The love story of General Secretary Le Duan's daughter with a Russian academician

Mr. Le Kien Thanh wrote on his personal Facebook: " On August 3, 2023, Russian Academy of Sciences member Viktor Maslov, Le Vu Anh's husband, passed away in Moscow, Russian Federation, in the endless sorrow of his children, grandchildren, relatives and friends. From a faraway place, I bow my head and say goodbye. Fly back there, where Vu Anh and great love are waiting, my dear Vichia! ",

He also shared: " Coincidentally, exactly three years ago, I posted this on my Facebook. Today I post it again as a stick of incense in memory of Academician Maslov, a genius scientist, a man who loved my sister madly until the last moments of his life ."

VTC News republished the article "About the love story of General Secretary Le Duan's daughter with a Russian academician" from the People's Police newspaper, recorded according to Mr. Le Kien Thanh's story.

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I have long understood that a family like mine has almost nothing that is private; all joys and sorrows are seen and understood by outsiders in their own way… But the fact that someone thinks that my father – for his own political interests, could sacrifice the life of the daughter he loved so much, really makes me hurt to the core…

1. When we were young, my brother and I never really understood why we had to leave our mother. In our young minds, we simply thought that we had to live with our father because our mother was away on a business trip.

But my sister – Le Vu Anh – soon understood all of that. Because she was sensitive, she was also very vulnerable if someone mentioned her personal pain. My father loved Vu Anh with a very special love. He loved the daughter who had felt the pain of her family early on; and because he always saw the shadow of my mother through her.

Mrs. Bay Van, wife of General Secretary Le Duan and two grandchildren.

While I was often scolded and beaten every time I made a mistake, my father always treated Vu Anh very gently. Unlike me, who always felt like I didn't know what to say to my father when we sat together, Vu Anh could sit and talk with my father for hours without getting bored. And my father always listened to her patiently and enthusiastically.

My father had high expectations for Vu Anh. He always believed that she could do great things in the future. She was a good student in literature in the North and was admitted to the Party in the 10th grade. I still remember one time, when he welcomed my sister and I back from the evacuation area, the first minute we met, my father hugged Vu Anh affectionately and exclaimed: " Hello, my comrade! ".

But after finishing school, Vu Anh asked my father for permission to go to the South to fight. That made him extremely angry. He said: “ Do you know how difficult the battlefield is? Do you know how difficult the road to the battlefield is? I am just afraid that you will hinder others as soon as you start marching. Go to school and bring the knowledge you have learned back here to contribute to this country .”

My sister weighed just over 30kg at that time. And for the first time in her life, my father refused Vu Anh something. That afternoon, I saw Vu Anh run out of my father's office in tears. That was the only time in my life I witnessed my sister being scolded by my father. And then my sister went to study in the Soviet Union, where she met, fell in love with and married Viktor Maslov, in the tragic story that followed...

2. Viktor Maslov is 20 years older than my sister, a genius scientist with a super intelligence but also extremely eccentric. Many years ago, when the Soviet Union was still a superpower that many Western countries feared, Maslov used algorithms on imbalance to prove to me that this society would soon be in crisis and collapse.

It was only later, when I witnessed the flow of history unfolding exactly as it did, that I understood that Maslov was a genius. At that time, I only thought he was a reactionary.

Maslov was also one of the few scientists in Russia to be promoted directly from Doctor to Academician (skipping the title of Corresponding Academician) – a title that affirmed his great prestige in the scientific community in Russia. But Maslov was also very “crazy”. Maslov had ways of thinking and behaving very differently from normal people.

Instead of sending his children to school so that they could adapt to society and have opportunities to communicate, he just let his children hang around the suburbs and invited lecturers to teach his children.

Maslov was also haunted by one thing: there was always some plot from Vietnam that threatened the safety of him and his children. So one time, when we visited our grandchildren, Maslov used a radiation meter to check us, to prevent danger!

But perhaps, it was Maslov’s genius and eccentricity that attracted Vu Anh and made her fall in love. Because Vu Anh was also a person who, deep down, always hid a hidden rebellion. My sister understood her situation, understood her origin, so she tried every way to resist that love, even marrying a classmate she did not love.

But in the end, my sister still followed her heart. She secretly divorced her first husband, secretly had a child, secretly registered her marriage with Maslov, and then told my father. Of course my father was angry. Of course my father opposed the marriage.

In fact, unlike many other leading families in Hanoi, my father never asked or assigned his children to marry this person or that person. He also never placed importance on social status. My father-in-law worked at the national library, my mother-in-law worked at the Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs, and some of the family members migrated to the South. But my father still allowed us to marry each other.

When Ms. Muoi (daughter of General Secretary Le Duan and Ms. Le Thi Suong - PV) fell in love and wanted to marry a man whose family was a mandarin of the Nguyen Dynasty, the agency where she worked proposed to oppose that marriage, and my father had to meet many people to ask for Ms. Muoi's permission to marry the person she loved.

