Vietnam nurse remembers John McCain

A former nurse in Vietnam has been recalling the time she treated one of the men now running for the White House, John McCain, after his plane was shot down during the Vietnam war.

Nurse Nguyen Thi Thanh chose to care for Mr McCain despite his enemy status

Mr McCain was captured and taken with serious injuries to a clinic where the nurse, Nguyen Thi Thanh, worked.

Mrs Nguyen, now 81, talked to the BBC's Nga Pham at her house in Hanoi.

It was about 9 in the morning of 26 October 1967. There was a loud siren to alert people to get to shelters quickly, as American war planes were about to fly over Hanoi.

Half an hour after the planes left, I heard a noisy crowd, who shouted that an enemy pilot had jumped into Truc Bach Lake. Then they brought him in.

I didn't know who he was, but he was obviously not Vietnamese. The pilot was not that big and heavy, he was pale and handsome.

The injured John McCain was pulled out of the lake by Vietnamese locals

My responsibility was to care for my own countrymen only.

But [North Vietnamese leader] Ho Chi Minh advised people to show compassion and to save the enemies. So I told myself that I had to fulfil my duty.

He was very pale, his eyes were closed, he didn't utter a sound. I even didn't know whether there was any hope for him.

But I felt a pulse, and when I fed him with some medicinal syrup, he managed to swallow.

He did not bleed and I didn't detect any broken bones.

He lay there in my clinic for a good 20 minutes until they came to take him away. That evening, when I left the clinic, an old man came to me and yelled at me for 'caring for an enemy'. I told him I just did what Ho Chi Minh asked all of us to do.

McCain was taken prisoner with fractures to his arms and right leg

"I only found out about 20 years later, when I was summoned to a local meeting and told by the authorities, that the prisoner's name was John McCain and that he had become a good friend of Vietnam. He even came to visit a couple of times.

Will it be good for Vietnam if John McCain becomes president? I don't really know. He is friendly and he has done some good things for the Vietnamese, but it is difficult to predict the future.

As for Barack Obama, I don't think he has any ties with Vietnam. People say he doesn't know much about the country, but a clean slate can be a good thing.

If American people are wise, they will choose someone who loves peace, who is engaged in war prevention activities.

I don't follow the election closely, so I don't know what they are like. But I find John McCain very friendly towards Vietnam.