Editing Võ Nguyên Giáp (section)

==== First Indochina War ====
{{main|North Vietnam|First Indochina War|Battle of Dien Bien Phu}}
The tense standoff between the Vietnamese government and the French occupiers escalated dramatically on 23 October when the French commander [[Georges Thierry d'Argenlieu|Argenlieu]] ordered the cruiser ''[[French cruiser Suffren|Suffren]]'' to bombard Haiphong in response to repeated skirmishes with Vietnamese forces as they tried to bring arms and contraband into the port. Around six thousand people were killed, and fourteen thousand wounded in the bombardment.<ref name="inerventionandrevolution">{{cite book|last=Barnet|first=Richard J.|title=Intervention and Revolution: The United States in the Third World|url=https://archive.org/details/interventionrevo00barnrich|url-access=registration|year=1968|publisher=World Publishing|isbn=0-529-02014-9|page=[https://archive.org/details/interventionrevo00barnrich/page/185 185]}}</ref><ref name=Sheehan>{{cite book|last1=Sheehan|first1=Neil|title=A Bright Shining Lie|date=1988|publisher=Random House|location=New York|isbn=0-394-48447-9|page=[https://archive.org/details/brightshininglie01shee/page/155 155]|url=https://archive.org/details/brightshininglie01shee/page/155}}</ref> Giáp, acting as de facto president in the absence of Ho Chi Minh, tried to maintain some kind of peace but by the time Ho returned in November, both sides were on a war footing. Local fighting broke out repeatedly and on 27 November, Ho's government, concluding that it could not hold Hanoi against the French, retreated up into the northern mountains where it had been based two years previously. On 19 December, the Vietnamese government officially declared war on France and fighting erupted all over the country.<ref>Macdonald 1993, pp. 74–78.</ref> After this time, detailed information on Giáp's personal life becomes much scarcer and in most sources the emphasis is on his military achievements and, later, on his political work.

The first few years of the war involved mostly a low-level, semi-conventional resistance fight against the French occupying forces. Võ Nguyên Giáp first saw real fighting at Nha Trang,<ref>Lawrence 2007, p. 82.</ref> when he traveled to south-central Vietnam in January–February 1946, to convey the determination of leaders in Hanoi to resist the French.<ref>{{cite book |author-link=David G. Marr |first=David G.|last=Marr|title=Vietnam: State, War, Revolution, 1945–1946|year=2013|location=Berkeley|publisher=[[University of California Press]]|page=132|isbn=978-0-520-27415-0|quote="Between 18 January and 5 February, Võ Nguyên Giáp traveled to south-central Vietnam to convey the determination of leaders in Hanoi to back armed resistance to the French invaders."}}</ref> In 1947, though French ambitious armored, amphibious, and airborne drives had plunged into the northern mountains and along the Annam coast, Viet Minh sabotage and raids along lines of communication had mounted steadily, and French had come to realize that France had lost the military initiative. <ref name="pent5">{{cite web|archive-date=2011-08-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110806004651/http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pentagon/pent5.htm |accessdate=2011-07-23 |title=The Pentagon Papers, Chapter 2, "U.S. Involvement in the Franco-Viet Minh War, 1950-1954", U.S. POLICY AND THE BAO DAI REGIME |url=http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pentagon/pent5.htm |url-status=dead}}</ref>

[[French Union]] forces included colonial troops from many parts of the former French empire (Moroccan, Algerian, Tunisian, Laotian, Cambodian, Vietnamese and Vietnamese ethnic minorities), French professional troops and units of the [[French Foreign Legion]]. The use of [[Metropolitan France|metropolitan]] recruits (i.e. recruits from France itself) was forbidden by French governments to prevent the war from becoming even more unpopular at home. It was called the "dirty war" (''la sale guerre'') by supporters of the Left in France and intellectuals (including [[Jean-Paul Sartre]]) during the [[Henri Martin affair]] in 1950.<ref name="ch5martin">{{cite web|title=Those named Martin, Their history is ours – The Great History, (1946–1954) The Indochina War|language=fr|publisher=Channel 5 (France)|work=documentary|url=http://www.france5.fr/martin/W00353/2/93603.cfm|access-date = 20 May 2007 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070929083220/http://www.france5.fr/martin/W00353/2/93603.cfm <!-- Bot retrieved archive --> |archive-date = 29 September 2007}}</ref><ref name="ruscio">{{cite news|last=Ruscio|first=Alain|title=Guerre d'Indochine: Libérez Henri Martin|language=fr|publisher=l'Humanité|date=2 August 2003|url=https://www.humanite.fr/journal/2003-08-02/2003-08-02-376623|access-date=20 May 2007 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20030804173942/http://www.humanite.fr/journal/2003-08-02/2003-08-02-376623 |archive-date=4 August 2003 }}</ref>

