English: The brand-new Museum of the Vietnamese Armed Forces is a stunning new building on a huge site about 5 km west of Hanoi city centre. I hired a taxi for the day for around US$50 to do this and the Airforce and B-52 Victory museums, as there is currently no public transport option to reach all three.

Currently (April 2025) only the ground floor is open. There will be three more floors of display galleries above and a top-floor restaurant. Right now, tourist facilities are limited to a small cafe at the gate and no shop! However, the ground floor galleries are simply superb. The left side is devoted to Vietnam's military history from the 10th Century up to the French invasion in 1850 and includes weapons from 950AD onwards.

The right hand side of the building covers the two Indochina wars - against the French in the 1950s and the Americans in the 1970s. It is just a great museum and covers the conflicts in detail with English translations or subtitles throughout.

Outside are the larger aircraft exhibits which are also really good, but there is plenty of room for more to be added. I spotted an ex-Vietnam Airlines Ilyushin IL-18 in store at the airport that could easily be moved here to join their IL-14. The panes are a mix of captured USA and Soviet-supplied fighters and transports - my favourite is the Antonov AN-26 which was apparently converted to a bomber role!