To say that somehow the DNR warden didn't have any fear or whatnot, is so bias and unfair. The truth is, both guys were equally fearful and anxious about the whole situation. You have a situation where people are in the woods away from civilization, isolated from others, when everyone carries high caliber rifles and 12 and 10 gauge shotguns. As a hunter, an ethnic minority, you have no idea if the other hunters or wardens approaching you have hate and malice in their hearts. Also, as a game warden, even a white-European person, has no idea if the hunter(s) he/she is approaching has malicious intent. Incidences involving warden and hunters are not always between whites and ethnic minorities. In the 1940s, a white person gunned down three MN DNR game wardens cold-blooded when they wanted him to present his commercial fishing license (which he didn't have). Especially out west in remote areas where people still have an anti-government/anti-progression attitude, poaching is rampant and it's a very dangerous job for game wardens. The deer season is longer and the hunting grounds are more vast, isolated and remote. In most cases, the poachers and those who give shit to wardens are white.
We are all Hmong and let's not lie to ourselves; when in privacy our Hmong elders are very expressive of their fear and suspicion of white people in general especially during hunting season, and the Chai Vang incident only exacerbated it further. What we have here is one Hmong guy who stays within the confines of Hmong community for 365 days a year and on the other end, we have one white person who stays within the confines of white community for 365 days a year. Each has their own misunderstandi ngs, fears, bias, and suspicions about the other race. It doesn't help that both persons cannot fully communicate in one language. And for these few weeks of hunting, they may encounter each other in which all of these emotions and prejudice come rushing out. All it takes is for one little action - the warden speaks in a matter-of-fact tone which Hmong elders do not use towards one another, or a hunter sneaks in a quick radio message in a language the warden cannot understand - and these emotions and prejudice, mixed with adrenaline of not knowing WTF is going on, creates something like this incident.