Vietnam War: Armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia between North Vietnam and South Vietnam

It was fought between North Vietnam and South Vietnam. North Vietnam was supported by the Soviet Union, China, and North Korea, and South Vietnam was set up by the United States and supported by South Korea, Thailand, Australia, New Zealand, and the Philippines. People from other countries also went to fight but not in their own national armies. The conflict between communist and capitalist countries was part of the Cold War.

Vietnam War
Part of the Indochina Wars and the Cold War in Asia
Clockwise from top left: American Huey helicopters insert South Vietnamese ARVN troops, 1970. North Vietnamese soldiers in action c. 1966. American marines use a flamethrower, 1967. South Vietnamese general Nguyễn Ngọc Loan summarily executes Viet Cong officer Nguyễn Văn Lém during the Tet Offensive. Two Douglas A-4C Skyhawk fly past the anti-submarine aircraft carrier USS Kearsarge (CVS-33), 1964. Dead civilians from the Massacre at Huế are buried.
Date 1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975 (19 years, 5 months, 4 weeks and 1 day) Location South Vietnam North Vietnam Cambodia Laos South China Sea Gulf of Thailand (spillover conflict in China, and Thailand) Result North Vietnamese victory Territorial changes Reunification of North Vietnam and South Vietnam into the Socialist Republic of Vietnam in 1976
Belligerents
North Vietnam Viet Cong and PRG Pathet Lao Khmer Rouge GRUNK (1970–1975)  China (1965–1969)  Soviet Union  North Korea	South Vietnam United States  South Korea  Australia  New Zealand Template:Country data Kingdom of Laos Cambodia (1967–1970) Khmer Republic (1970–1975)  Thailand Template:Country data Fourth Philippine Republic  Taiwan  Spain
Commanders and leaders
Hồ Chí Minh Lê Duẩn Võ Nguyên Giáp Phạm Văn Đồng Trần Văn Trà ... and others	Ngô Đình Diệm X Nguyễn Văn Thiệu Nguyễn Cao Kỳ Lyndon B. Johnson Richard Nixon Robert McNamara William Westmoreland Creighton Abrams ... and others
Strength
≈860,000 (1967) North Vietnam: 690,000 (1966, including PAVN and Viet Cong) Viet Cong: ~200,000 (estimated, 1968) China: 170,000 (1968) 320,000 total Khmer Rouge: 70,000 (1972): 376  Pathet Lao: 48,000 (1970) Soviet Union: ~3,000 North Korea: 200	≈1,420,000 (1968) South Vietnam: 850,000 (1968) 1,500,000 (1974–1975) United States: 2,709,918 serving in Vietnam total Peak: 543,000 (April 1969): xlv  Khmer Republic: 200,000 (1973)[source?] Laos: 72,000 (Royal Army and Hmong militia) South Korea: 48,000 per year (1965–1973, 320,000 total) Thailand: 32,000 per year (1965–1973) (in Vietnam and Laos)[source?] Australia: 50,190 total (Peak: 8,300 combat troops) New Zealand: Peak: 552 in 1968: 158  Template:Country data Fourth Philippine Republic Philippines: 2,061 Spain: 100-130 total (Peak: 30 medical troops and advisors) .
Casualties and losses
North Vietnam & Viet Cong 30,000–182,000 civilian dead: 176 : 450–453  849,018 military dead (per Vietnam; 1/3 non-combat deaths) 666,000–950,765 dead (US estimated 1964–1974): 450–451  232,000+ military missing (per Vietnam) 600,000+ military wounded: 739  Khmer Rouge: Unknown Pathet Lao: Unknown  China: ~1,100 dead and 4,200 wounded  Soviet Union: 16 dead  North Korea: 14 dead Total military dead/missing: ≈1,100,000 Total military wounded: ≈604,200 (excluding GRUNK/Khmer Rouge and Pathet Lao)	South Vietnam: 195,000–430,000 civilian dead: 450–453  Military dead: 313,000 (total) 254,256 combat deaths (between 1960 and 1974): 275  1,170,000 military wounded ≈ 1,000,000 captured  United States: 58,281 dead (47,434 from combat) 303,644 wounded (including 150,341 not requiring hospital care)  Laos: 15,000 army dead Khmer Republic: Unknown South Korea: 5,099 dead; 10,962 wounded; 4 missing  Australia: 521 dead; 3,129 wounded  Thailand: 351 dead  New Zealand: 37 dead  Republic of China: 25 dead 17 captured Template:Country data Fourth Philippine Republic Philippines: 9 dead; 64 wounded Total military dead: 333,620 (1960–1974) – 392,364 (total) Total military wounded: ≈1,340,000+ (excluding FARK and FANK) Total military captured: ≈1,000,000+
Vietnamese civilian dead: 405,000–2,000,000: 450–453  Vietnamese total dead: 966,000–3,010,000 Cambodian Civil War dead: 275,000–310,000 Laotian Civil War dead: 20,000–62,000 Non-Indochinese military dead: 65,494 Total dead: 1,326,494–3,447,494 For more information see Vietnam War casualties and Aircraft losses of the Vietnam War
FULRO fought an insurgency against both South Vietnam and North Vietnam with the Viet Cong and was supported by Cambodia for much of the war.

