Witness Project Podcast: Vi Kha Hoang

The Witness Project Podcast tells the tragic and powerful stories of the victims of communism. Join us as we speak with the courageous men and women who experienced life under communism, the historians preserving the truth, and the politicians fighting back against the most deadly ideology in history.  

In the inaugural episode, VOC’s Lily McHale sits down with Vi Kha Hoang.

The year is 1989 and a group of 13 people are out on the open ocean in a small fishing boat, miles away from the shoreline. They have encountered pirates, storms, and sustained injuries, and have yet to see any signs of land. The group is made up of men and women, both young and old, including a pregnant mother and two young children. The people on board have escaped Vietnam, risking their lives on the sea, to find their freedom in another country, any country, free from Communism. What drove them to this perilous decision and a brush with almost certain death?

Vi Kha Hoang, a witness of communism in Ho Chi Minh’s Vietnam, survived the journey on that boat and he joins us today to talk about life in Vietnam under communism and his daring bid for freedom. He now lives in the United States with his family and teaches young Vietnamese Americans about the trials that his generation went through.