In what year did the Vietnam War happen? Vietnam War - briefly. United States intervention

Officially, the Vietnam War began in August 1964 and continued until 1975 (although direct American intervention ceased two years before the end of hostilities). This clash is the best illustration of the instability of relations between the USSR and the United States during the Cold War. Let us analyze the prerequisites, highlight the main events and results of the military conflict that lasted eleven years.

Prerequisites for the conflict

The actual root cause of the conflict is the logical desire of the United States to surround the Soviet Union with those states that will be controlled by it; if not formally, then in fact. At the time the clash began, South Korea and Pakistan were already “conquered” in this regard; then the leaders of the United States made an attempt to add North Vietnam to them.

The situation was conducive to active action: at that time, Vietnam was divided into North and South, and a civil war was raging in the country. The South side requested assistance from the United States. At the same time, the northern side, which was ruled by the Communist Party led by Ho Chi Minh, received support from the USSR. It is worth noting that the Soviet Union did not openly - officially - enter the war. The Soviet document specialists who arrived in the country in 1965 were civilians; however, more on this later.

Course of events: the beginning of hostilities

On August 2, 1964, an attack was carried out on a US destroyer that was patrolling the Gulf of Tonkin: North Vietnamese torpedo boats entered the battle; A similar situation repeated itself on August 4, resulting in Lyndon Johnson, then President of the United States, ordering an air strike against naval installations. Whether the boat attacks were real or imaginary is a separate discussion topic that we will leave to professional historians. One way or another, on August 5, an air attack and shelling of the territory of northern Vietnam by ships of the 7th Fleet began.

On August 6-7, the “Tonkin Resolution” was adopted, which made military action sanctioned. The United States of America, which had openly entered the conflict, planned to isolate the North Vietnamese army from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, creating the conditions for its destruction. On February 7, 1965, Operation Burning Spear was carried out, which was the first global action to destroy important objects of North Vietnam. The attack continued on March 2 - already as part of Operation Rolling Thunder.

Events developed rapidly: soon (in March) about three thousand American Marines appeared in Da Nang. After three years, the number of United States soldiers fighting in Vietnam had risen to 540,000; thousands of units of military equipment (for example, about 40% of the country’s military tactical aircraft were sent there). In the 166th, a conference of states belonging to SEATO (US allies) was held, as a result of which about 50 thousand Korean soldiers, about 14 thousand Australian soldiers, about 8 thousand from Australia and more than two thousand from the Philippines were brought in.

The Soviet Union also did not sit idly by: in addition to those sent as civilian military specialists, the DRV (Northern Vietnam) received about 340 million rubles. Weapons, ammunition and other means necessary for the war were supplied.

Developments

In 1965-1966, a large-scale military operation took place on the part of South Vietnam: more than half a million soldiers tried to capture the cities of Pleiku and Kontum using chemical and biological weapons. However, the attack attempt was unsuccessful: the offensive was disrupted. In the period from 1966 to 1967, a second attempt at a large-scale offensive was made, but the active actions of the SE JSC (attacks from the flanks and rear, night attacks, underground tunnels, the participation of partisan detachments) stopped this attack as well.

It is worth noting that at that time more than a million people were fighting on the US-Saigon side. In 1968, the National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam switched from defense to offensive, as a result of which about 150 thousand enemy soldiers and more than 7 thousand pieces of military equipment (cars, helicopters, planes, ships) were destroyed.

There were active air attacks by the United States throughout the conflict; According to available statistics, more than seven million bombs were dropped during the war. However, such a policy did not lead to success, since the government of the Far Eastern Republic carried out mass evacuations: soldiers and people hid in the jungle and mountains. Also, thanks to the support of the Soviet Union, the northern side began to use supersonic fighters, modern missile systems and radio equipment, creating a serious air defense system; as a result, more than four thousand United States aircraft were destroyed.

