boy who fled vietnam returns as commander

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/world/asia/10vietnam.html?_r=1 Boy Who Fled Vietnam War Returns as U.S. Officer

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By SETH MYDANS
Published: November 9, 2009

DANANG, Vietnam ? Cmdr. H. B. Le, the first Vietnamese-American to command a United States Navy destroyer, had just stepped ashore on a formal port call, making an emotional return to Vietnam for the first time since he fled as a boy on a fishing boat at the end of the war in 1975.
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Justin Mott for The New York Times


A youthful and smiling man of 39, he bore on his shoulders the weight of the symbolism of cautiously warming military ties between Vietnam and the United States in the latest of fewer than a dozen naval port calls since 2003.

But the symbolism quickly became more nuanced as his welcoming ceremony was delayed by a dispute between the sides over the display of the red Vietnamese flag with its gold star aboard the Blue Ridge, the flagship of the Seventh Fleet, which had just pulled in to port.

Two hours later the flag was finally raised high on the yardarm, seemingly in accord with the Vietnamese demand and contrary to American naval custom.....good for him!