Abandoned in Sài Gòn: The Mass Grave in Lê Thị Riêng Park

One day in 1971 or 1972, journalist Cù Mai Công and a group of friends entered Chí Hòa Cemetery, now Lê Thị Riêng Park, to catch crickets. [1]

About 200 meters from the main entrance, one friend suddenly halted and warned, “Let’s stop here. Beyond this point, it’s all Việt Cộng graves,” an incident Công recalled in a Facebook post on June 5, 2026.

He looked toward where his friend pointed to see a massive, overgrown plot at the back of the cemetery. It had only a scattering of headstones, and many graves were just unmarked mounds rising a few dozen centimeters from the soil. 

Decades later, authorities unearthed mass graves containing the remains of numerous Việt Cộng soldiers at Lê Thị Riêng Park, located on the former cemetery grounds. State media reported that the communist fighters buried there were killed during the 1968 Tết Offensive. [2] 

This discovery leaves lingering questions: Why were there mass graves located in the heart of Sài Gòn? How did the victims perish, and who was responsible for burying them there?

The Abandoned Dead of Sài Gòn

According to “Combat Operations: Staying the Course, October 1967 to September 1968” (2017), by U.S. Army Center of Military History historian Erik B. Villard, the governments in Sài Gòn and Hà Nội agreed to a 48-hour cease-fire for the 1968 Tết holiday. [3] The Republic of Vietnam granted many soldiers leave to celebrate Tết, but communist forces broke the cease-fire agreement and launched a surprise attack on Sài Gòn before dawn on Jan. 31, 1968, the first day of the Lunar New Year. [4]

Hà Nội’s plan called for simultaneous attacks on cities and key military targets across the South. A document captured in Tây Ninh from a Việt Cộng cadre also indicated that the forces planned to attack military bases and instigate a popular uprising. [5]

This plan failed as the Republic of Vietnam and U.S. troops intercepted communist reinforcements outside Sài Gòn. The popular uprising never materialized, and the Republic of Vietnam’s military remained intact, contrary to the mass desertions the communist planners had anticipated. [6] 

Stranded without reinforcements or control over key locations, the attacking units suddenly had to figure out how to escape the city. The operational plan and documents captured after the fighting reveal that the communist regional command had instructed main-force units stationed outside Sài Gòn to block Republic of Vietnam reinforcements and to enter the city only if necessary. [7] If the offensive failed, however, they could withdraw to their bases, even if it meant leaving behind the “comrades” who had penetrated deep within the city. [8]

This contingency became a reality as the commando teams assigned to attack key targets in central Sài Gòn were defeated one after another. Most of their fighters died in combat, and the survivors were either wounded, surrendered, or captured. [9] 

Faced with overwhelming pressure from the Republic of Vietnam and U.S. forces, battalions fighting around Tân Sơn Nhất, Gò Vấp, and the inner city borders splintered into smaller groups to flee. On Feb. 2, under pressure from Republic of Vietnam troops in Gò Vấp, four communist battalions broke into small groups, each seeking its own escape route. According to the U.S. military advisory team’s operations log for that day, Việt Cộng forces left behind about 600 bodies from three battalions of the 101st Regiment and one battalion of the 165th Regiment. [10]

West of Tân Sơn Nhất Airport, fighting around the Vinatexco textile mill left a similar scene. After airstrikes on the mill complex and its recapture, U.S. forces reported finding more than 300 communist bodies in the area. [11] 

Furthermore, not all communist soldiers killed in the offensive had reached central Sài Gòn. Many units were intercepted as they approached their objectives. In An Mỹ Hamlet, north of Gò Vấp, two battalions of the 273rd Regiment were nearly destroyed before reaching Thủ Đức. Reports from the area recorded at least 343 bodies. [12]

Operational reports by U.S. and Republic of Vietnam forces from multiple battle sites indicate that, after the offensive failed, many communist units (mostly from the North) were cut off and forced into hurried retreats, leaving their dead in areas retaken by the Republic of Vietnam. When the gunfire finally subsided, thousands of Liberation Army soldiers lay abandoned in factories, barracks, streets, and residential neighborhoods. 

