Page 76 - History of War - Issue 10-14

VIETNAM

THE UNTOLD STORY

A country’s fight for independence

and unity that spans centuries

t was a cold night on the 2 November and as long as the empire remained strong,
1963 as rebel forces broke into the Vietnam would continue to bow. But when
IGia Long palace in South Vietnam. The the Chinese dynasties fell into decline, the
invasion marked a climax to days of attacks spirit of the Vietnamese people emerged and
of government and loyalist army buildings they enjoyed several periods of independent
across the country, and the rebels were looking rule before being snatched under China’s
for one man: Ngô Ðình Diêm, the president wing again. They returned to bowing and
of South Vietnam. The palace fell into rebel speaking Chinese, but this period of self-rule
hands by daybreak, and Diêm surrendered had given the Vietnamese people a taste of
after being promised safe exile. The president independence, and they wanted it back.
was arrested and bundled into the back of an At the start of the 15th Century Le Loi,
armoured personal carrier before promptly a wealthy landowner, was finally pushed
being shot. His assassination would make to breaking point by Chinese oppression
headlines around the globe, but just what had and started his own movement of national
driven his own people to do this? Why did the resistance. Although it took ten long years of
United States care so much about the fate of fighting, the Vietnamese managed to force
the president of this remote Asian country? China out of their country. Le Loi consequently
The assassination of Diêm was not only became a national hero and emperor of the
the catalyst for a war that would rock the Vietnamese dynasty. Vietnam flourished with
foundations of the most powerful nation on art, literature, education, agriculture and
earth, but also the culmination of discontent fairer laws throughout the country. It also
that had been building for hundreds, if not experienced a rapid period of growth and
thousands of years. even began to gain territory to the south, but
Vietnamese history is almost as long as the it was this push that would create a divide
history of man itself, and some of the earliest that would plague the country for hundreds of
civilisations of the world thrived there. Uniquely years. Vietnam had previously always enjoyed a
situated between sea, mountains, rivers and large central government, but when Le Loi was
jungles, those who tried to attack Vietnam eventually overthrown, it found itself divided
found their attempts to be disastrous, but once into two separate governments, one in the
the invaders were successful the country was north and one in the south.
unable to shake them off. For 1,100 years the For years the two sides engaged in bouts of
people of Vietnam bowed to Chinese emperors civil wars, revolutions and political chaos, with
and the Vietnamese culture was slowly and one regime overthrowing the other over and
methodically scrubbed out until little remained over again. It wasn’t until 1801 that Nguyen
of a Vietnam before Chinese presence. The Anh, a member of the Southern royal family,
country became simply an extension of China emerged victorious from a 14-year-long conflict

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