Why do all rapes during the Vietnam war never get investigated?

Rape and looting was a common even carried out by the ARVN and the US Military throughout Vietnam and also by the ARVN in Cambodia.

When the ARVN did it, it was to intimidate the local people who may have collaborated with the NLF and/or the PAV. Also. the ARVN did it in Cambodia in reprisal for the massacre of innocent Vietnamese men, women and children in May 1970 carried out by the US-supported Lon Nol regime.

The US soldiers did it because they were often spaced out on drugs, were pi***ed off with the locals or because they could easily get away with doing it and their commanders did not care. Some Officers even encouraged the rape and looting.

Few Vietnamese were capable of reporting the troops for fear of reprisals.

Most of these answers are true and good answers, but none of them actually address your question directly. Yes people are afraid to confront the Military, but the mil has had a good reputation of prosecuting for crimes within it's ranks.

I guarantee that in the vietnam era there were some commanders who "overlooked" certain discretion's (i.e. sexual assaults, drug use, etc) in order to keep the unit moving forward and not to rock the boat, but there WERE NCIS, AFOSI, and CID agents, Judge Advocate Generals(JAGs) and other members of the Military Justice system employed between 1968 and 1973! What does everyone think, that these people sat around and played parcheesi?!? No, they investigated crimes. including ones that occurred against Vietnamese people!

Look, I am truly sorry for what happened, but I doubt you'll be choosing this one as the best answer! Why? because I'm about to say something that you probably didn't come here looking for. Is it the truth? Yes, but the truth hurts sometimes.

The reason, the real reason, that no one investigated was because at the end of the day, the justice system has rules. Thousands of rapes occurred during the war and there were many factors involved in each one. Mostly it was a "My word against theirs" type of situation. No evidence was available, troops stuck together and lied to cover each other and some vietnamese people were sympathetic to the NVA or the VC and would regularly make up stories to tie up military resources(it's an old trick of warfare). Investigators take all this into account, and without firm evidence there really is no case! In fact, this was so widespread and rampant that unless the rape occurred out on the street in front of the Base Commanders quarters it was generally deemed to be hearsay.

I know that you may think that your nephew was proof, but you have to remember that during many times in the war local girls would prostitute themselves for a few scraps of sheet metal! Most of the time they would have never even heard of birth control let alone employ it! Thousands of babies were born in this regard. Not implying anything on your family, but look at this through an investigators eyes. There's no real way to tell if the baby was a result of rape or consentual sex.

Because nobody was prepared to stand up against the most powerful military in the world either.

The reason they weren't investigated quite frankly, is it's the soldiers that fight the wars and makes the money for the businessmen that run Capitalistic politics.

And still, there are very few soldiers in that war that were saints. The USA, South Vietnamese, North Vietnamese and Viet Cong all had a good record of war crimes during the war. Seems it was only the Aussies and South Koreans that kept some sort of clean record.

Plus, did your sisters ever speak up? Can't investigate it if they weren't willing to speak up about it to the American Military Police.

On a final note, it's sad to hear that this happened to your sisters, but it's been and past. Why bring it up when the war was nearly 40 years ago? I think we all should just let the past die.

Yes I understand what you mean, the Aussies and South Koreans had their bad moments. But there are hardly enough documented war crimes involving the 2 countries compared to the other 4 factions I mentioned. But I am aware of some, such as Binh Ba. The majority of people those Centurions blew up were women and children being held at gunpoint by the VC and NVA.

Rape as an act of war often goes unpunished. That is real sad, because the victims are traumatised for life. I really feel sorry for what happened to your sisters.

We now have the International Court of Justice in The Hague to deal with war crimes. Since you don't know the identity of the rapists, I am afraid there is nothing they can do for you. Also it may be too long ago, I am not sure.

My sympathy for you and your family. I know that there were a lot of servicemen prosecuted for this types of things. I also know that all of them were not reported. My dad has a series of court martial books from that era and i read some really gruesome details about what happen. I know it has been over 4 decades but for someone living with the memories of what happen will never go away. I wish there was a way to find those whom did this and bring them to justice. Did you know the Army Soldiers did a similar thing to German women. They did not rape them, but got them pregnant and then just left. There are a lot of German children that dont know there father too. Again my condolences to you and your family.

When war happens, rape happens. Unfortunately, your siblings were casualties to the war. My parents lost most of their family to the incident when their nation should have never been dragged into the war. They could blame the Vietnamese, Chinese, and entire southeast Asian region for pulling their country into the war but they don't. It is closing in on 40 years since the end. Unless you can pursue justice with actual evidence, which is very doubtful, move on.

Wayne, you might want to find some facts before making statements such as South Koreans and Australians having a clean track record.

in all reality war is war..yes american troops raped and killed innocent villagers but vietnam insurgents also tortured troops.... its not right for US troops to do such unpatriotic things but that was a war in which many and mostly all of military personal didnt volunteer for....it was an occupation in which alot of people did not understand or know what was going on at the time

How would we investigate it? How would we track these people down? There is nothing that can be done. This is one of the horrible parts of war and very common.

I find that horrible :/ I think rape is just so sad... and maybe it's because the Vietnam War was too complicated, and did they ever report it?

It's been a while hasn't it? A little hard to investigate a crime from forty years or more.