| History |
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Vietnam | Info |
| Brief History
Archaeological studies have suggested that the ancient Vietnamese people existed 3000,000-500,000 years ago in the swampy woods of the Red River delta. According t ancient legends and folklore, King Loc Tuck (2879 BC) married the daughter of the God of the seas. Their son Lac Long Quan and his wife Au Co had 100 sons. One of them, their eldest, ruled the ancient Kingdom of Van Lang.
Vietnam has faced countless struggles against aggressors from this period of the Hung kings right through to the present century. The Han Chinese ruled the country for 1,000 years from 111 BC, during which the efforts of the Trung sisters independence. It was Ngo Quyen, in 944, who put an end to 1,000 years of Chinese feudal dominance.
At the time when King Dinh Bo Linh came to the throne (968) the armies of Champa were attacking deep into Vietnamese territory from the south. King Dinh, together with his successor General Le (980), overthrew the Chinese and Cham invaders.
The new line of rulers that followed, the Buddhist Ly King, Ly Thuong Kiet and Tran Hung Dao, the most powerful of the 12 Tran kings, overthrew the Chinese and defeated the mighty armies of Kublai Khan.
During the Ho Dynasty (1400-1407), China once more gained the upper hand, but this was only to be short-lived. The national hero, King Le Thai To, known as Le Loi, the Great Administrator, defeated the Minh in 1418.
The second Le Dynasty, 1428-1527, saw the nine kings gaining further ground from the kingdom of Champa. The border of Vietnam then extended deep into the present-day Central Provinces.
The famous Tay Son rebellion, led by Nguyen Hue, occurred during the 3rd Le Dynasty (1533-1788). This ended the exploitation of the peasants by the Trinh and Nguyen lords. The regime ended when Nguyen Anh proclaimed himself Emperor Gia Long in 1802 in the ancient Imperial capital Hue. By the beginning of the rule of the 13 Nguyen kings, Champa had been totally overthrown and the coastline of Vietnam now extended for well over 2,000 km.
During the period of French rule, which began in 1858, Vietnam became divided into Tonkin in the North, Annam in the center and Cochinchina in the south and struggle for liberation became intense during the 1883-1945 period. The people's resistance movements increased and many new political parties came into being. None were more powerful than the Vietnam Doc Lap Dong Ming Hoi, known as the Viet Ming, led by Ho Chi Minh. This League for the Independence of Vietnam was formed in 1940, one year before the Japanese invaded.
In August 1945 the 'Democratic Republic of Vietnam' was formed under Ho Chi Minh's leadership, but independence was only short lived. The French regained control in 1947 and held it until 1954, when they were beaten during the battle of Dien Bien Phu.
The first major Indochina war was over, but the series of events during which American aid was given to the South escalated into the horrific 'Vietnam War', known to the Vietnamese as the 'American War'. Bombing raids deep into North Vietnam had started before the troop arrivals at Danang on 8 March 1965; they were to continue right through t 1973. By then 7 million tons of bombs, including phosphorus, napalm and thousands of gallons of chemical defoliants, had been dropped, and 25 million bomb craters poxed the landscape.
Despite the American involvement the North Vietnamese armies had advanced across the 17th parallel in 1972 and by March 1975 they had overthrown Buon Ma Thuot and Hue. The final blow came when the NLF tanks appeared on Le Duan Boulevard in Saigon before crashing through the gates of the headquarters of the South Vietnamese government.
Even after the end of the second Indochina war the country has not been totally peaceful. There have been invasions from Kampuchea on to Vietnam's border provinces in the Mekong Delta. Thousands were killed by Pol Pot's troops between 1977 and 1978, and there is always a treat from China. But despite all, the Vietnamese people remain steadfast and undaunted.
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