The Man Who Brought Back Ho Chi Minh

A visit with the California shop owner who sparked the Vietnam War all over again

Truong Van Tran is proud to be an American. So proud that the Vietnamese refugee, 37, chose to give his two children not the ancestral surname of Tran but a certifiably American one, that of the first President of the U.S. At home in a gated community in Orange County, Calif., Tran expounds on what it means to be an American: "Freedom in this country means I can say what I feel."

The phone rings. It's a producer from Roseanne who wants Tran to be a guest. But he has to check his schedule first. He's not working, but he's still...

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