The Aftermath of French Defeat in Vietnam

by Cunningham, Mark E.; Zwier, Lawrence J.

• ISBN13: 9780822590934
• ISBN10: 082259093X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-03-01
• Publisher: Lerner Pub Group

Summary

The whole Vietnamese people, animated by a common purpose, are determined to fight to the bitter end against any attempt by the French colonialists to reconquer their country. These words from the 1945 Vietnamese Declaration of Independence told the world that the people of Vietnam would no longer tolerate foreign occupation of their nation. In the following Indochina War, Vietnamese fighters succeeded in ousting the French from their country after a surprise Vietnamese victory at the battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954. The two sides signed a peace treaty that year, but fighting was far from over in Vietnam. A new war began in 1957 between Communist forces, led by North Vietnam, and anti-Communist forces, including the powerful United States. The war finally ended eighteen years later, with a Communist victory and a death toll of one million people. Follow the dramatic story of bloody Dien Bien Phu and its aftermath: years of savage fighting in the jungles of Vietnam, antiwar protests and political turmoil in the United States, and ultimate reunification of Vietnam.