The First Indochina War
The First Indochina War (also called the French Indochina War) was fought in French Indochina from 1946 through 1954 between France and the French-controlled State of Vietnam on the one side, and the Communist-dominated independence movement, the Viet Minh, on the other. The Viet Minh won the war, gaining effective control of all northern Vietnam except an enclave around Hanoi.
In 1954, France gave up its control of Vietnam, and the Viet Minh was recognized as the government of northern Vietnam.
Read more about this topic: Vietnamese Demilitarized Zone
Famous quotes containing the words the first and/or war:
“Knowledge has two extremes. The first is the pure natural ignorance in which all men find themselves at birth. The other extreme is that reached by great minds, who, having run through all that men can know, find they know nothing, and come back again to that same natural ignorance from which they set out; this is a learned ignorance which is conscious of itself.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)
“There is the guilt all soldiers feel for having broken the taboo against killing, a guilt as old as war itself. Add to this the soldier’s sense of shame for having fought in actions that resulted, indirectly or directly, in the deaths of civilians. Then pile on top of that an attitude of social opprobrium, an attitude that made the fighting man feel personally morally responsible for the war, and you get your proverbial walking time bomb.”
—Philip Caputo (b. 1941)