Truong Huy San, better known by his pen name Huy Đức, is a

Vietnamese Vietnamese may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Vietnam, a country in Southeast Asia ** A citizen of Vietnam. See Demographics of Vietnam. * Vietnamese people, or Kinh people, a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to Vietnam ** Overse ...

journalist, blogger, and author. In 2005-2006 he studied at the

University of Maryland The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. Founded in 1856, UMD is the flagship institution of the University System of M ...

under a

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Fellowship. In 2012 he received a fellowship from the

Nieman Foundation for Journalism The Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University is the primary journalism institution at Harvard. It was founded in February 1938 as the result of a $1.4 million bequest by Agnes Wahl Nieman, the widow of Lucius W. Nieman, founder of ' ...

to study at

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Life

He was born in 1962 in

Ha Tinh Province Ha may refer to: Agencies and organizations * Health authority * Hells Angels Motorcycle Club * Highways Agency (now ''National Highways''), UK government body maintaining England's major roads * Homelessness Australia, peak body organisation ...

, Vietnam. He served in the Vietnamese army for eight years and fought in the Sino-Vietnamese Border War of 1979 and the Vietnamese-Cambodian War in the 1980s. He then became a journalist, based in

Ho Chi Minh City , population_density_km2 = 4,292 , population_density_metro_km2 = 697.2 , population_demonym = Saigonese , blank_name = GRP (Nominal) , blank_info = 2019 , blank1_name = – Total , blank1_ ...

. He wrote for several newspapers such as ''Tuoi Tre'', ''Thanh Nien'', and ''Sai Gon Tiep Thi''. Until 2010 he also wrote a blog called Osin, which was ranked as the most popular blog in Vietnam. The blog was critical of the Vietnamese government, attempting to "push the line but not cross the line". In 2009 he was dismissed from his post at ''Sai Gon Tiep Thi (Saigon Marketing)'', a state-run newspaper, because of comments on his blog. Since then he has been a freelance journalist. While studying at Harvard, he published his book ''Bên Thắng Cuộc (The Winning Side)''. The book describes life in Vietnam after the end of the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...

and the reunification of the country. It is a two-volume work. The first volume, ''Giải Phóng (The Liberation)'', was published as an e-book in 2012, followed by a hardcover edition. Even before publication he published excerpts and chapters on his

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page; the excerpts were widely circulated through the internet. The second volume, ''Quyền Bính (The Power),'' was published the same year. The name "The Winning Side" is inspired by a quote from Vietnamese poet Nguyễn Duy: "In every war, whichever side wins, after all/ It's the people who take the fall." The Vietnamese government has not officially banned the book, but the state-run media has been critical of it. In some cases the Vietnamese government has seized copies of it and questioned people who had them. Critics have described the book as "perhaps the first critical, comprehensive history of Vietnam since 1975 by someone inside the country." The book ranked number one in the category Southeast Asia History for several weeks on Amazon, and since its publication it is one of the most downloaded electronic Vietnamese books. Duc is one of many people interviewed in

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's series ''

The Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...

''.

Works

* ''Bên thắng cuộc'', Los Angeles, California : OsinBook, 2012.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Huy Duc Living people 1962 births Vietnamese writers Vietnamese bloggers Vietnamese journalists Nieman Fellows