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The tunnels of Củ Chi are an immense network of connecting tunnels located in the Củ Chi District of Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam, and are part of a much larger network of tunnels that underlie much of the country. During the war, the Củ Chi tunnels were one of the critical intel hubs for the H63 strategic intelligence network, a highly successful North Vietnamese strategic espionage group operating in South Vietnam during the Vietnam War. It was most famous for deeply infiltrating the American and South Vietnamese military and political commands to provide critical intelligence. Used by Viet Cong soldiers as hiding spots during combat, the Củ Chi tunnels likewise served as communication and supply routes, hospitals, food and weapon caches and living quarters for numerous North Vietnamese fighters. The tunnel systems were of great importance to the Viet Cong in their resistance to American and ARVN forces and helped to counter the growing American military presence.
The tunnels played a colossal part in securing the final win on April 30, 1975, sealing the end of Vietnam’s brutal 21-year fight for freedom. Tunnels: Sun In the Dark, however, is set a little under a decade earlier on January 8, 1966 during the U.S. military campaign named Operation Crimp when B-52 bombers dropped 30-ton loads of high explosive onto the region of Củ Chi, effectively turning the once lush jungle into a pockmarked moonscape. When Americans started the raid more than 3000 officers were stuck at Phu My Hung and An Phu, having to hide in the tunnels. Despite their carpet bombing (the Americans dropped all types of bombs—timed bombs, airburst bombs, and ground-impact bombs) and their “destroy all, burn all, kill all” policy, the operation did not bring about the desired success, though it revealed for the first time the immense military significance of the tunnels. The failure of Operation Crimp resulted in the expanded operation dubbed Operation Cedar Falls.
Without making the American forces strictly evil, Tunnels: Sun In the Dark admirably presents the inhumanity of war and its impact on both sides of the war. As Rupert Bottenberg assesses in his program capsule for Fantasia, “Cinematic ruminations on the Vietnam War have long come mainly from the United States, and while films like Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket, and Platoon hardly glorified the massive military misadventure in southeast Asia, they offered only the American perspective.” Tunnels: Sun In the Dark “tells the other side of the tale with a powerful war film that’s intelligent, empathic, convincing, and intense.”
Chuyen Bui Thac who directed, wrote, and executive produced Tunnels: Sun In the Dark built his script on documented practices of the Củ Chi tunnels. Each hamlet had its own tunnel entrance. If an outsider wandered in, they would blindfold him, and lead him outside, releasing him far from the entrance. Such is the case with Tu Dap (Quang Tuan) who serves the tunnel community by dismantling and studying recovered bombs in order to teach himself mine-building. Though forced to live outside of the tunnels, Tu Dap nonetheless becomes romantically involved with Ba Huong (Thu Anh Ho), as impossible as that might seem in a world explosively ravaged 24/7. The ensemble is large and the breadth and depth of interactions noteworthy, such that this viewer felt for them and their plight. Many of them were so young with no chance of leading a normal life.
There’s a palpable haunt to Tunnels: Sun In the Dark. By acknowledging and elevating the resilience and perseverance of the guerillas under the onslaught of American military power, using the tunnel system to develop ingenious ways to fight back, their determination to hold out effected the sad truth that the United States did not “win” the Vietnam War. One would hope we would have learned the lesson that bombing a country to destruction does not mean you win a war. And yet, in another chilling example of the unbridled use of military might by the United States of Amnesia, the Trump regime has led us into another misguided war of choice in Iran, which to date has no clear way out. I feel not only for the Americans at home who do not want this war and are anxious over it, but Tunnels: Sun In the Dark provides a sense of the hell we are visiting on the Iranian people and the tenacity with which they will harrow it. I can predict that we’re not going to win that war either, if it hasn’t already been lost.
