Le Van Tam is the name of a heroic teenager during the French Indochina War of Vietnam with the remarkable achievement of committing suicide to destroy a French arsenal. After the war, Le Van Tam's image is considered a revolutionary hero symbol, mentioned to this day in textbooks for children to learn the example of a national heroic teenager, having sacrificed himself for the great cause of national liberation.

“In a series of articles in the liberated Saigon newspaper , researcher Tran Trong Tan cited contemporary sources affirming that Le Van Tam was a real character. With the historical document of Saigon - Cho Lon - Gia Dinh resistance war (1945-1975) of Ho Chi Minh City Publishing House (published in 1994) and articles archived from the end of 1945, we can confirm : Thi Thi ammunition storage was carried out twice, the first on October 17, 1945 and the second on January 1, 1946. The Thi Nghe ammunition mine mines battle by workers of the Cho Quan lamp factory mentioned above is: second match. The first match on October 17, 1945 with "live torch Le Van Tam" is real.”

The story of Le Van Tam is often told that a young boy who sold roasted peanuts, though young, joined the resistance forces against the French . After careful scouting, the boy managed to get into the French gas depot in Thi Nghe. There, he sprinkled gasoline all over the ammunition depot and set it on fire. The whole arsenal was destroyed and the boy followed and was sacrificed.

This story was spread widely throughout Vietnam during the war, with the symbol "living torch Le Van Tam", in order to encourage the fighting spirit of the people. This story is also included in elementary textbooks in Vietnam. Le Van Tam's name has been given to a number of elementary schools , scholarship funds, monuments, parks , cinemas, streets or other places in Vietnam .

According to journalist Nguyen Ky Nam, this is a feat of Saigon militia performed by two suicide soldiers and a Japanese officer serving in the Vietnam resistance force on April 9, 1946. Japanese officers who used to work in the ammunition store should know the terrain of this place. He knew the French were not guarding the rear of the ammunition adjacent to Thi Nghe Canal so the militia could penetrate the ammunition from this side. Thanks to the guidance of Japanese officers, the two suicide soldiers entered the ammunition via a sewer pipe and poured it into the Thi Nghe canal and placed explosives with a fire conductor tied to a cigarette. When the cigarette burns out, the wire catches fire and explodes. Thanks to this way the Vietnamese suicide force can escape the ammunition safely. French ammunition destroyed. Then the press in the resistance zone reported, " There were two soldiers who wrapped themselves in cloth and soaked in gasoline and ran into the ammunition ... The guards became too afraid to shoot. The two men risked burning 4,000 tons of bullets."

According to historian Phan Huy Le ( Hanoi National University ), the feat of destroying French warehouses is real but the name of the soldier burning the warehouse is unknown. On the basis of that fact, for the sake of information, Tran Huy Lieu , then the Minister of Propaganda and Promotion of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam , named the unknown soldier, Le Van Tam.  In a press conference in February 2005 in Hanoi , Mr. Phan Huy Le said: I still have a debt to Mr. Tran Huy Lieu that has not been paid up to now. That was when Mr. Lieu was the Minister of Propaganda (after the August Revolution of 1945, Tran Huy Lieu was Minister of Propaganda and Promotion), Mr. Tran Huy Lieu wrote about the character Le Van Tam, a young boy. When I wrote the story of Le Van Tam, Lieu did tell me: "Now because of propaganda, I wrote this document later. when the country is in peace, you are a historian.”