THE VIETNAM WAR

The Vietnam War

The Vietnam War

Introduction

The Vietnam War is commonly understood to refer to the armed conflict between the forces of the United States and the Communist Party of Vietnam which took place primarily from March 1965 until January 1973, when the Paris Peace Agreements were signed. The nature of the conflict was more complex and its course more protracted, but it was informed by the common feature of a struggle over the political identity of Vietnam. The Vietnam War passed through two clearly defined historical stages involving differing forms of American intervention. Its origins are to be found in the determined attempt by the Vietnamese-dominated Communist Party of Indochina (founded in 1930) to thwart the re-establishment of French colonial power after the end of the Pacific War and to set up a Marxist state. In the wake of Japan's surrender in August 1945, the Communist front, known as the Viet Minh (standing for the League for the Independence of Vietnam) seized power in Hanoi in the August Revolution ; on 2 September Ho Chi Minh proclaimed the formation of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. The Viet Minh attracted popular support because of its nationalist credentials, while the French were faced with rising opposition at home.

Discussion

Direct military confrontation between the Viet Minh and the French first took place at the end of 1946 ostensibly over control of customs but, in effect, over entry of arms in the northern port of Haiphong. The first of the Indochina Wars began as a guerrilla struggle on the Communist side but progressively became one between conventional formations, culminating in the historic Battle of Dien Bien Phu in the early months of 1954. Dien Bien Phu is a valley in north-western Vietnam where the French had established a military redoubt, in the false hope of luring the Viet Minh into a pitched battle whose outcome would be determined by the superiority of their conventional forces. The French made a major miscalculation, above all, about the ability of the Viet Minh to deploy heavy artillery in the hills surrounding their military position. From 1950 the Viet Minh had the advantage of military assistance from the newly established People's Republic of China, whose provision of US-manufactured artillery captured during the Korean War was decisive in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu. The French had attracted military assistance from the United States because of an ability to represent their colonial interest as part of a global struggle against international communism. It took the form of economic aid, military supplies and logistical support; by the time of the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, the United States was bearing almost 80 per cent of the total cost of France's prosecution of the war. (Garfinkle 199)

[The Vietnam War Map]

As the French military position became progressively more untenable with growing popular opposition to the war, an agreement was reached to convene an international conference in Geneva to discuss Korea and Indochina. The fortress of Dien Bien Phu fell to Viet ...