When it became clear that France was becoming involved in a long drawn-out and so far not very successful war, the French government tried to negotiate an agreement with the Viet Minh. They offered to help set up a national government and promised that they would eventually grant Vietnam its independence.{{Citation needed|date=March 2023}} Ho Chi Minh and the other leaders of the Viet Minh did not trust the word of the French and continued the war.
[[File:Vo Nguyen Giap4.jpg|alt=|thumb|Võ Nguyên Giáp and Phạm Văn Đồng in [[Hà Nội]], 1945]]
French public opinion continued to move against the war:
# Between 1946 and 1952 many French troops had been killed, wounded, or captured.
# France was attempting to build up her economy after the devastation of the Second World War. The cost of the war had so far been twice what they had received from the United States under the [[Marshall Plan]].
# The war had lasted for seven years and there was still no sign of a clear French victory.
# A growing number of people in France had reached the conclusion that their country did not have any moral justification for being in Vietnam.<ref>Arthur J. Dommen. The Indochinese experience of the French and the Americans: nationalism and communism in Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. Indiana University Press, 2001 {{ISBN|0-253-33854-9}}, p. 233.</ref>
# Parts of the French left supported the goals of the Việt Minh to form a socialist state.

While growing stronger in Vietnam, the Việt Minh also expanded the war and lured the French to spread their force to remote areas such as Laos. In December 1953, French military commander General [[Henri Navarre]] set up a defensive complex at [[Ðiện Biên Phủ]] in the [[Mường Thanh Valley]], disrupting Việt Minh supply lines passing through Laos. He surmised that in an attempt to reestablish the route, Giáp would be forced to organize a mass attack on Ðiện Biên Phủ, thus fighting a conventional battle, in which Navarre could expect to have the advantage.

Giáp took up the French challenge. While the French dug in at their outpost, the Việt Minh were also preparing the battlefield. While diversionary attacks were launched in other areas,<ref>{{cite book|first=Philip B.|last=Davidson|title=Vietnam at War: The History 1946–1975|location=Novato|publisher=Presidio Press|year=1988|isbn=0-89141-306-5|url=https://archive.org/details/vietnamatwarhist00davi}}</ref> Giáp ordered his men to covertly position their artillery by hand. Defying standard military practice, he had his twenty-four [[Howitzer#Twentieth century|105 mm howitzers]] placed on the forward slopes of the mountains around Dien Bien Phu, in deep, mostly hand-dug emplacements protecting them from French aircraft and counter-battery fire.

With anti-aircraft guns supplied by the Soviet Union, Giáp was able to severely restrict the ability of the French to supply their garrison, forcing them to drop supplies inaccurately from high altitude. Giáp ordered his men to dig a trench system that encircled the French. From the outer trench, other trenches and tunnels were gradually dug inward towards the center. The Viet Minh were now able to move in close to the French troops defending Dien Bien Phu.

When Navarre realized that he was trapped, he appealed for help. The United States was approached and some advisers suggested the use of [[tactical nuclear weapon]]s against the Viet Minh, but this was never seriously considered. Another suggestion was that conventional air raids would be enough to scatter Giáp's troops. U.S. President [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]], however, refused to intervene unless the British and other Western allies agreed. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill declined, claiming that he wanted to wait for the outcome of the peace negotiations taking place in [[Geneva]], before becoming involved in escalating the war.

On 13 March 1954, Giap launched his offensive.<ref name="Pringle2004">{{cite news|last=Pringle|first=James|title=Au revoir, Dien Bien Phu|newspaper=[[International Herald Tribune]]|date=1 April 2004|url=http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/04/01/edpringle_ed3_.php|access-date=23 February 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080208195657/http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/04/01/edpringle_ed3_.php|archive-date=8 February 2008}}</ref> For 54&nbsp;days, the Viet Minh seized position after position, pushing the French until they occupied only a small area of Dien Bien Phu. Colonel [[Charles Piroth|Piroth]], the artillery commander, blamed himself for the destruction of French artillery superiority. He told his fellow officers that he had been "completely dishonoured" and committed suicide with a hand grenade.<ref>[[Martin Windrow|Windrow, Martin]] ''The Last Valley: Dien Bien Phu and the French Defeat in Vietnam.'' London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2004. {{ISBN|0-297-84671-X}}</ref> [[Christian de Castries|General De Castries]], French Commander in Dien Bien Phu, was captured alive in his bunker. The French surrendered on 7 May. Their casualties totaled over 2,200&nbsp;killed, 5,600&nbsp;wounded, and 11,721&nbsp;taken prisoner. The following day the French government announced that it intended to withdraw from Vietnam.

Giáp's victory over the French was an important inspiration to anti-colonial campaigners around the world, particularly in French colonies, and most particularly in North Africa, not least because many of the troops fighting on the French side in Indochina were from North Africa.<ref>Macdonald, Peter (1993). ''Giap: The Victor in Vietnam'', p. 134</ref><ref>Chiviges Naylor, P., ''France and Algeria: A History of Decolonization and Transformation'', University Press of Florida, 2000, p. 18.</ref>