3.9. Vietnam Wars (1954-1975)
Vietnam, a nation in Southeast Asia on the eastern edge of the Indochinese peninsula, had been under French colonial rule since the 19th century.
During World War II, Japanese forces invaded Vietnam. To fight off both Japanese occupiers and the French colonial administration, political leader Ho Chi Minh—inspired by Chinese and Soviet communism—formed the Viet Minh, or the League for the Independence of Vietnam.
Following its 1945 defeat in World War II, Japan withdrew its forces from Vietnam, leaving the French-educated Emperor Bao Dai in control. Seeing an opportunity to seize control, Ho’s Viet Minh forces immediately rose up, taking over the northern city of Hanoi and declaring a Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV) with Ho as president.
The Vietnam War was a long, costly and divisive conflict that pitted the communist government of North Vietnam against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. The conflict was intensified by the ongoing Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. More than 3 million people (including over 58,000 Americans) were killed in the Vietnam War, and more than half of the dead were Vietnamese civilians.
Opposition to the war in the United States bitterly divided Americans, even after President Richard Nixon signed the Paris Peace Accords and ordered the withdrawal of U.S. forces in 1973. Communist forces ended the war by seizing control of South Vietnam in 1975, and the country was unified as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam the following year.
1946 - Communists in the north begin fighting France for control of the country.
1949 - France establishes the State of Vietnam in the southern half of the country.
1951 - Ho Chi Minh becomes leader of Dang Lao Dong Vietnam, the Vietnam Worker’s Party, in the north.
North Vietnam was communist. South Vietnam was not. North Vietnamese Communists and South Vietnamese Communist rebels, known as the Viet Cong, wanted to overthrow the South Vietnamese government and reunite the country.
1954 - North Vietnamese begin helping South Vietnamese rebels fight South Vietnamese troops, thus BEGINS the Vietnam conflict.
April 30, 1975 - South Vietnam surrenders to North Vietnam as North Vietnamese troops enter Saigon, ENDING the Vietnam conflict.
