Vietnam War Timeline Essay

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Vietnam War Timeline

Building Tension

1858-1887
The French began their colonial rule on Vietnam and began to call the land French Indochina.

1930
The Indochinese Communist Party was created by Ho Chi Minh to try to get Vietnamese independence from the French.

1941 The Viet Minh was a resistance force organized by the Indochinese Communist Party, as a response to an invasion from Japan during World War II.

1945
At the end of World War II, the Viet Minh achieved their goal of gaining Vietnam’s independence. They conquered Hanoi, a Northern Vietnamese city, and declared it as a democratic state with Ho Chi Minh as the president.

1946
French forces attacked Viet Minh in Haiphong in November, starting a war of resistance against …show more content…

The effort to take the outpost lasted for two months,while the French government agreed to attend to peace talks in Geneva.

The United States Enter the War
1964
North Vietnam PAtrol boats fire on U.S ships. US Congress approves Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorising military action in region.
1965
200,000 American combat troops arrive in South Vietnam.
1966
US troop numbers in Vietnam rise to 400,000, then to 500,000 the following year.

1968 - Tet Offensive - a combined assault by Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese army on US positions - begins. More than 500 civilians die in the US massacre at My Lai.

1969 Ho Chi Minh dies. President Nixon begins to reduce US ground troops in Vietnam as domestic public opposition to the war grows.

1970
Nixon's national security advisor, Henry Kissinger, and Le Duc Tho, for the Hanoi government, start talks in Paris.

1973 Ceasefire agreement in Paris, US troop pullout completed by March.

1975 North Vietnamese troops invade South Vietnam and take control of the whole country after South Vietnamese President Duong Van Minh surrenders.

1976 Socialist Republic of Vietnam proclaimed. Saigon is re-named Ho Chi Minh City. Hundreds of thousands flee

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