But Vu Anh’s marriage was a completely different story. My father never imagined that he would have a foreign son-in-law, and that he would have grandchildren whose blood was only half Vietnamese. I remember one time, watching my children and Vu Anh’s children playing together, I suddenly heard him say to himself: “ Vietnamese people are so beautiful .”

I understood him, and felt a pang of love for him and for my sister. But he did not use his power to hinder my sister's happiness. The only thing he did was accept his daughter's choice. And later, every time he went to Moscow, he was still very happy and joyful every time he met my sister and the children.

I still remember in 1977, I met my father when he returned to Hanoi from Moscow after Vu Anh announced her marriage. He only said: " Maybe we have to wait 5-10 more years for "people" to accept your sister's marriage ."

That was also the year when the relationship between Vietnam and China began to become extremely tense. Every time I saw my father, I could feel the terrible burden weighing on his shoulders.

And Vu Anh's marriage to Maslov, at that time, also caused my father many difficulties and pressures. Some people with bad thoughts said that: Mr. Le Duan, because he wanted to be close to the Soviet Union, sold his daughter, letting his daughter marry a foreigner.

Honestly, I used to be very angry with Vu Anh every time I looked at my father. I always asked myself: Why did my sister do that, why not at another time but now, at this moment, when my father was facing so many difficulties? But my father was too strong and steadfast for anyone to pressure or make him collapse just because of my sister's marriage.

Therefore, it would be absurd for anyone to think that my sister died because of some political conspiracy. It would be ridiculous and stupid for anyone to think that my father sacrificed his daughter's life for the common good of the nation, or for his own political interests.

It would be unfair to think that a father could do anything that would endanger the safety of his child, for whatever reason. The truth is simple: My sister died of hemorrhage shortly after giving birth to her third child, Anton. My sister died because no doctor at the hospital at that time dared to risk operating on her, because they all knew that my sister was the daughter of the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam.

When my sister was in critical condition, they called the leading doctors to the hospital where she was in the emergency room after giving birth to consult. But Vu Anh passed away before they could arrive. My sister died because of the excessive caution of those who knew who she was, not because of any political conspiracy behind it.

3. After Vu Anh passed away, Viktor Maslov raised three children alone. Anton, her youngest child, was orphaned right after birth. My mother went to Moscow to bring Vu Anh's ashes back to Vietnam.

Le Vu Anh and his two children took a photo with Ms. Tu Khanh, wife of Dr. Le Kien Thanh, when visiting Mr. Le Duan in Moscow in 1980.

She visited Maslov with her grandchildren and almost cried when she saw Maslov raising her three grandchildren. My mother – a careful and meticulous woman, could not believe that a man who worked as a scientist, lived carelessly and was somewhat “crazy” could raise three children, the oldest of whom was not yet 4 years old.

And she was eager to raise her youngest grandchild until he was strong. That was why my mother brought Anton back to Vietnam to raise. I don't know why Maslov wrote in his memoirs that he had been robbed of his child and had to consider creating a political scandal to win Anton back.

But the truth is that our relationship is much more normal and better than what many people have read. After Anton came to live with us in Vietnam, one time when I returned to Moscow and visited Maslov, he told me: “ Thanh, maybe it is also lucky that my mother helped me raise Anton. Because I really do not know how to manage with 3 children ”.

But like many other fathers who always miss their children, Maslov often asked me: “ Thanh, when will you bring Anton back to me? ” And when I returned to Vietnam, I told my mother: “ You will grow old. And you cannot keep him with you forever. He must live with his father and his sisters, his closest relatives .”

My mother loved Anton dearly and had not left her grandson's side since she brought him back to Vietnam. But my mother always understood that it was natural: a child would be best raised by their parents.

And when Anton was four years old, she agreed to take Anton back to the Soviet Union with Maslov, with only one condition that she made Maslov obey: Anton would definitely go to kindergarten, and not live in isolation in a house in the suburbs. My mother, Maslov and Anton took a photo together on the day she returned him to his father, which she still has to this day. They really did not hate each other…

No matter what happens, fate has arranged for us to be a family, and the person who binds us together is none other than my sister – Le Vu Anh. Because of our love for Vu Anh – we still have to love each other and together give the best to the children. This November (2016-PV), Anton will go to Vietnam with his girlfriend to visit his grandmother.

But right now, my whole family has been looking forward to the day we can welcome him back. The memoirs circulating online these past few days have touched on the deep sadness that my family has felt for many years. But I also consider this a one-time opportunity for us to talk about the private things that we have never talked about before.

My sister's love story is a beautiful and touching love story. But it would be much more beautiful if people knew about it with all the truth as it is!

(Source: People's Police Newspaper)

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