youth union work and youth movements. All-level party committees, political commissars, junior political commissars, and political agencies should continue to well implement the CMC’s Action Program 231-CTr/ĐU for the 10^th Party Central Committee’s Resolution 25-NQ/TW, dated 25 July 2008, on “enhancing the Party’s leadership over youth work in the period of promoting industrialisation and modernisation”, the Resolution of the 11^th Military Party Congress, the 5-year Action Program for Military Youth Union Work and Youth Movement (2022 - 2027), and the Program for Military Youth Development between 2021 and 2030, and concretise those documents into their specialised resolutions and regulations for youth work. They should exercise their direction over the building of strong youth unions in terms of politics, ideology, morality, organisation, and action to contribute to the development of party organisations. Due regard should be paid to the planning, building, and cultivation of a pool of youth union and youth work cadres as the VPA’s future key officers. At the same time, it is necessary to grasp and opportunely settle the youth’s issues and legitimate aspirations and create a favourable condition for the development of youth unions and movements. Consideration should be given to actively preventing “self-evolution”, “self-transformation”, and negative impacts of the dark side of society, evil information, and hostile forces’ distortions, building a healthy cultural environment within offices and units, protecting, nurturing, developing, and completing the core values of the virtues of “Uncle Ho’s Soldiers” as the basis for realising military youths’ aspirations for devotion and maturity in the cause of Fatherland construction and protection.

Third, creating a favourable condition for the military youth to improve their knowledge to meet their task requirements. In the current period, military youths should continue to assert their willpower, vigour, and spirit of daring to think and daring to do; they should devote efforts to improve themselves comprehensively, remain active in production, and quickly acquire knowledge of modern science and technology to assist the entire Party and people in stepping up the cause of national renovation, industrialisation, and modernisation, ensuring a peaceful, stable environment for building and firmly protecting the Fatherland. To that end, offices and units should create a favourable condition for military youths’ study, work, entertainment, and self-improvement for the sake of the youth’s healthy, comprehensive, harmonious development in terms of knowledge, fitness, and aesthetic, providing an incentive for the youth to play a vanguard role in study, production, mastery of modern science and technology, VPA building, and national development. Military youths should keep improving their general and specialised knowledge, enhancing their self-study and self-improvement, remaining dynamic and creative, daring to think, daring to do, adapting themselves to realities, and mastering modern science, technology, weapons, and equipment. They should uphold “lofty aspirations, great responsibility, good learning, effective action, strict discipline” as typical examples of the Vietnamese youth’s willpower and knowledge in the new era.

Fourth, building helpful environments and revolutionary action movements to realise military youths’ aspirations for devotion. Offices and units should continue to concretise and creatively apply movements launched by the Party, State, VPA, and Youth Union Central Committee in line with the Campaign entitled “promoting tradition, devoting talent, deserving to be Uncle Ho’s Soldiers in the new period” and the Determined to Win Emulation Movement. All-level party committees, commands, and political agencies should exercise their close, uniform leadership and direction over youth revolutionary action movements via new, creative forms towards the performance of central political tasks in order to raise the quality of training, combat readiness, scientific research, regularity building, discipline management, and production, create synergy, and practically contribute to the cause of VPA building, national defence consolidation, and Fatherland protection. It is vital to continue enhancing emulation and revolutionary action movements, such as “military youths improve their morality and knowledge, promoting their vanguard, creative role, deserving to be Uncle Ho’s Soldiers in the new period” and “military youths follow predecessors’ footsteps, deserving to be Uncle Ho’s Soldiers”, thereby creating many helpful, creative environments to spark military youths’ passion and desire for devotion.

Fifth, promoting military youths’ dynamism, creativity, and desire for devotion under the “seven dares” spirit. Youth is a period of life full of energy, passion, and aspirations for devotion. As an elite part of the Vietnamese youth with the VPA’s heroic and glorious tradition, military youths possess great potential, good fitness, deep knowledge, strict discipline, revolutionary ideal, passion, and great responsibility for achieving strategic goals set by the Party, State, and VPA. Thus, in order to realise the aspirations for the nation’s rise, more than anyone else, the military youth should heighten the spirit of “daring to think, daring to speak out, daring to do, daring to take responsibility, daring to renovate and be creative, daring to confront difficulties and challenges, and daring to act for the common interests”, self-confidence, self-reliance, and self-strengthening to foster willpower and sustainable values in social consciousness and responsibility for the Fatherland and people. Each military youth should be ready to play a vanguard role in training, combat readiness, regularity building, discipline management, and emulation movements to contribute to successfully accomplishing political tasks and building typically strong, pure party organisations, “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong offices and units, strong political bases, and a firm “posture of people’s hearts and minds” within each stationed area.

With their dynamism, creativity, passion, and aspirations for devotion, the military youth will always be readily pioneering to enter a new era - the era of the nation’s rise, worthy of the trust of the Party, State, CMC, MND, and people across the country.

Col. NGUYEN QUANG HUY

Acting Head of the Military Youth Committee