Editing Viet Cong (section)

== Names ==
The term ''Việt Cộng'' appeared in [[Saigon]] newspapers beginning in 1956.<ref name="Pentagon">{{cite web |url=http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pentagon/pent14.htm |title=Origins of the Insurgency in South Vietnam, 1954–1960 |work=The Pentagon Papers |year=1971 |pages=242–314 |access-date=June 13, 2008 |archive-date=October 19, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171019184424/https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pentagon/pent14.htm }}</ref> It is a contraction of {{lang|vi|Việt Nam cộng sản}} (Vietnamese communist).<ref name="Pentagon"/> The earliest citation for ''Viet Cong'' in English is from 1957.<ref>"Viet Cong", ''Oxford English Dictionary''</ref> American soldiers referred to the Viet Cong as Victor Charlie or VC. "Victor" and "Charlie" are both letters in the [[NATO phonetic alphabet]]. "Charlie" referred to communist forces in general, both VC and North Vietnamese [[People's Army of Vietnam]] (PAVN).

The official Vietnamese history gives the group's name as the Liberation Army of South Vietnam or the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam (NLFSV; {{lang|vi|Mặt trận Dân tộc Giải phóng miền Nam Việt Nam}}).<ref name="Victory68">Military History Institute of Vietnam,(2002) ''Victory in Vietnam: The Official History of the People's Army of Vietnam, 1954–1975'', translated by Merle L. Pribbenow. University Press of Kansas. p. 68. {{ISBN|0-7006-1175-4}}.</ref><ref group="nb">Radio Hanoi called it the "National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam" in a January 1961 broadcast announcing the group's formation. In his memoirs, [[Võ Nguyên Giáp]] called the group the "South Vietnam National Liberation Front" ({{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9YbSAAAAIAAJ |title=The Military Art of People's War: Selected Writings of General Vo Nguyen Giap |year=1970 |pages=206, 208, 210 |author=Nguyên Giáp Võ, Russell Stetler |publisher=Monthly Review Press |isbn=978-0-85345-129-7 }}). See also the {{cite web |url=http://vietnam.vassar.edu/docnlf.html |title=Program of the National Liberation Front of South Viet-Nam |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100626065021/http://vietnam.vassar.edu/docnlf.html |archive-date=June 26, 2010 }} (1967).</ref> Many writers shorten this to National Liberation Front (NLF).<ref group="nb">The terminology "liberation front" is adapted from the earlier [[National Liberation Front (Greece)|Greek]] and [[National Liberation Front (Algeria)|Algerian]] National Liberation Fronts.</ref> In 1969, the NLF created the "[[Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam]]" (''Chính Phủ Cách Mạng Lâm Thời Cộng Hòa Miền Nam Việt Nam''), abbreviated PRG.<ref group="nb">This also follows terminology used earlier by leftists in Greece ([[Provisional Democratic Government]]) and Algeria ([[Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic]]).</ref> Although the NLF was not officially abolished until 1977, the NLF no longer used the name after the PRG was created. Members generally referred to the NLF as "the Front" (''Mặt trận'').<ref name="Pentagon"/> Today's Vietnamese media most frequently refers to the group as the "[[Liberation Army of South Vietnam]]" (''Quân Giải phóng Miền Nam Việt Nam'') .<ref>See, for example, [https://web.archive.org/web/20051104055722/http://vietnamnews.vnagency.com.vn/showarticle.php?num=01WAR100405 this story] in [http://vietnamnews.vnagency.com.vn Viet Nam News], the official English-language newspaper.</ref>