By: Esmond, Ryan, Wing Fung, JH, Nikhil, Justin, Monika, Ellen, Christine, Kimmy, Prudence

HOW DID THE VIETNAMESE DEFEAT THE FRENCH?

Ho Chi Minh returned to Vietnam in 1940

Vietnam was occupied by the Japanese during the Second World War

After the war, the French wanted to restore order in Vietnam

The French were then defeated at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu

Battle of Dien Bien Phu The Battle lasted 55 days and then the French

surrendered The Vietminh had first hand knowledge about

the terrain and the local hideouts Other communist countries like the Soviet

Union and Communist China are supporting the Vietminh

Strategy used by the Vietminh in The Battle of Dien Bien Phu

Main strategy of the Vietminh was to avoid direct confrontation with enemy fire

They all master the art of camouflaging, making them invisible to the French

And soon after, the French were defeated by the Vietminh

The Geneva Agreement After the French were

defeated at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, the French was willing to talk peace with the North Vietnamese

This was known as the Geneva Agreement

The list of terms covered the independence of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam

And splitting North and South Vietnam with a demilitarized zone along the 17th parallel

Ngo Dinh Diem

Ngo Dinh Diem – appointed as Prime Minister by Emperor Bao Dai

Diem called himself President after overthrowing Emperor Bao Dai a year later, in 1957

Diem had the US supporting him, because he was nationalist, and Ho Chi Minh was communist

Diem would not hold any elections, saying that the North does not allow free elections

Protests against Ngo Dinh Diem

The Vietnamese and Farmers disliked the new President, Diem

Farmers in the countryside lost their land from the Vietminh and were forced to move into the cities

Religion was also another main reason why the Vietnamese didn’t like their new President

Diem was Roman Catholic and the Vietnamese were mainly Buddhists

Assassinated by ARVN generals who overthrown the government near the end of 1963

The Gulf of Tonkin Incident

This incident involved a US destroyer – USS Maddox and 3 NV Navy torpedo boats belonging to the 135th Torpedo Squadron

No US casualties in the whole incident

But the NV suffered 4 sailors killed and 6 others wounded

This incident was used as an excuse by President Johnson to get support from the congress in sending troops to Vietnam

Strategies Used by the NVA and Vietcong during the war Guerrilla War The use of tunnels was also another way to

avoid direct contact with enemy soldiers Bomb shelters, underground strongholds, and

weapon stores are found in the tunnel systems When the time is correct, the hiding soldiers

will come out of their tunnels and attack

Booby Traps Booby traps were used as a defensive measure against US troops in the jungle The most well known trap was called the Punji Trap It was a hole dug by the VC with sharp bamboo stakes covered in poison waiting at the bottom of the hole These traps were lethal, and were capable of killing a soldier instantly Trip wires were used a lot during the war as well, as a trip wire can set off a grenade when a rather careless soldier walks and trips on the wireOther weapons can be attached to the wires as well, such as sharp maces, and spike balls etc.

Traps Side-closing Punji trap: A simple trap that is very cheap

to make and very commonly used Basically a small hole covered

with leaf and sticks, and the victim's foot is impaled when stood on

Spike Board: The spike board is a board fixed

on the sides of a pit, like a see-saw, with one side spiked

So when the victim steps on the side without spikes, the other side full of spikes will smash into the victim’s face or chest

“Vietnam is a terrible country for fighting” Vietnam was a new environment

for the Americans to fight in ‘It is a terrible country for

fighting, The jungle tree and the vines that cover the sharp ridges and the deep valleys in the mountains make the military movement difficult. Bombs explode harmlessly on the thick jungle canopy’ – An American soldier

Also, a constant drizzle of monsoon rain kept all the soldiers soaked

‘for five days it rained without let up.’ – A Vietnamese soldier

The Geography of Vietnam

The Vietcong and NVA fighters were already adapted to the climate of Vietnam

The humid and hot conditions forced the Americans to spend time to adapt to the climate

The US Army relied on helicopters and APCs to travel around the landscape of Vietnam (APC -> Armoured Personal Carriers)

Helicopters played a big part in search and destroy missions

Helicopters were mainly used as transports, and supply helicopters

Over 2200 helicopters were lost in the war during combat

Vietcong

Vietcong – consists of men and women who lived in or fled from South Vietnam

They fought guerrilla warfare, usually at night-time

These guerrilla fighters are concentrated at the countryside

Guerrilla fighters in the cities have a role as saboteurs and terrorists

Vietcong Tactics Vietcong Tactics were divided into 3 main stages: 1: Infiltrate the countryside: Get to know the people, gain their trust, spread the idea

of revolution, and signing up new recruits 2:a) Fight guerrilla warfare: -Ambush Enemy vehicles, isolated units and outposts -Sabotage, terrorism, and murder -Plant mines and traps b) Camouflage: -move around undetected -the use of tunnels and foxholes to avoid US pursue 3: Open warfare: If kindness didn’t work to gain the people’s trust, they

use terrorism and murder, torturing officials and executing spies

When the Vietcong gained control of the countryside, they immediately launched guerrilla campaigns against US and ARVN troops

