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Vietnam war from the Vietnamese point of view
Vietnam war
Vietnam war history
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Oppression is perhaps the worst crime that man will ever inflict upon himself. Despite a tyrant's will, the fighting spirit of the oppressed never dies out. Oppression has the power to turn an average commoner into a force to be reckoned with. If you take a man's freedom from him he has nothing to lose, making him extremely dangerous. Since 248 A.D., this oppression plagued South East Asia by the French, the Chinese and others. At the end of World War II in August of 1945, the French were trying to re-establish control over their Indochinese colonies. This weak moment would be seized by Vietnam to free themselves from French rule and declare their independence.
Vietnam has a long history of other countries ruling over it, beginning around 2,700 years ago. Successive dynasties based in China ruled over Vietnam from 111BC until 938 when Vietnam re-gained independence briefly. Vietnam remained a tributary state to China for much of its history and constantly repelled invasions from both Chinese and Mongols. The “independent” era ended towards the end of the 19th century when it was colonized by the French. France obtained control over northern Vietnam following its victory over China in the Sino-French war (1884-1885). French Indochina was formed in October 1887 from Annam, Tonkin, and Cochinchina, which together form modern Vietnam.
In the spring and summer of 1954, French and Vietminh forces were battling fiercely over who would be in control of Vietnam. Things were beginning to look very bleak for the French forces trying to quell the uprisings of the Vietminh in their colonial possession of Indochina. An uprising by Vietnamese soldiers occurred on February 10, 1930, in the French colonial army's Yen Bai garrison, a small t...
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...eva Accords partitioned the country in two, with the promise of re-unification and democratic free elections. Unfortunately rather than peaceful re-unification, partition led to the Vietnam war, where former neighbors were at war with each other. Meanwhile the Geneva conference had begun again in April. Vietminh general Giap decided to commence his attack on Dien Bien Phu while the conference was under way. The September before the U.S had agreed to give the French a grant of $385 million to begin the ‘Navarre Plan’, a plan to destroy the Viet Minh forces by 1955. The French were in desperate need of the aid by that time.
While The Vietnamese eventually reached their goal of independence, had to fight hard and stay determined to win. The Indo-China war took many Vietnameese lives but united a country of mostly peasants under Ho Chi Minh against their oppressors.
After World War II, the French began a fight for their former colony of Indochina, which included Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. The French and other countries failed to see at that time the will and desire of the Vietnamese people to gain independence from foreign rule and to have their country unified. Ho Chi Minh, a Vietnamese nationalist, fought the French and overtook the North Vietnam capital of Hanoi with his followers, the Viet Minh, declaring the area the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. (Anderson, 2002) The French were unwilling to give up their colony and drove the Vietminh from many of the larger cities in the south. The United States entered the Vietnam struggle in 1950 when $15 million in aid was pledged to France in order to fight the Vietminh. (Anderson, 2002) The rationale was to align with France and keep the Soviet Union from expanding in Europe and to keep another country from falling into communist rule.
Appy’s book is valuable to its readers in showing how Vietnam became the template for every American war since, from novelties like the invasion of Grenada to the seemingly never-ending conflicts post-9/11. But before all that, there was Vietnam, and, larger lessons aside, Appy’s book is a fascinating, insightful, infuriating and thought-provoking study of that conflict, from its earliest days
The Vietnam War: A Concise International History is a strong book that portrays a vivid picture of both sides of the war. By getting access to new information and using valid sources, Lawrence’s study deserves credibility. After reading this book, a new light and understanding of the Vietnam war exists.
E-History (2012, N.d.). Retrieved March 25, 2012, from http://ehistory.osu.edu/vietnam/essays/battlecommand/index.cfm.
In 1954, French involvement in Vietnam ended and led to the Geneva Conference where a ceasefire agreement was negotiated. From the Geneva Accords, Vietnam was divided into two portions, North and South, at the 17th parallel. At the time, North Vietnam was communist and was gaining followers quickly (Rogers). The United States had previously created something called the Truman Doctrine, a policy to counter communism and allowed the US to provide political, military, and economic assistance
Vietnam has a very rich and culturally diverse background dating all the way back to 1066 when William the Conqueror invaded and paved the way for English colonization. The French had been colonizing since the 19th century. The French role in Vietnam's history is critical; they started out by bringing these simple peasants to the latest technology of farming and hunting (Yancey 37). The French helped these people out greatly in the beginning, but like all stories of occupation go, they just got worse. They started forcing rules and laws on the people of Vietnam.