Final stage

In 1969, the RSV (Republic of South Vietnam) was created, and in 1969, due to the failure of the bulk of operations, US leaders gradually began to lose ground. By the end of 1970, more than two hundred thousand American soldiers had been withdrawn from Vietnam. In 1973, the United States government decided to sign an agreement to cease hostilities, after which it finally withdrew troops from the country. Of course, we are talking only about the formal side: thousands of military specialists remained in South Vietnam under the guise of civilians. According to available statistics, during the war the United States lost about sixty thousand people killed, more than three hundred thousand wounded, as well as a colossal amount of military equipment (for example, more than 9 thousand airplanes and helicopters).

Hostilities continued for several more years. In 1973-1974, South Vietnam again went on the offensive: bombing and other military operations were carried out. The result was reached only in 1975, when the Republic of South Vietnam carried out Operation Ho Chi Minh, during which the Saigon army was completely defeated. As a result, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and South Vietnam were united into one state - the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

What is the cause of the US war in Vietnam, results and consequences

The topic of the Vietnam War cannot be covered in one article. Therefore, a number of articles will be written about this period in. This material will examine the background of the conflict, the causes of the Vietnam War and its results. The US War in Vietnam was the Second Indochina War. The First Indochina War was a liberation war for Vietnam and was fought against France. It ran from 1946 to 1954. By the way, the United States also took part in that war, which is remembered much less often. In the United States, the Vietnam War is treated as a “dark spot” in its history, but for the Vietnamese it became a tragic and heroic stage on the path to their sovereignty. For Vietnam, this war was both a struggle against external occupation and civil confrontation between various political forces.

Vietnam was colonized by France in the second half of the 19th. A few decades later, Vietnamese national consciousness led to the creation of the Independence League in 1941. The organization was called Viet Minh and united under its wing all those who were dissatisfied with the rule of the French in Vietnam.

The Viet Minh organization was created in China and its main figures were of communist views. They were led by Ho Chi Minh. During World War II, Ho Chi Minh collaborated with the Americans in the fight against Japan. When Japan surrendered, Ho Chi Minh's supporters took control of northern Vietnam with its capital Hanoi. They proclaimed the creation of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

France sent an expeditionary force into the country in December 1946. Thus began the First Indochina War. But the French were unable to cope with the partisans and, starting in 1950, the United States began to help them. The main reason for their involvement in this war was the strategic importance of Vietnam. This was the region that covered the Philippines and Japan from the southwest. And since the French had by that time become allies of the United States, they decided that it was better for them to control the territory of Vietnam.

Thus ended the First Indochina War, but it was only a prelude to even greater carnage. After communist power was established in China, the US leadership decided to completely replace the French presence with its own. To do this, they placed their puppet Ngo Dinh Diem in the southern part. With the support of the United States, he proclaimed himself President of the Republic of Vietnam.

Ngo Dinh Diem turned out to be one of the worst rulers in the history of Vietnam. He appointed relatives to leadership positions in the country. Corruption and tyranny reigned in South Vietnam.

The people hated this government, but all opponents of the regime were killed and rotted in prisons. The USA didn’t like it, but Ngo Dinh Diem was “their scoundrel.” As a result of this rule, the influence of North Vietnam and the ideas of communism grew. The number of partisans also increased. However, the US leadership saw the reason not in this, but in the machinations of the USSR and communist China. Measures to tighten the government did not produce the desired result.

Another reason was that the US leadership by sending troops demonstrated its determination to the Soviet Union to destroy communism in Indochina. The American authorities could not lose South Vietnam, since this would lead to the loss of Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos. And this put Australia at risk. In November 1963, the security services organized a coup, as a result of which Diem and his brother (the head of the secret police) were killed. The reason here is clear - they have completely discredited themselves in the fight against the underground.

Subsequently, a series of coups followed, during which the partisans managed to further expand the territory under their control. American President Lyndon Johnson, who came to power after Kennedy's assassination, continued to send troops to Vietnam. By 1964, their number there was increased to 23 thousand.

In early August 1964, as a result of provocative actions by the destroyers Turner Joy and Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin, they were fired upon by the North Vietnamese military. A few days later, there was a report that the Maddox had been fired upon again, which was later denied by the ship's crew. But intelligence reported the interception of a message where the Vietnamese allegedly admitted that they had attacked the ship.

