Existing comment:
Vietnam War:
Background to the Vietnam War:
The defeat of French military forces by Viet Minh soldiers at Dien Bein Phu in 1954 signaled the collapse of French colonial power in Southeast Asia. The French withdrew from the region and Vietnam split into two states. The Vietnamese Democratic Republic, or North Vietnam, embraced communism and received support from the Soviet Union and the Peoples Republic of China. Conversely, the Republic of Vietnam, or South Vietnam, sought to remain an independent, non-communist state. The United States supported South Vietnam to block the further spread of communism in Southeast Asia. However, the new South Vietnamese government proved unpopular, and its influence proved greatest in urban areas, rather than in the countryside where the bulk of South Vietnamese government proved unpopular, and its influence proved greatest in urban areas, rather than in the countryside where the bulk of South Vietnamese resided. North Vietnam sought to reunite Vietnam under its own influence. The National Front for the Liberation of Southern Vietnam formed to achieve this goal. A mix of communist and Vietnamese nationalist organizations, the National Liberation Front, began a guerrilla campaign to undermine the South Vietnamese government in 1957. The National Liberation front, also known as the Viet Cong, began to infiltrate soldiers into South Vietnam, resupplying them through Cambodia and Laos along a route that became the Ho Chi Minh Trail. |