The Viet Cong, also known as the National Liberation Front or NLF, was a South Vietnamese communist force that was helped by North Vietnam. It fought a guerrilla war against South Vietnamese anticommunist forces. The People's Army of Vietnam (also known as the North Vietnamese Army) engaged in a more conventional war by at times putting large forces to battle.

The Vietnam War was very controversial, especially in the United States. It was the first war to feature live television coverage and the first major armed conflict that the United States lost. The war became so unpopular in the United States that President Richard Nixon eventually agreed to send American soldiers home in 1973.

 

The Viet Minh waves its flag over a captured French bunker at Dien Bien Phu in 1954. The French defeat at the Battle of Ðiện Biên Phủ led to the Geneva Conference and to the partition of Vietnam.

 

Map of a partitioned Vietnam, 1964. The communist-controlled North Vietnam is in red. Most of the ground fighting was in South Vietnam.

France began to colonize Vietnam between 1859 and 1862, when it took control of Saigon. By 1864, it had controlled all of Cochinchina, in the south of Vietnam. France took control of Annam, the large central part of Vietnam, in 1874. After France defeated China during the Sino-French War (1884–1885), it took over Tonkin, the north of Vietnam. French Indochina was formed in October 1887 from these three areas of Vietnam (Cochinchina, Annam and Tonkin), as well as Cambodia. Laos was added after a war against Thailand, the Franco-Siamese War, in 1893.

During World War II, after Nazi Germany had defeated France in 1940, French Indochina was controlled by the Vichy French government, a puppet government recognized by Germany. In March 1945, the Japanese Empire launched the Second French Indochina Campaign. Japan occupied Indochina but surrendered in August 1945.

After the defeat of Nazi Germany, the Vichy government was no longer in control of France or its territories. The newly formed Provisional Government of the French Republic attempted to take back control of its former colonies in Indochina by force, if necessary, but France's efforts at regaining its colony in Vietnam were opposed by a communist Vietnamese army, the Viet Minh.

 

The Viet Minh had been founded in 1941 by the Vietnamese Communist Party and was led by Hồ Chí Minh. That led to the First Indochina War between France and the Viet Minh. Fighting started with the French bombardment of Haiphong Harbor in November 1946 and ended with a triumph of the Viet Minh at Dien Bien Phu.

In July 1954, France and the Viet Minh signed the Geneva Peace Accord, which resulted in dividing Vietnam along the 17th parallel into a northern section, under the control of the communists, led by Ho Chi Minh, and a southern section, led by the Catholic anticommunist Ngo Dinh Diem who is backed by the United States. The partition was to be temporary until elections in 1956. However, Diem started arresting suspected communist sympathizers that year and wanted to keep power for himself. The elections were never held, and in 1957, North Vietnam began guerrilla warfare against the south.

The United States began to send military advisors to help train and support the South Vietnamese Army. It was fighting against the Viet Cong, also known as the National Liberation Front, a communist party based in South Vietnam that was controlled with North Vietnam. The Viet Cong began a campaign of assassination in 1957. In 1959, North Vietnam dramatically increased its military assistance to the Viet Cong, which then began attacking South Vietnamese military units. Because of domino theory, the US feared that if communism took hold in Vietnam, it would then spread to other countries nearby.

 

On 2 August 1964, the destroyer USS Maddox was in the Gulf of Tonkin, on an intelligence mission along North Vietnam's coast. The US said that three North Vietnamese torpedo boats attacked the destroyer. The Maddox fired back and damaged the three torpedo boats. The US later claimed that two days later, the torpedo boats again attacked the Maddox and the destroyer USS Turner Joy. In the second attack, the US ships did not actually see the torpedo boats, but it was said that they had been found by using the ship's radar.

After the alleged second attack, the US launched air strikes against North Vietnam. The Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Joint Resolution (H.J. RES 1145) on 7 August 1964 and so gave the president the power to run large-scale military operations in Southeast Asia without declaring war. There was little to no proof of the attacks, and it was believed by some that they had been an excuse for expanded US involvement in Indochina.

