who controlled the territory now known as vietnam prior to 1954
History of Vietnam Full-scale war broke out between the Việt Minh and France in late 1946 and the First Indochina War officially began. Realizing that colonialism was coming to an end worldwide, France decided to bring former emperor Bảo Đại back to power, as a political alternative to Ho Chi Minh. A Provisional Central Government was formed in 1948, reuniting Annam and Tonkin, but the complete reunification of Vietnam was delayed for a year because of the problems posed by Cochinchina's legal status. In July 1949, the State of Vietnam was officially proclaimed, as a semi-independent country within the French Union, with Bảo Đại as Head of State. France was finally persuaded to relinquish its colonies in Indochina in 1954 when Viet Minh forces defeated the French at Dien Bien Phu. The 1954 Geneva Conference left Vietnam a divided nation, with Hồ Chí Minh's communist DRV government ruling the North from Hanoi and Ngô Đình Diệm's Republic of Vietnam, supported by the United States, ruling the South from Saigon. Between 1953 and 1956, the North Vietnamese government instituted various agrarian reforms, including "rent reduction" and "land reform", which resulted in significant political oppression. During the land reform, testimony from North Vietnamese witnesses suggested a ratio of one execution for every 160 village residents, which extrapolated nationwide would indicate nearly 100,000 executions. Because the campaign was concentrated mainly in the Red River Delta area, a lower estimate of 50,000 executions became widely accepted by scholars at the time.[38][39][40][41] However, declassified documents from the Vietnamese and Hungarian archives indicate that the number of executions was much lower than reported at the time, although likely greater than 13,500.[42] In the South, Diem went about crushing political and religious opposition, imprisoning or killing tens of thousands.[43]
Vietnam War Kennedy advisors Maxwell Taylor and Walt Rostow recommended that U.S. troops be sent to South Vietnam disguised as flood relief workers.[132] Kennedy rejected the idea but increased military assistance yet again. In April 1962, John Kenneth Galbraith warned Kennedy of the "danger we shall replace the French as a colonial force in the area and bleed as the French did."[133] By November 1963, there were 16,000 American military personnel in South Vietnam, up from Eisenhower's 900 advisors.[134]
Vietnam War Beginning in 1970, American troops were withdrawn from border areas where most of the fighting took place, instead redeployed along the coast and interior, and US casualties in 1970 were less than half of 1969 casualties after being relegated to less active combat.[285] At the same time that US forces were deployed, the Army of the Republic of Vietnam took over combat operations throughout the country, with casualties doubled US casualties in 1969, and more than tripled US ones in 1970.[286] The post-Tet environment saw a rise in membership in Regional Force and Popular Force militias, now more capable of providing village security which the Americans could not under Westmoreland.[287] In 1970 Nixon announced the withdrawal of an additional 150,000 American troops, reducing the number of Americans to 265,500.[285] By 1970 the Viet Cong forces were no-longer southern-majority, and nearly 70% of units were northerners.[288] Between 1969 to 1971 the Viet Cong and some PAVN units had reverted to small unit tactics typical of 1967 and prior instead of nation-wide grand offensives.[267] In 1971 Australia and New Zealand withdrew their soldiers and U.S. troop count was further reduced to 196,700, with a deadline to remove another 45,000 troops by February 1972. The United States also reduced support troops and in March 1971 the 5th Special Forces Group, the first American unit deployed to South Vietnam, withdrew to Fort Bragg, North Carolina.[289] [A 4]
Vietnam War Beginning in 1950, American military advisors arrived in what was then French Indochina.[86][A 3] Most of the funding for the French war effort was provided by the U.S.[87] The Việt Cộng, also known as Front national de libération du Sud-Viêt Nam or FNL (the National Liberation Front), a South Vietnamese communist common front aided by the North, fought a guerrilla war against anti-communist forces in the region, while the People's Army of Vietnam, also known as the North Vietnamese Army (NVA), engaged in more conventional warfare, and had launched armed struggles from 1959 onward. U.S. involvement escalated in 1960 under President John F. Kennedy, with troop levels gradually surging under the MAAG program from just under a thousand in 1959 to 16,000 in 1963.[88][89]