Vietnam ground combat operations in 1965, and at their peak they numbered more than 500,000. The US also engaged in a sustained aerial bombing campaign. Meanwhile, China and the Soviet Union provided North Vietnam with significant material aid and 15,000 combat advisers. Communist forces supplying the Việt Cộng carried supplies along the Hồ Chí Minh trail, which passed through the Kingdom of Laos. The communists attacked South Vietnamese targets during the 1968 Tết Offensive. Although the campaign failed militarily, it shocked the American establishment, and turned US public opinion against the war. During the offensive, communist troops massacred over 3,000 civilians
First Chinese domination of Vietnam First Chinese domination of Vietnam The first Chinese domination is a period in Vietnamese history during which Vietnam was under Chinese rule from the north. It is the first of four periods of Chinese domination of Vietnam, the first three of which are almost continuous and referred to as ("Northern domination"). In 111 BC, the powerful Chinese Han dynasty conquered the Nam Việt (which in Chinese translates to "land of the southern barbarians") kingdom during its expansion southward and incorporated what is now northern Vietnam, together with much of modern Guangdong and Guangxi, into the expanding Han empire. Vietnamese resistance