The communists were supplied by a vast network of hidden trails, known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail. It was very well hidden although many attempts were made by the US to bomb and destroy it. Supplies and soldiers from North Vietnam were sent through Laos to communists forces in South Vietnam. American planes heavily bombed the Ho Chi Minh Trail, and 3,000,000 short tons (2,700,000 t) of bombs were dropped on Laos. That slowed down but did not stop the trail system.

Severe communist losses during the 1968 Tet Offensive made it possible for the US to withdraw many soldiers. As part of a policy called "Vietnamization," South Vietnamese troops were trained and equipped to replace the Americans who had left. By 1973, 95% of the American troops had left.

All of the parties signed a peace treaty in Paris in January 1973, but the fighting continued until 1975, when the South Vietnamese government surrendered after its capital, Saigon, had fallen.

 

Cross-sectional diagram showing an example of a section of tunnel system used by the Viet Cong during the Vietnam War.

The area with the most tunnels was called the Iron Triangle by the Americans. The Viet Minh and later the Viet Cong used the tunnels.

Some of the larger tunnel complexes had kitchens, operating rooms, dorm rooms, storage rooms, and school rooms.

 

Viet Cong soldiers wore typical clothing and sandals in a tunnel.

They often ate and slept in the tunnels and disappeared into them when the Americans raided a village.

There were some large-scale battles during the Vietnam War, but most of the fighting was guerilla warfare, which is different from the large-scale battles fought between armies like those during World War II.

 

In guerilla warfare, small units fight limited battles against an enemy force, set up ambushes, make surprise attacks, and then retreat to the countryside or blend into the local population. That also includes making it difficult for the enemy to operate by engaging in sabotage and harassing the enemy with lethal means such as the land mine and the booby trap. The communist troops more often engaged in guerilla warfare against South Vietnamese and American troops than the reverse because the communists knew of their weakness in conventional (large-scale) warfare.

Although few of the traps were explosive, all of the explosive traps used grenades. A tripwire was placed, and if a soldier tripped over the wire, a grenade pin was pulled out, the grenade would blow, and the soldier would usually be killed.

Another style of trap was nicknamed the Venus flytrap. It had about eight barbs attached to a rectangular frame sitting on a small hole. The barbs faced down so that when the soldier’s leg got caught in it, it would not hurt until he pulled his leg out, when the barbs would rip through his leg.

Another Viet Cong trap was the Punji trap. Two wooden platforms were placed and covered with leaves to camouflage it. There were spikes on the inside of the wood. When a soldier came along and walked on the wood, it caved in, and the spikes would go through the soldier’s foot. That trap was the most common because it was the cheapest one and was very effective. It was also often contaminated, often with feces, so that the soldier would also become infected.

Besides hurting or killing people, the traps caused fear and lowered morale.

 

The Fall of Saigon was the capture of Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, by the People's Army of Vietnam and the National Liberation Front on April 30, 1975. That marked the end of the Vietnam War and the beginning of the formal reunification of Vietnam into a communist state.

Before the city fell, the few American civilian and military personnel had left Vietnam, and tens of thousands of South Vietnamese soldiers and civilians had also fled.

The North Vietnamese forces, commanded by General Văn Tiến Dũng and began their final attack on Saigon, whose defence was commanded by General Nguyen Van Toan on April 29. A heavy artillery bombardment of Tân Sơn Nhứt Airport killed the last two American servicemen who died in Vietnam: Charles McMahon and Darwin Judge.

By the afternoon of the next day, North Vietnamese troops had occupied the important points within the city and raised their flag over the South Vietnamese presidential palace. The government of South Vietnam soon formally surrendered.

The Americans still in Saigon were evacuated by helicopter or fixed-wing aircraft. The surrender of Saigon was given in person by South Vietnamese President General Duong Van Minh: "We are here to hand over to you the power in order to avoid bloodshed." He was president for two days as his country crumbled.

Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City after the communist leader Ho Chi Minh.

The war made potential farmland useless, as it was bombed and affected by Agent Orange. The economy crashed because inflation was high and so unemployment was common, and there was poor health care. Many people fled Vietnam because of these conditions.

The Đổi Mới reforms helped to improve many of the problems that had been caused by the war. Although there are still many situations with serious economic issues, Vietnam now has a fairly successful economy. The income and the standard of living of the average Vietnamese people have kept improving since the 1990s.

The war also had lasting effects on the US. It led to divisions in American society that are still seen today, and many Americans became more wary of their government. Many veterans came back with PTSD and were not treated well; people who opposed the war saw them as killers, and people who supported the war saw them as losers.

• First Indochina War
• Weapons of the Vietnam War