Recovering the Bodies from All Sides

Bùi Văn Phú, now a freelancer for BBC-Vietnamese, witnessed the transportation of bodies to Đô Thành Cemetery (now Lê Thị Riêng Park) and recalled that about 800 people were buried in a single mass grave. 

“One morning, I saw fire trucks carrying bodies pass through the Ngã ba Ông Tạ area. The stench was terrible. I estimated that each truck could carry about 100 bodies, so it probably took eight to 10 trips to collect them from the area between the Vinatexco textile mill and the Hoàng Hoa Thám airborne barracks,” he told Luật Khoa. 

Phú also noted that a neighbor had taken him on a Honda motorcycle through streets where bodies remained after the fighting in the preceding days. 

“He said the bodies wearing Bình Trị Thiên sandals were Việt Cộng, and the others were civilians. I saw both. I can no longer remember which group had more members.”

When asked why the recovery effort centered on the Vinatexco textile mill, Phú explained that it lay along one of the routes communist forces used in their attempt to advance on Tân Sơn Nhất Airport. He stated that the road through the Ông Tạ intersection, now part of Cách Mạng Tháng Tám Street, connected Sài Gòn with Tây Ninh at the time, passing through Bà Điểm and Vườn Trầu. 

Farther along from the Bảy Hiền intersection stood the Hoàng Hoa Thám airborne barracks, while the Vinatexco mill was near the airport’s defensive perimeter.

“The Việt Cộng could not get through the defensive perimeter here because Republic of Vietnam soldiers had to defend the area. During the second wave of the offensive in May 1968, the Việt Cộng reached the Bảy Hiền intersection and the Western Cemetery, again seeking to breach Tân Sơn Nhất Airport’s perimeter in this area. When the Việt Cộng shelled the airport, stray 122 mm rockets landed in the Ông Tạ intersection area on several occasions, hitting homes and killing people. Newspapers reported it at the time.”

In its Feb. 19, 1968, edition, Chính Luận reported, “On Feb. 15, the municipal and Gia Định sanitation departments jointly dug two pits at Chí Hòa Cemetery to bury as many as 1,000 bodies. The bodies had previously been held for relatives to identify, but after a prolonged wait, they had become bloated and decomposed, so all were buried together in the two pits.” 

Phú’s account indicates that after the battles around Vinatexco and the Tân Sơn Nhất perimeter, bodies were collected from several combat areas and taken to Đô Thành Cemetery. They included both communist soldiers and civilians, though he could no longer say in what proportions. 

The Feb. 19, 1968, report in Chính Luận provides an important piece of evidence: By mid-February, sanitation authorities in Sài Gòn-Gia Định had been compelled to dig two pits at Chí Hòa Cemetery for the communal burial of bodies unclaimed by relatives, with an anticipated total of as many as 1,000 people. [13]

Between 1978 and 1983, Chí Hòa Cemetery was cleared to make way for Lê Thị Riêng Park. [14] Insufficient documentation prevented the excavation of the mass burial trenches from 1968, even though some remains were discovered during the relocation of graves and leveling of the ground. 

According to journalist Cù Mai Công, many former residents of the area knew about the mass graves of communist soldiers. [15] He believes that Chí Hòa Cemetery must have had a map of burial plots before 1975, consistent with the Republic of Vietnam government’s cemetery management practices at the time. 

Whether that map still exists and where it might be held remain unanswered questions. This gap in the records may help explain how the location of a mass burial site, once publicly documented, could remain unknown for decades.

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Thúc Kháng wrote this article in Vietnamese and published it in Luật Khoa Magazine on August 1, 2026. The Vietnamese Magazine translated it into English.