The French eventually gained back some control over parts of Vietnam. In early 1946, the French began a series of dual negotiations with the Chinese and Viet Minh over the future of Vietnam. After failed negotiations with the French over the future of Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh and his Viet Minh retreated into remote parts of the countryside to fight a small-scale insurgency against the French. (The History Place, Beginner’s Guide)
After returning, Minh had help from the Vietminh; an organization of communist that wanted freedom from other countries. Their main goal was to turn Vietnam into a self-governed communist country. France wanted none of this non-sense. In 1945 they had moved back into southern Vietnam and ruled most of the cities. Ho Chi Minh swore to fight France to gain control of the whole country. U.S. promised to aid France, and sent almost $15 million worth of financial aid to France. The French fought for four years, being financially aided by the U.S. the whole time. The U.S. spent nearly one billion dollars in order to help France regain control of the tiny country. The only reason that much effort was put into a small area was the fear of the y. Domino Theory. The Domino Theory first showed it's head during a 1954 news conference by U.S. President Eisenhower. The domino theory is the fear of the spread of communism from one country to the next, and so on. Even with the assistance of the U.S. France could not gain the control it once had on Vietnam.
(4)The U.S. used realpolitiks in The Geneva Conference because the United States negotiated with a communist country over another country. (5) On April 27, 1954, the Conference produced a declaration which supported the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Indochina thereby granting it independence from France. In addition, the Conference declaration agreed upon the cessation of hostilities and foreign involvement (or troops) in internal Indochina affairs. Northern and southern zones were drawn into which opposing troops were to withdraw, to facilitate the cessation of hostilities between the Vietnamese forces and those that had supported the French. The Viet Minh, awaited unification on the basis of internationally supervised free elections to be held in July 1956. Most of the French Union forces evacuated Vietnam, although much of the regional governmental infrastructure in the South was the same as it had been under t...
The 1950s was not a particularly good decade for France. The Fourth Republic, which had been established in the aftermath of the Second World War, remained unstable and lurched from crisis to crisis. Between 1946 and 1954, there had been a war in French Indo-China, between a nationalist force under Ho Chi Minh and the French. The war was long and bitter and towards the end, the French suffered the ignominy of losing the major fortress of Dien Bien Phu to the guerrillas on 7 May 1954. An armistice was sought with Ho Chi Minh, and the nations of North and South Vietnam emerged from the ashes of the colony. It is entirely likely that the success of the guerrillas influenced the Algerian insurrectionists, the National Liberation Front(FLN), in tactics and in the idea that the time was ripe to strike. It is clear that the FLN employed similar methods to those developed by the nationalists under Ho Chi Minh.1
However, many problems still remain in Vietnam. After the war there was a conference to discuss the troubles in Vietnam and all of the other troubles in Asia. That conference was called the Geneva Conference. Vietnam sent two delegations to the conference. One of the delegations represented Viet Minh (which was Communist in their leanings) and the other represented Bao Dia's government, which was backed by the United States.
...ence of 1957 would support the cession of foreign involvement in Vietnam. However the French would not relinquish any territorial claims until the electoral conference in 1956. It was there that the French finally gave up its remaining control in Vietnam, however, the United States and South Vietnam rejected the decisions made between the two conferences and thus began a new chapter in Vietnam’s history with American involvement and further wartime.
Gilbert, Marc Jason. "Vietnam War." World Book Student. World Book, 2010. Web. 21 March 2010.
The French’s began to colonize Vietnam in 1874. The Vietnamese people gave the French a hard time during the “Pacification Period.” During this time the French tried to gain control of Vietnamese rebel groups and the Chinese, who also wanted to obtain Vietnam. The French divided Vietnam into three different parts. The southern part of Vietnam included two regions called Cochinchina and Annam. The northern part of Vietnam included a region called Tonking. Most of the rebellions took place in Tonking and Annam. The French were in Vietnam because of Economic reasons but, Catholic missionaries also wanted to convert all the people of Asia to Catholicism. Also the French wanted to spread their culture within Vietnam and teach the Vietnamese people about French literature, language, and history. After this period of time France focused on modernizing Vietnam and bringing in rail roads, bridges, and highways. They also forced labor and taxed the Vietnamese people.
The Vietnam War took action after the First Indochina War, in fact the Vietnam War is also known as the Second Indochina War. This war included the communist North Vietnam and its allies of the Viet Cong, the Soviet Union, China and other communist allies going against South Vietnam and its allies, the Unites States, Philippines and other anti-communist allies. It was a very long and conflicting war that actually started in 1954 and ended in 1975. The war began after the rise to power of Ho Chi Minh and his communist party in North Vietnam. More than three million people were killed during the war, this included approximately 58,000 Americans and more than half of the killed were actually Vietnamese civilians. The Vietnam War ended by the communist forces giving up control of Saigon and the next year the country was then unified as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. Many people, including both men and women were directly and indirectly involved within the war itself. Women worked many different roles in the Vietnam War, and they are most definitely not credited enough for all that they actually did.