The secrets of the Vietnam War were hidden by the American leadership for a long time. As it turned out today, NSA officers made a mistake when decrypting the message. But the NSA leadership, knowing about the error, presented the data in a light favorable to themselves. And this became the cause of the war.

As a result, the military invasion was approved by the US Congress. They adopted the Tonkin Resolution and started with the US or Second Indochina.

Causes of the Vietnam War

It can be said unequivocally that the war was started by American politicians. At one time, the inhabitants of the USSR cited the imperialist habits of the United States and the desire to subjugate the planet as the cause of the war. In general, given the worldview of the Anglo-Saxon elite of this country, this version is not far from the truth. But there were also more prosaic reasons.

The second significant reason was the desire to enrich corporations that sell weapons and ammunition. As you know, in the United States the economic and political elites are very connected. And the corporate lobby has a very strong influence on political decisions.

How did they describe the cause of the war to ordinary Americans? The need to support democracy, of course. Sounds familiar, doesn't it? In fact, to US politicians, communist Vietnam was like a “thorn in one place.” And the owners of military enterprises wanted to increase their fortunes from deaths. The latter, by the way, did not need victory. They needed a massacre that would last as long as possible.

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The Vietnam War is one of the most terrible events in the history of the country that has occurred over the last century. We often see the American interpretation on screens, but was it really like that? Let's take a short excursion into history.

Humanity is built in a strange way. Any inhabitant of the Earth understands that war is horror, misfortune and tears. A person, unless, of course, he is deeply ill, realizes that there is no place for romance in it. It is impossible to justify the death of civilians by any goals. There are no such goals! But at the same time, most of those living do not perceive the pain of millions of people as their own. The loss of a wallet is perceived more acutely than war, unless it concerns one personally. For this reason, events that took place several decades ago are of little interest to anyone. Especially if they took place in a country located thousands of kilometers away.

The problem is that history repeats itself. The trouble that engulfed distant Vietnam in the 70s of the last century has now reached other parts of the world. Can we be sure that it will not affect you and me?

Causes

When thinking about the causes of the Vietnam War, it is difficult to escape the patterns. The roots of any war must be sought in the answer to the question: “Who benefits from this?” For the domestic audience of the United States, its citizens brought the light of democracy to the uncouth natives. However, even today Americans “save” the inhabitants of Iraq, Libya, and Syria from ignorance. And we all remember well how they “helped” the people of Yugoslavia to understand all the “beauty” of democratic values.

The Vietnam War was a period of fierce confrontation between two ideologies. Vietnam at that time was divided into two parts. The liberation movement in North Vietnam was supported by the USSR, and South Vietnam was a US protectorate. The precursors to war are often internal contradictions in a country, and Vietnam was no exception. For a long time it was a French colony. The liberation movement for independence in the country began in the 40s of the last century. An interesting fact is that the leader of the movement against the French colonialists, Ho Chi Minh, was actively supported by the United States during World War II. The Americans benefited from the fact that the Vietnamese Independence League, which he headed, was fiercely fighting the Japanese. At that time, “Grandfather Huo” was fighting in China. The Americans spared no money on weapons for the Chinese and Vietnamese communists, with whose hands the enemies of the United States were destroyed.

The situation changed after the Japanese surrender. Ho Chi Minh with troops of his supporters captured Hanoi and moved on, spreading his influence over increasingly vast territories of North Vietnam. Not wanting to lose its influence in Indochina, in December 1946 France transferred its expeditionary force there, but was unable to do anything against the growing strength of Ho Chi Minh's partisan detachments.

And already in 1950, the United States came to the aid of France. And they got involved in this long war. They were terrified of the spread of communist influence in Asia, so the States already at that time paid for 80% of all military expenses. These were terrible years in the history of Vietnam. Tourists who decide to visit Hanoi will learn about this terrible time by visiting the Hoa Lo prison museum.

The museum is conveniently located in the historical part of the city, between the central railway station and the Lake of the Returned Sword. Part of the museum's exhibition tells about the torture that Vietnamese fighters against the French colonialists were subjected to. During the period of 1954 alone, more than 2 thousand people were kept and brutally tortured in the Hoa Lo prison. The cruelty of “civilized” people is amazing.

