Talk:South Vietnam

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1 Suggest name change of article
2 Currency
3 Question of a name
4 bias
5 Ngo Đinh Diem or Ngo Dinh Diem?
6 South Vietnamese Culture
7 General
8 Evolution of Vietnam
9 Fact vs Opinion
10 POV parentheses
11 Time Zone
12 Bombings

[edit] Suggest name change of article

I strongly suggest that the name of this article be renamed to "Republic of Vietnam". Problem is that the word "South" never appeared in the official name (i.e., it never officially referred to itself as "South Vietnam"), while the name of the successor government after the end of the war but prior to unification WAS "South Vietnam".

64.72.137.241 19:10, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

The Revision of 01:33, 16 February 2007 changed the statement that Cochin China "elected" a deputy to the French National Assembly to saying that they "killed" a deputy. This is vandalism, yes?

This is more a Q than an outright edit. I read the commentary regarding the use of the correct characters for people's names and was wondering why the same is not done for the country's name. We have Việt Nam as the name of the country in the heading of the article, but then we see Vietnam in all the text. Why not Viet Nam? JoeSchmuckatelli 01:37, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

If I remember correctly, there was a pretty lengthy discussion of this in the Vietnam talk page, and (most) agreed to use the common variant of Vietnam--66.16.19.198 00:01, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Since the last dated comments regarding the merged/conquered controversy are from 2003, I'm assuming that this has been settled, and so I am removing the NPOV tag from the article for now. It can be restored if further controversy arises. -- Jonadab, 2006 Jan 19.

Vicki, thanks for restoring South Vietnam to stub status from redirect. Many U.S. veterans who think they fought for a good cause there will appreciate having an article. Of course, the Vietnam article should still exist. The situation is perhaps similar to the West Germany and East Germany articles vs. the Germany article. Ed Poor, Thursday, June 27, 2002

Ed, about "merged" vs "conquered": The sentence now doesn't read very well; "it was conquered by ... to form"??? "merged with ... to form" makes better grammatical sense, and we should use a word that reflects this. That a conquest was involved is already stated in the first part of the sentence anyway; this part of the sentence describes the neutral fact that the countries were combined. So we should find a term that doesn't imply consent but fits in with the sentence. I claim that "merged with" is exactly the term that we need. It's a neutral term, because mergers are not necessarily voluntary. This was what in the business world is called a "hostile takeover", which is more neutrally referred to as a "merger" in that context too. If you disagree that "merged with" is neutral, claiming that it implies consent, then can you suggest another term to use instead? As it is, it doesn't read well at all, IMO. — Toby 20:03 Aug 1, 2002 (PDT)

"merged with"... is neutral but "conquered"... is biased to one side

Actually, NPOV isn't my concern; I'm convinced that "conquered" is a reasonable factual word to use. The sentiment is already expressed in the phrase "the fall of Saigon", and I wouldn't even object to rephrasing that to be more explicit. When I say that "merged" is neutral, I don't mean that it's unbiased but instead that it simply doesn't say whether the merger was voluntary or not. If that point were under contention, then we'd have to use a neutral word to remain NPOV. To my knowledge, however, that point is not under contention; even those who find the government of South Vietnam illegitimate would concede that it was conquered by the other government. So I say "neutral" not to argue that we must use that word but rather that we can without being factually incorrect (since the fact of the matter is that it was not voluntary, as Ed is correct to imply). The reason that we must (or rather, should) use "merged" is simply the way that it fits into the sentence. If the fact of conquest were not expressed at all, then I would agree that it should be added (albeit in a way that reads well), but that fact is already mentioned. — Toby 21:23 Aug 1, 2002 (PDT)

Merged vs. Conquered.

South Vietnam was conquered by North Vietnam in 1975. vs, South Vietnam and North Vietnam merged in 1976.

While both may factually correct, the nuance of the second is that it was voluntary, and the first more accurately reflects that the South lost the war to the North.

I vote conquered.

[edit] Currency

I think the currency was the "dong", but this might be American soldier's slang.

Sorry, your indication is correct. Please wait for edit.

The currency IS đồng, as clearly shown here. When the region was under French rule, the currency was called the piastre, which was translated into Vietnamese as đồng (see here). But South Vietnamese currency has no French writing in them, so they should no longer be called by their French name (else we'd be calling the current Vietnamese currency the piastre as well). DHN 11:12, 18 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Agreed, but it might be worth noting that there was a brief time (I think) before the piastre was phased out and the new đồng was introduced. I've noted this in the article — I hope it conveys what I mean, but feel free to rephrase it if it makes things unclear. -- Vardion 11:22, 18 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Question of a name

An anon (68.101.223.149) apparently clicked on the red link for Bui Van Mau and typed "Vu Van Mau instead of BUI Van Mau." I've speedily deleted that, but thought I would mention it here. It seemed he was trying to let us know we had the name wrong. Google returns three (WP) hits for "Bui Van Mau" and none for "Van Van Mau." Anyone? SWAdair | Talk 06:57, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that the anon is correct, and "Vu Van Mau" is the proper name. See, for example, here and here. Our own Leaders of Republic of Vietnam article says the same thing. I'll change the article accordingly. -- Vardion 07:58, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] bias

I am aware that every record of history has a certain amount of bias, but doesn't this article lean too far towards justifying American intervention in Vietnam? The historical record is pretty clear in showing the justification for stopping "murderous" communism to be largely irrational and McCarthyist. Although there were murders under Stalin's rule, it is unreasonable to put such a biased and charged statement in an encyclopedia. I don't want to insult somebody by changing their work willy nilly, but I think someone should revise the opening paragraph of this article since it definitely justifies American intervention rather than simply stating the facts. ~Andy

I agree, the first paragraph has some severe NPOV issues. I'm going to slap a {{POV-section}} on it. It's also pretty garbled in how it talks about Ho Chi Minh - I don't know reading the article who he is, whether he's a North Vietnamese figure or a Southern one, and it's hard to figure out what the whole "election" thing is about. Yelyos 15:13, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Ngo Đinh Diem or Ngo Dinh Diem?

