The Man Behind the Journey
Paul Reed served as a paratrooper with the U.S. Army’s 173rd Airborne Brigade during the Vietnam War.
But the story that would come to shape much of his life did not end when he left Vietnam.
Years later, the translation of a small wartime diary set Reed on an unexpected journey—one that eventually carried him back to Vietnam, into a friendship with Nguyen Van Nghia, and into decades of telling a story that had begun when the two men stood on opposing sides of war.
Reed later co-authored Kontum Diary, and the story was documented through American and Vietnamese television and film. His continuing work eventually led him beyond simply telling the story toward helping other veterans return to Vietnam and meet former enemies.
That work became Valor Veterans, an effort Reed founded to help veterans make journeys of their own toward understanding and reconciliation.
Through writing, speaking, and those journeys, Reed has continued pursuing the same purpose that grew from the little diary:
to tell what happened—and allow others to decide what the story might mean in their own lives.
A LIFE OF SERVICE AND STORYTELLING
After returning from Vietnam, Paul Reed could not have known that a small diary packed away among his wartime belongings would eventually shape much of the life ahead of him.
Its story became the foundation for Kontum Diary, co-authored by Reed and later documented through television and film in both the United States and Vietnam.
But telling the story was not enough.
Reed later founded Valor Veterans, helping veterans return to Vietnam to meet former enemies—creating opportunities for encounters that war once made almost unimaginable.
Now, in What War Could Not Destroy, Reed returns to the journey with Nguyen Van Nghia, bringing together the stories of two men whose lives were connected by a little diary neither could have imagined would travel so far.
The diary began the journey.
The journey became a friendship.
And the story continues to travel.
THE STORY CONTINUES
Today, Paul Reed continues to write and speak about the journey that began with a little diary recovered during war.
Through What War Could Not Destroy, speaking engagements, and the continuing mission behind Valor Veterans, the purpose remains simple:
Tell the story.
Remember those who were lost.
Share what two former enemies discovered along the way.
And perhaps, somewhere down the road, their journey may help someone else begin one of their own.