It’s hard to imagine, but the history of long-suffering Vietnam could have been even more tragic. It is known that Vice President Richard Nixon recommended destroying the Vietnamese with tactical nuclear weapons. Memories of the nuclear bombing of Japan were still fresh. Only the prisoner prevented this bloody madness from being carried out. in July 1954 Geneva Agreement. In accordance with it, Vietnam was divided along the demilitarized zone (17-1 parallel) into North and South Vietnam. Losing their influence, the French almost immediately granted independence to South Vietnam.

For a short time, active military operations in Vietnam subsided. During this period, an outright “witch hunt” began overseas in the United States. Communist ideology becomes banned; the United States views any event in the world through the prism of its own security, as is customary today. In the case of Vietnam, this played a fatal role. The spread of communism in China, and then in North Vietnam, was perceived by the US administration as a threat to a complete loss of influence in Asia.

France, having lost its strength, could no longer hold back the onslaught of the northerners, and the Americans decided to replace them. They provided universal support to the first president of South Vietnam, Ngo Dinh Diem. The Vietnamese associate this personality with the times of rabid dictatorship and persecution of Buddhism. Today, all tourists visiting the sights of Hue are shown the car in which the Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc went to Saigon and committed self-immolation. So he protested against the persecution of Buddhism. A recording of this tragic event has been preserved.

Ngo Dinh Diem's ​​brutal rule predictably led to the formation of a resistance in South Vietnam. Multiple South Vietnamese guerrilla groups united in December 1960 to form the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam, called the Viet Cong in the West.

The Americans could not allow the Viet Cong to unite with the northern troops. This would mean the fall of the Ngo Dinh Diem regime, loyal to the Americans. In December 1961 US armed forces arrived in South Vietnam consisting of two helicopter companies.

In our minds it is customary to associate the image of John Kennedy almost with a “dove of peace.” However, this image is far from reality. It was his administration that frantically demonstrated to the USSR its determination in the matter of destroying the “communist infection.” American advisers trained the South Vietnamese military in the basics of counterinsurgency. The situation in the country was heating up. The threat of losing South Vietnam, and with it Laos, Thailand, and Cambodia, was already too realistic. The blame for the sluggishness of the military was attributed to the inability to fight and the excessive greed of Ngo Dinh Diem.

Predictable November 2, 1963, under vague circumstances, Ngo Dinh Diem was shot and killed. There was a coup in the country, of which there were several more in the next two years.

By a fateful coincidence, at the same time, US President John Kennedy was shot, and Lyndon Johnson took his place. The first document he signed was an order to send additional troops to Vietnam. Thus, the limited contingent of American troops from 760 people in 1959 increased to 23,300 in 1964. The flywheel of the war began to spin with renewed vigor. From this moment we can consider that the “hot” phase of the confrontation between the two systems began.

Now all that remained was to wait for a formal reason and unleash a full-scale bloodbath. This occasion was the shelling of the American destroyer Maddox by North Vietnamese troops, which, together with two other American ships August 2, 1964 arrived in the Gulf of Tonkin. Later, information about the shelling was refuted by the sailors of the destroyer themselves. But who cared anymore? Isn’t it true, there is a direct analogy with today. For example, with unconfirmed information on the “uranium dossier”, which formed the basis for the decision to start the war in Iraq.

Lyndon Johnson immediately ordered airstrikes against North Vietnam (Operation Pierce Arrow). The US Congress adopted the Tonkin Resolution almost unanimously. There was only one vote against. Ordinary Americans were not at all excited by the news of the start of a military operation. Then none of them imagined that they would have to die on foreign soil. It’s one thing when “you need to unite the nation and defend democracy,” and quite another to die.

US military contingent in Vietnam to the beginning February 1968 numbered more than half a million people. The Vietnamese fought desperately for their right to life. When coffins began to arrive in the United States, the wave of anti-war sentiment began to grow exponentially. War came to the homes of ordinary Americans.

Against the backdrop of significant defeats in South Vietnam and the actual failure of the “air” war, spring 1968 Negotiations were started to end the hostilities. Then events began to occur that today are commonly called the use of “double standards.” Publicly, the American administration announced a policy of withdrawing American soldiers from the territory of South Vietnam and even returned home 210 thousand of its troops. In fact, the bet was placed on arming the Saigon army, which by that time numbered more than a million people. She was given modern American weapons.