I see people changing his middle name ad naseum. Đ, eth, and D are two distinct letters in Vietnamese with two totally different sounds. Are we going to treat eth as just a diacritical D? I vote for Đinh. Any comments?--hvn73 16:49, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Please note that eth (Ð, ð) is distinctly different from the Vietnamese letter đ (Đ, d) in the internal representation (eth: U+00D0, U+00F0, đ: U+0110, U+0111). Please DO NOT use eth in place of đ. See D with stroke. Furthermore, it should be all or nothing; it doesn't make sense to just show some of the diacritics while ignoring the others. They're all essential. DHN 04:09, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] South Vietnamese Culture

I think the parts relating to contemporary Vietnamese culture should be moved to the Culture of Vietnam article, as this section should strictly be concerned with culture in South Vietnam prior to 1975. Viking880 05:22, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Edited out the caution that was at the bottom of information box. Utterly useless to tell people that the informaion is about an Anti-Communist regime.

[edit] General

I have reinstated some of the changes I made last week.

Firstly, it is illogical to say that South Vietnam came into existence in 1954 and then delete references to the State of Vietnam in the preview.

Any claims of South Vietnam to be the government of all of Vietnam were spurious, and to all intents and purposes, irrelevant to this article.

The P.R.G. did not "claim to be as such"; they were.

While an interesting fact, I am not sure how important the movement of Catholics from the North to the South is - it seems like a bit of an orphan factoid in the middle of that particuar section, but I left it in for others to decide.

It is incorrect to say that ARVN drove the North Vietnamese out of South Vietnam in a counter-attack in 1972.

I also tidied up some pretty loose language within the body text, and re-deleted the caution at the bottom of the information box: totally pointless.

Cripipper 22:23, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Evolution of Vietnam

To make in short and simple, in september 2nd 1945 came the Democratic Republic of Vietnam with ensuing French-Vietnamese War (145-1954) turned to civil War by France with the creation of State of Vietnam (Quoc Gia Viet Nam) when the French called back Empereur Bao Dai self exiled in Hong Kong to lead this State in 1948.

At the time of Geneva Conference, Bao Dai callef back Ngo Dinh Diem from the US to be his Prime Minister. Diem threw Bao Dai in a coup and made the Republic of Vietnam. One Vietnam since 1945 has been temporary divided to group the armed forces for full evacuation of the French Expeditionnary Force from Vietnam in 1955.

After Unconditionnal Surrender of April 30th 1975 started the process of reunification and both RVN and DRVN went out os stage to make a single Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

Takima 00:22, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

I have searched extensively, but have never come across anything that qualifies as a declaration of independence/statehood by the political entity of South Vietnam. I'm not aware of any admission to the UN or even application thereto, any recognition by foreign governments, including the USA or in short, any pretense of a formal independent state in the southern part of the country post-1954. Can anyone supply this? Asgrrr 05:47, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

NO, because both Hanoi and Saigon claimed to be the legitimate capitals of the entire nation of Vietnam. That is why Saigon's complaints about 'foreign' troops/aggression from the D.R.V. were slightly disingenuous, given that Saigon claimed to be the legitimate government of what was North Vietnam. Cripipper 14:13, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Hanoi recognized the South as independent and accepted the Geneva Accords that divided the country. Saigon rejected the accords. This is why the communists placed so much stress on the claim that the Vietcong were indigenous the South. In 1969, the Vietcong changed their offical name to "Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam." At the same time, communist nations recognized the Vietcong as the legitimate government in the South.Kauffner (talk) 06:34, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Fact vs Opinion

"The government preferred more chaos and loss of life in what amounted to battles which no longer had any meaning."

This isn't a fact! It is an opinion. Alot of this article looks like an essay. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.216.244.127 (talk • contribs) .

[edit] POV parentheses

one of the authors of this article (i don't care which author) suggests that catholics fled the north in what was perceived "communist persecution" now that that is all well and fine if it is consistent but with the parenthesis it is suggesting that persecution of catholics in the North is a propaganda or a myth which indicates a non NPOV. since rvn presidents persecution of anti-communists or anyone else are not parenthesized i have removed the previous parentheses for consistency and NPOV. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 202.4.79.70 (talk • contribs) .

[edit] Time Zone

I have edited the time zone of the South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) during 1955-1975. They use the time zone UTC+8, not UTC+7. During those times, North Vietnam used UTC+7 but South Vietnam used UTC+8.

[edit] Bombings

In 1965 was a bombing in a civilian area classed as a terrorist act in this conflict? Cause I havn't heard of it especially from sources close to the time period. Enlil Ninlil 05:10, 24 July 2007 (UTC)