Shadowing Practice: Searching for Vietnam’s fallen soldier | Vietnam Today - Learn English Speaking with YouTube
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General Phan Van Giang, Politburo member, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of National Defense on Saturday oversaw the search
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General Phan Van Giang, Politburo member, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of National Defense on Saturday oversaw the search
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and rescue recovery of fallen soldiers' remains in Mình Đức, Camille, Đồng Nai.
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Acting on information from historical witnesses,
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search teams launched operations on July 14 and by July 20 has recovered 21 sets of remains along with military artifacts.
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Historical records and witness accounts indicate the site is a mass burial ground for fallen soldiers.
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Before the 500 days and night campaign, 55 sets of remains had already been recovered from the area.
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The campaign to search for, recover and identify the remains of fallen soldiers continues in Guangxi province.
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Many of these soldiers' bodies are still buried across hills and forests, waiting to return home.
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Bringing them back has become a shared mission, uniting local communities, veterans and search teams.
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The 500 day and night campaign to search for,
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recover and identify the remains of fallen soldiers relies on military search teams along with village elders,
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veterans and local residents who still remember where fierce battles once took place.
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Their memories have become valuable clues in the effort to bring the fallen home.
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Information provided by village elders has helped recover the remains of five soldiers, two of whom have since been identified and returned to their families.
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Local ethnic communities have provided invaluable support, helping us speed up the search for fallen soldiers in remote and mountainous areas.
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Veterans are also playing an important role.
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By sharing wartime records and battlefield information, they are helping families chase relatives who have remained missing for decades.
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After learning about the battlefield through social media and historical records, I believe my brother is here.
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I hope the 500-day campaign will finally bring him home.
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We have identified 93 soldiers who fell in this area and recovered the remains of 29.
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We hope to find and identify as many of our comrades as possible.
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So far, nearly 100 sets of remains have been recovered under the campaign.
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Meanwhile, around 7,000 of Quang Chit's nearly 23,000 martyrs' graves have been exempt for identification,
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underscoring the scale of the tasks ahead.
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As the search continues, the support of veterans and local communities remains vital in bringing more of the fallen home.
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Identifying and recovering the remains of fallen soldier has truly been a collaborative effort, drawing invaluable support from international friends,
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many of whom are American veterans.
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Funded by the U.S government, Several veteran-led initiatives have spent years examining original records preserved in the U.S.
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National Archives.
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And these efforts actually serve a dual purpose.
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Locate Americans still missing from the war and uncover information
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that could help identify the resting places of Vietnamese soldiers who lost their lives during the conflict.
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Our correspondent reports from the United States.
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Researchers from the Vietnam Wartime Accounting Initiative are digitizing archival film at the U.S.
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National Archives.
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The film was shot from U.S military helicopters operating out of Dong Tam Base, about 7 kilometers west of My Tho in southern Vietnam.
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After analyzing the film, researchers believe it may point to the burial site of around 200 Vietnamese soldiers killed during a battle in 1969.
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The point of the story is nothing's been built, which increases the chances that those guys maybe are still there.
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So to narrow down that to a, you know, to give the Vietnamese government the best chance of finding these guys, we need to use period film,
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film from 1969 as close to the date, in order to try to see, you know, maybe we can even see them putting them into the ground.
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Once we know that there was a significant enough battle there that a mass grave is suspected,
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then we do research with witnesses, soldiers who were involved, American soldiers who were involved in that battle.
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We speak with them and find out whether or not they remember
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if a mass grave was dug for the Vietnamese that died there.
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Once we verify that, then we try to also find where the mass grave was from their description near the base.
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As veterans and eyewitnesses grow older and many pass away,
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archival research is becoming an increasingly valuable tool in reconstructing battlefields and locating both missing Vietnamese soldiers and American service members.
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We also know which way the plane scan the film today, and then we'll go home back to our office
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and we'll put it under more scrutiny and look for the exact locations
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and mark if we see any pits or recognised shapes
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or features on the site that we're looking at and try to date them.
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So we know this happened in 69, we're not going to bother looking.
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We'll look, you know, maybe get a shot from 68 to see what before it looked like
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and then we'll build up a period like timeline.
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This is March, this is April, this is May.
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Those reports will be submitted to the government of both U.S and Vietnam.
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They are expected to provide key evidence for decision on possible excavation at the site
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and recommend the next step ongoing efforts to identify Vietnam's fallen shoulder.
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Thay Thang for Vietnam Today.
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The above reports highlights the vast archive of Vietnam-related records preserved at the U.S.
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National Archive.
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The question now is how these materials can be accessed quickly and used effectively to support efforts to identify Vietnam's fallen soldiers.
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Here is Andrew Deng with his perspective.
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Mr. Deng is senior advisor for Mission Palmia, which is part of the Vietnam Wartime Accounting Initiative,
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and that's the joint program between the U.S and Vietnamese government to search for Vietnamese missing.
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The aerial images are a key step that has not been included very much before now.
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And so we believe that by bringing in these photographs, we can have more identifications of sites.
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Thanks to the software that Glenn Hines developed, we can find out exactly which rolls of film
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have the pictures that may help with the site that we are looking for.
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I hope that researchers can use the Vietnamese archives also to find documents and information that can link to what is here.
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You're practicing English with "Searching for Vietnam’s fallen soldier | Vietnam Today" using the Shadowing technique — a method originally developed for professional interpreter training.
Focus on sounding like the speaker — not just repeating words. With 15–30 minutes of daily practice, you'll build real-world speaking confidence.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.