Indochina Wars - Colonization

Colonization

French colonization and occupation of the region was a consequence of missionary work of the 16th century, which had resulted in Catholics forming a converted minority. While Gia Long tolerated Catholicism, his successors Minh Mạng and Tự Đức were staunch Confucians, admiring China rather than France. They brutally suppressed Catholicism and attempted to remove French influence, which provoked the Catholic nations of Europe to retaliate. Confucian isolationist policy led the Vietnamese to refuse industrial modernization, so that they were ill-equipped against the French. In August 1858, Napoleon III of France ordered the landing of French forces at Tourane, (present-day Da Nang), beginning a colonial occupation that was to last almost a century. By 1884, the French had complete control over the country, which now formed the largest part of French Indochina.

A continuous thread of local resistance began with Hàm Nghi, then to Phan Dinh Phung, Phan Boi Chau and lastly to Ho Chi Minh, who returned to Vietnam from France and joined the Viet Minh in 1941. A founding member of the French Communist Party, Ho Chi Minh had de-emphasised his communist ties and dissolved the Indochinese Communist Party, in order to win trust and gain power. When a famine broke out in 1945, causing 2 million deaths, the Viet Minh arranged a massive relief effort, consequently winning over many people to their nationalist cause. Ho Chi Minh rose to become the leader of the Vietcong.

When World War II ended, North Vietnam came under the control of Ho Chi Minh. The Japanese surrendered to the Chinese Nationalists in North Vietnam, and the Viet Minh organized the "August Revolution" uprisings across the country. Emperor Bảo Đại abdicated power to the Viet Minh, on August 25, 1945. In a popular move, Ho Chi Minh made Bảo Đại "supreme adviser" to the Viet Minh-led government in Hanoi, which asserted its independence on September 2 as the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV). In 1946, Vietnam had its first constitution.

In 1948, France tried to regain its colonial control over Vietnam. In South Vietnam, the Japanese had surrendered to British forces, who had supported the Free French in fighting the Viet Minh, along with the armed religious Cao Dai and Hoa Hao sects and the Binh Xuyen organized crime group. The French re-installed Bảo Đại as the head of state of Vietnam, which now comprised central and southern Vietnam. The ensuing war, between the French-controlled South and the independent Communist-allied North, is known as the First Indochina War.

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