Guerrilla Warfare The main strategy in guerrilla warfare is to avoid

direct exposure with the enemy at all times And try to fight the stronger enemy by sabotage

and small scale attacks (eg. ambushes) Local guerrilla fighters were given a basic amount

of infantry training Local guerrillas also invented and designed simple

weapons that can either kill or frighten an enemy

Weapons used by the Vietcong

By the mid-1960s, most of the main VC troops were armed with automatic rifles supplied by Communist China and the Soviet Union

The Type 56 assault rifle was a Chinese version of the Russian AK-47

Heavy machine guns and highly effective Rocket Propelled Grenades were used as an Anti-air weapon against US helicopters

Captured American weapons were re-used by the NVA and VC

Camouflaged Vietcong – Friend or Foe?

The Vietcong had no uniform, making them look the same as South Vietnamese peasants

Americans cannot tell the difference

VC fighters became experts in camouflage and other things, because they knew they cannot win against the US air force

When ever a group of VC fighters are being chased by US troops on search and destroy missions, they can always disappear into thin air

Vietcong Tunnels

Tunnels were first dug by the Vietcong as bomb shelters

Tunnels then developed into a very sophisticated system of strongholds

Some tunnels are as long as 250km

The tunnels were a sign of the strong will and determination of the Vietcong

Tunnels were also used as supply routes

The Ho Chi Minh Trail The Ho Chi Minh Trail was a supply

route from North Vietnam to South Vietnam crossing through the countries of Laos and Cambodia

The route stretches as far as 1000km long

The trail was called the Truong Son Strategic Supply Route, named after a mountain range in Vietnam

The trail gave an option to North Vietnam to supply everything the VC needed in the south

The trail can also reach other places in Vietnam too

Supplying the Vietcong with the trail

A work force of 40,000 people were stationed along the rail to keep the supply vehicles moving

Most of the trail have been carefully hidden from the air

The trail was quoted as “one of the great achievements of military engineering of the 20th century”

Sacks carrying the supplies doubled in weight from the monsoon rains in the forest

Supplying North Vietnam Most of the weapons and supplies came

from the Communist allies of North Vietnam

Soviet Union: The Soviet Union supplied most of the

aircraft, heavy guns, and Surface-to-air missiles (SAM)

Communist China: China supplied most of the fuel,

ammunition, firearms, and food And finally, the Third most important

supplier, the US United States Of America: Large amounts of American equipment

fell into enemy hands during the war The captured equipment was recycled

and re-used Unexploded shells were dismantled and

the explosives inside were used to make Vietcong booby traps and bombs

NVA’s Defence against US fighters

Operation Rolling Thunder was a series of bombing missions launched on the 11th of Feb. 1965

Saturation bombing from B-52 Heavy bombers at targets in NV

Over 1,400 US war planes were shot down in NV airspace between 1965 and 1968

Air Defence strategies used by NV

The NVA in North Vietnam used 3 main strategies to engage US fighters

1) Anti-Aircraft Guns: These Anti-Aircraft Guns were manned by eager gun crews who were responsible for most of the plane hits

2) SAMs (Surface-To-Air Missiles): These missiles supplied by the Soviet Union were used

3) Soviet MIG-17 and MIG-21PF fighters were used by the NVA to engage and intercept incoming US fighters with air-to-air missiles

Chemical Warfare Chemical weapons were used to

remove the cover that conceals the VC

With the cover removed, the US planes can target the VC units with ease

They Used 4 Main methods to remove the cover provided to the VC:

1) Napalm: A gel like chemical substance mixed with flammable liquids to create a sticky gel that burns aggressively when ignited

Napalm was used to burn away leaves from plants

The Use of Chemical Weapons 2) Herbicides and weed-killers were used

3)Dropping heavy bombs at trees to create bare land without any vegetation

4) American troops also used giant mechanical ploughs to tear down/up-root trees

Then the US Army came up with a solution to effectively take down trees

They began using weed-killers or known as defoliants, which kills leaves on trees

The American air force then launched a series of defoliant missions known as the “Ranch Hand Operations”

Agent Orange A range of colour-coded defoliants

were used during defoliant missions (also known as “Rainbow Herbicides”)

Agent Orange was the most well-known defoliant out of the colour-coded defoliant chemicals

Approx. 77,000,000L of Agent Orange were sprayed over the Mekong Delta Area and other parts of Vietnam

Agent Orange contains a poison called dioxin

The toxic chemical poisoned the areas sprayed and also the people who handled the chemical in the airbases

The effects of Agent Orange

Short term effects suffered from victims were symptoms like vomiting and headaches

Long term effects suffered include:

Birth defects Serious skin complaints And damage to brain development

of minors exposed to the chemical

Agent Orange was responsible for over 400,000 deaths and disabilities, and approx. 500,000 children who were born with birth defects

