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The Indochina Wars (Vietnamese: Chiến tranh Đông Dương) were a series of wars fought in Southeast Asia from 1946 until 1979, between nationalist Vietnamese against French, American, and Chinese forces. The term "Indochina" originally referred to French Indochina, which included the current states of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. In current use, it applies largely to a geographic region, rather than a political area. The four wars were:
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French colonization and occupation of the region was a consequence of missionary work of the 16th century, which had resulted in Catholics forming a converted minority. While Gia Long tolerated Catholicism, his successors Minh Mạng and Tự Đức were staunch Confucians, admiring China rather than France. They brutally suppressed Catholicism and attempted to remove French influence, which provoked the Catholic nations of Europe to retaliate. Confucian isolationist policy led the Vietnamese to refuse industrial modernization, so that they were ill-equipped against the French. In August 1858, Napoleon III of France ordered the landing of French forces at Tourane, (present-day Da Nang), beginning a colonial occupation that was to last almost a century. By 1884, the French had complete control over the country, which now formed the largest part of French Indochina.
A continuous thread of local resistance began with Hàm Nghi, then to Phan Dinh Phung, Phan Boi Chau and lastly to Ho Chi Minh, who returned to Vietnam from France and joined the Viet Minh in 1941. A founding member of the French Communist Party, Ho Chi Minh had de-emphasised his communist ties and dissolved the Indochinese Communist Party, in order to win trust and gain power. When a famine broke out in 1945, causing 2 million deaths, the Viet Minh arranged a massive relief effort, consequently winning over many people to their nationalist cause. Ho Chi Minh rose to become the leader of the Vietcong.
When World War II ended, North Vietnam came under the control of Ho Chi Minh. The Japanese surrendered to the Chinese Nationalists in North Vietnam, and the Viet Minh organized the "August Revolution" uprisings across the country. Emperor Bảo Đại abdicated power to the Viet Minh, on August 25, 1945. In a popular move, Ho Chi Minh made Bảo Đại "supreme adviser" to the Viet Minh-led government in Hanoi, which asserted its independence on September 2 as the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV). In 1946, Vietnam had its first constitution.
In 1948, France tried to regain its colonial control over Vietnam. In South Vietnam, the Japanese had surrendered to British forces, who had supported the Free French in fighting the Viet Minh, along with the armed religious Cao Dai and Hoa Hao sects, and the Binh Xuyen organized crime group. The French re-installed Bảo Đại as head of state of Vietnam, which now comprised central and southern Vietnam. The ensuing war, between the French-controlled South and the independent Communist-allied North, is known as the First Indochina War.
In the First Indochina War, the Communist North Vietnamese, supported by the Communist powers of the People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union, fought to gain their independence from the French, supported by the French-loyalist Vietnamese and the United Nations. This war of independence lasted from December 1946 until July 1954, with most of the fighting taking place in areas surrounding Hanoi. It ended with the French defeat at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu and French withdrawal from Vietnam.
The Second Indochina War, commonly known as the Vietnam War, pitted the recently-successful Communist Vietnam People's Army (VPA or PAVN, but also incorrectly known as the North Vietnamese Army or NVA) and the National Front for the Liberation of Vietnam (South Vietnamese NLF guerrilla fighters allied with the PAVN, known in the Republic of Vietnam as the Viet Cong, meaning 'Vietnamese Communists') against United States troops and the United States-backed ARVN (South Vietnamese soldiers). Because there was no declaration of war, there is much disagreement as to when the war began, but two events commonly cited are the first arrival of United States advisors in South Vietnam in 1955, and open declaration of United States involvement in 1964. During the War, the North Vietnamese transported most of their supplies via the Ho Chi Minh Trail (known to the Vietnamese as the Truong Son Trail, after the Truong Son mountains), which ran through Laos and Cambodia. As a result, the areas of these nations bordering Vietnam would see heavy combat during the war.
For the United States, the political and combat goals were ambiguous: success and progress were ill-defined and, along with the large numbers of casualties, the Vietnam War raised moral issues that made the war increasingly unpopular at home. U.S. News reports of the 1968 Tet offensive, especially from CBS, were unfavorable in regard to the lack of progress in ending the war. Although the 1968 Tet offensive resulted in a military victory for South Vietnam and the United States, with virtually complete destruction of the NLF forces combat capability, it was ironically also a turning point in American voter opposition to U.S. support for their anti-communist Vietnamese allies.
The United States began withdrawing troops from Vietnam in 1970, with the last troops returning in January, 1973. The Paris Peace Accords called for a cease-fire, and prohibited the North Vietnamese from sending more troops into South Vietnam - although the North Vietnamese were permitted to continue to occupy those regions of South Vietnam they had conquered in the 1972 Easter Offensive.
The North Vietnamese never intended to abide by the agreement. Fighting continued sporadically through 1973 and 1974, while the North Vietnamese planned a major offensive, tentatively scheduled for 1976. The North Vietnamese Army in South Vietnam had been ravaged during the Easter offensive in 1973, and it was projected that it would take until 1976 to rebuild their logistical capabilities.
The withdrawal had catastrophic effects on the South Vietnamese Army (ARVN). Shortly after the Paris Peace Accords, the United States Congress made major budget cuts in military aid to the South Vietnamese. The ARVN, which had been trained by American troops to use American tactics, quickly fell into disarray. Although it remained an effective fighting force throughout 1973 and 1974, by January 1975 it had disintegrated. The North Vietnamese hurriedly attacked the much weakened South, and met with little resistance.
Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, was taken by the PAVN on April 30, 1975, and the Second Indochina War ended.
The fighting that took place between North and South Vietnam following United States withdrawal is sometimes called the Third Indochina War; this term usually refers to a later 1979 conflict, however (see below).
The Third Indochina War, commonly known as the Sino-Vietnamese War, was fought in February-March 1979 between the People's Republic of China and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.
In 1978, the Vietnamese had destroyed neighboring Cambodia and driven the ruling Khmer Rouge from power (see the main article at Cambodian-Vietnamese War). The Vietnamese deposed because the Khmer Rouge had been persecuting and committing genocide against ethnic Vietnamese.
The Khmer Rouge was a political ally of the Chinese. In 1979, the Chinese government launched an invasion of Vietnam as punishment for the Vietnamese expedition into Cambodia.
Fighting was short but intense. The Chinese advanced about forty kilometers into Vietnam, occupying the city of Lang Son on 6 March. There they claimed the gate to Hanoi was open, declared their punitive mission achieved, and withdrew. The real reason for their seemingly abrupt withdrawal is disputed (see Cambodian-Vietnamese War). A lasting result of this conflict is that Vietnam maintains a large standing army to this day.