As mists and rain swirled around the mountains, General Vo Nguyen Giap, the military commander of the Viet Minh, moved his supplies, enlisting thousands of supporters as porters. They walked along the jungle-shrouded tracks at night from his base at Juan Giap, 120 kilometers away. They transported large canons on their backs and on ordinary bicycles. By January 1954, 40 - 50,000 Viet Minh combat troops looked down on Diên Bien Phû. They also had brought in vastly superior artillery power which the French could not know. General Vo Nguyen Giap led the Viet Minh forces into a battle where they saw no option of being defeated. It was their people’s war and they were standing for everything they believe in. General Vo Nguyen Giap was found celebrating the Viet Minh victory with his fellow troops and discusses why he believes the Viet Minh were able to defeat the French:
“The victory at Diên Bien Phû was a victory for the people. It was a war for the people by the people. FOR the people because the war's goals are the people's goals -- goals such as independence, a unified country, and the happiness of its people.... And BY the people -- well that means ordinary people -- not just the army but all people. We believed that in the French camp, French general staff and the military chiefs were well informed. They'd weighed up the pros and cons, and according to their forecasts, Diên Bien Phû was impregnable. It has to be said that at the beginning of the autumn of '53, for example, when our political headquarters were planning our autumn and winter campaigns, there was no mention of Diên Bien Phû. Why? Because, the Navarre plan didn't mention it either. They had a whole series of manoeuvres planned. For us, the problem was that Navarre wanted to retain the initiative whereas we wanted to seize it. There is a contradiction that exists in a war of aggression whereby you have to disperse your forces to occupy a territory but rally your mobile forces for offensive action. We took advantage of this contradiction and forced Navarre to disperse his forces. That's how it all started. We ordered our troops to advance in a number of directions, directions of key importance to the enemy although their presence wasn't significant. So the enemy had no choice but to disperse their troops. We sent divisions north, northwest, toward the centre, towards Laos; other divisions went in other directions. So to safeguard Laos and the northwest, Navarre had to parachute troops into Diên Bien Phû, and that's what happened at Diên Bien Phû. Before then, no one had heard of Diên Bien Phû. French General Staff only planned to parachute in sufficient troops to stop us advancing on the northwest and Laos. Little by little, they planned to transform Diên Bien Phû into an enormous concentration camp, a fortified camp, and the most powerful in Indochina. They planned to draw our forces, break us, crush us, but the opposite took place. They'd wanted a decisive battle and that's exactly what they got at Diên Bien Phû -- except that it was decisive for the Vietnamese and not for the French. The Diên Bien Phû campaign is a great and first victory of a feudal colonial nation, whose agricultural economy is backward, against the great imperialist capitalist which has a modern industry and a great army. Thus, it means a lot to us, to people all over the world, and to other countries. This is also how Ho Chi Minh saw it. We see the Diên Bien Phû victory as the victory [over] the French army and [over] the intervention of the Americans --because in the Diên Bien Phû campaign, 80 percent of the war expenditures were spent by the Americans. The Americans had their hands in it. So the Diên Bin Phû defeat was a defeat for both the French and the Americans. But whether the Americans had drawn the lessons from that, I don't think so. That's why the Americans continue in South Vietnam. ... When we received news of the Diên Bien Phû victory, everyone practically jumped up in the air, they were so happy about it. But Ho Chi Minh said that this is only victory of the first step: we have yet to fight the Americans. It was very clear then that that would be our next step.”
The Viet Minh were fighting as a unified force, fighting for what they believed their country deserves; independence and freedom from this ongoing war and colonisation battle between foreign countries. An ordinary Vietnamese combat soldier involved in the battle at Diên Bien Phû happily took time out from the celebrations to share his opinion on why the French were so easily defeated and the differences between the two forces: “The first difference between the Viet Minh forces and the French forces was that we had more of a cause to be fighting for. We were more unified in our fight and were fighting for Vietnam’s independence and reunification. The French were ignorant of our possession of heavy artillery and our ability to move such weapons to the mountain crests overlooking the French encampment. Due to us occupying the highlands around Diên Bien Phû we were able to fire down accurately onto French positions, occasionally air – dropping reinforcements in. Ultimately, however, we were able to overrun the base and force the French to surrender. Our troops started the process of digging long trenches towards the middle of the camp, covering our movements from direct fire and allowing for a buildup and assault undercover. The first runway fell after a five day advance from the 18th to the 23rd. The last aircraft landed on the 28th on the second runway, used to bring in French supplies, but was destroyed in the process. In Vietnam’s next move as a nation aiming for its independence we need to defeat the Americans and keep back any forces against our cause as this is our country and no one else’s, no foreign force should be able to tell us what they believe is right for us, that is our job to decide.”
The Battle of Diên Bien Phû was more than just a battle. These three people’s perspectives give us a clear idea of what this battle meant to each of the individuals, why they won or lost and where they see themselves headed next. For the French a loss of face was caused by their underestimation of the intelligence of the Viet Minh, the determination of the Viet Minh soldiers and the importance of what Vietnam was fighting for. They saw however the need for intervention in Vietnam and were fighting for what they believed were their best interests as well as Vietnams. The Viet Minh forces went in as a nation, they were fighting their people’s war and we are able to see this from Vo Nguyen Giap’s and the Vietnamese soldier’s opinions. Vietnam has had an ongoing battle with foreign powers wanting to form colonization’s and gain control in Indochina. Since the 1870s Vietnam has been controlled by foreign powers and has fought to regain its independence and reunification. The Battle of Diên Bien Phû was 55 days of hell and will likely see the French withdrawal but the war is not completely over yet.
Jaydene Meadows
The information used to compile this article was gathered from the following resources:
Book/s
Title: Vietnam and the Indochina conflict
Author: John Wood
Publisher: Macmillan Publishers New Zealand Limited
Publication Date: 1990
Internet sites