Search and Destroy Missions

The first search and destroy missions began in 1966

Search and Destroy Missions were carried out to hunt and eliminate any VC units hiding in the rainforests

Huge supply bases were built to support inland ‘firebases’

Helicopters were depended on heavily, as a form of transportation

Operation Junction City was one of the largest offensive search and destroy missions launched on the 22nd of Feb. 1967

Vietcong Suspects The Americans have designed a

unique way of detecting VC suspects

The person is a VC suspect if you find weapons, food supplies, and equipment in their homes

Or if you catch the person at night holding a rifle or a weapon

Vietcong suspects from search and destroy were treated brutally and tortured

VC suspects were interrogated in hidden compartments

The My Lai Massacre On the 16th of March, 1968, 9

black helicopter gunships landed in My Lai Village, 120km away from Danang Supply base

3 platoon of US marines left the helicopters on a search and destroy mission

The 3 platoons of soldiers ruthlessly killed everything that moved in the village

The public were horrified when the truth was revealed

People are beginning to think that this war is not worth fighting

Official estimates that not less than 175 people were killed

But the death toll could have been as high as 400 or 500

Body Counts – Are we winning?

Body counts were done after a battle to see how many of the enemy is dead

But because of the high demand of dead VC and NVA units, US unit commanders in search and destroy missions often counted civilians as VC or NVA units

A quote from a marine lieutenant: “…The pressure on unit commanders to produce enemy corpses was intense and led to such practices as counting civilians as Vietcong ‘If it’s dead and Vietnamese, it’s Vietcong’ was the rule in the jungle”

Statistics of US casualties

Year Troop level

Casualties

1962 11,000 52

1963 16,000 118

1964 23,000 206

1965 184,000 1,863

1966 385,300 6,143

1967 485,600 11,153

1968 586,100 16,592

1969 475,200 11,616

1970 334,600 6,081

1971 156,800 2,357

1972 24,200 641

Statistics of NVA and VC casualties

Year Casualties

1966 71,473

1967 133,484

1968 208,254

1969 132,051

1970 86,591

1971 19,320

1972 4,261

•Total casualties:

•1,100,000

•Total wounded:

•600,000

Tet Offensive – Are the US winning?

By looking at the casualties, General Westmoreland from the US side was confident that they would win

The VC had lost nearly 100,000 men in 1967

And with the VC casualties rising, the number of US troops in Vietnam are also rising

By 1968, there are over 500,000 US troops stationed in Vietnam

The Tet Offensive attack began in the morning of Wednesday 31st of Jan. 1968

The Tet Offensive This assault campaign was named Tet,

after the Tet festival, which is the Lunar New Year for the Vietnamese

The Offensive was the largest military operation launched by the communists

Over 80,000 communist soldiers from the NVA and VC attack more than 100 towns and cites at once

The attack surprised the US Army and the ARVN, but soon they fought back against the communists and pushed them back

Public Reaction to the Offensive Although the attack was a failure to the communists, they achieved a different goal

Their target was to start uprisings in the South, but instead, the people back in the US are protesting with an anti-war attitude

The US government then had no choice but to start peace talks

At least 30,000 VC units were killed in the offensive, which was a big blow to the VC, and they never really recovered

Over 100,000 VC and NVA units were killed in the Offensive

HOW DID THE NORTH VIETNAMESE WIN THE

WAR? A ceasefire was agreed and gave

authorization to the US to give air support if SV is attacked by NV

As the US help was decreasing, the communists advanced south, jamming roads

People who opposed the communists were killed

Refugees flee the area in little boats, while the ARVN officers and soldiers retreat as well

THE WITHDRAWAL OF US TROOPS – DECIDING THE FATE OF SOUTH VIETNAM The last US combat troops

departed South Vietnam in March 1973

The withdrawal of US troops meant that all the fighting was now handed over to the ARVN

Meanwhile, the communist allies of NV are still supporting them with all the supplies they need

As the communists are pushing downwards, the ARVN showed their vulnerability with American Aid

AMERICAN WITHDRAWAL-

COMMUNIST VICTORY In Saigon, US helicopters flew 8000 of their Southern Vietnamese supporters to safety aboard American warships anchored offshore

The last guards at the American embassy were airlifted off the roof as looters broke down the main door

And on the 30th of April, the Northern Vietnamese army captured Saigon, and the Communist victory was complete

HOW DID THE WAR END?

On the 8th of August 1974, President Nixon resigned and Vice President Gerald Ford took his place

The new president was uncertain whether to support South Vietnam or not

And on the Jan. of 1975, the NV began its final assault on the remaining resistance from the ARVN

And on the 30th of April, 1975, the war is officially ended, as the Capital of Saigon was captured by the NVA

The Vietnamese not only won the war, but they also won their freedom and independence

Credits

Research:Causes: Justin, Nikhil, Wing Fung, J.H.

Strategies: Esmond, Monika, Ellen, Kimmy, Christine

Results: Prudence, RyanPower-point: Esmond, Ellen, Monika, Prudence

Script: Kimmy, Prudence

Thank you for your undivided attention!!!