When Richard Nixon, in the heat of his presidential promises, announced an end to the war in 1969, it was enthusiastically received by American society. The people had a short memory, because Lyndon Johnson lied just as sweetly. One way or another, Nixon was elected president. The coffins in which young boys from distant Vietnam were returning home quickly discouraged Americans from carrying “democratic values,” and discontent in the country grew.

At the same time, American bombers dropped more bombs on Vietnam in 1970 than in the last five years combined. All public statements of American politicians turned out to be lies.

Appetite, as you know, flares up during eating. It was no longer possible to stop the war when it brought such dividends. Weapons corporations had a vested interest in the supply of weapons. The fire of napalm and phosphorus burned out entire villages. Dioxin was used, the most toxic substance at that time. You can learn more about the history of this hell at the Hanoi War Crimes Museum. The photo and film documents collected there are terrifying. In Vietnam, children are still born with genetic deformities.

It is now known that during the entire conflict, 14 million tons of explosives were dropped on Vietnam. The American political and economic elite made billions of dollars from this tragedy. Maybe that's why the war lasted so endlessly.

Under the pressure of internal unrest, exhausted by large material and human losses, early 1973 The US was forced to end the war. The active phase of American participation in the war ended in inglorious flight. But military and material assistance to the Saigon regime continued until 1975, until its final defeat.

Results

For more than 10 years, the Vietnamese resisted desperately and heroically. You need to understand that it is impossible to win such a war on the will to win alone. It was a strange war in which millions of Vietnamese were killed and maimed, but it was actually fought between two political systems. The USSR and China sided with the communist North. The support was enormous. Free material assistance was provided, weapons were supplied, and our military advisers trained the Vietnamese military. Without their help, victory would have been impossible.

The Second Indochina War between Vietnam and the United States ended only in April 1975, when the Saigon Independence Palace was captured. Later the country was unified.

The Vietnamese are proud of their heroic history. While it was both a civil war, it was also a time of liberation from American occupation. The country defended its right to its own choice and sovereignty. Millions of maimed Vietnamese, in some places completely destroyed cities, fields and forests scorched by napalm - this is the price of that terrible war. But the country survived.

Today, tourists arriving in Vietnam are no longer reminded of the terrible and tragic pages of that very recent war. The country is actively developing. Young people are learning English in droves and are eagerly trying to help the crowds of vacationers who come to soak up the beautiful sandy shores of the South China Sea.

History buffs, tired of beach holidays, book excursions where they are willing to show them partisan tunnels and traps. Such excursions evoke ambivalent feelings. On the one hand, respect and admiration for the tenacity and courage of the people who endured a war to destroy the country for 10 years and emerged victorious from this massacre. On the other hand, the touch of commerce in everything is striking. A certain dissonance is felt in this country - patriotic posters are hung everywhere, on which “Grandfather Ho” is smiling, the pioneers wear red ties... But at the same time, there is universal admiration for the “green piece of paper”. A clear association emerges with the USSR during its collapse, and a sense of an impending era of change is felt.

For the United States, the war with the Vietnamese people became an inglorious and bitter page in history. The losses of the American army amounted to more than 60 thousand killed, over 300 thousand Americans were maimed. In addition, more than $4 billion was spent from the country's budget to help the Saigon regime. The war was a successful investment and a profitable event only for the “top”, which became quite rich during the 10 years of bloody carnage.

Vietnam War in cinema

Of course, Hollywood could not ignore this conflict. A large number of films have been made showing the hardships and hardships of American soldiers desperately resisting the “brutal” Viet Cong.

And, of course, the picture would not be complete without documentaries. Not to look nervous.

On the morning of January 27, 1973, downtown Hanoi along the shores of the Lake of the Returned Sword was unusually crowded. During the war, few people lived in cities. The Vietnamese explained this with the exhaustive word so tan - “evacuation” or, more precisely, “dispersal.” But the winter chill gave way to warmth, and it was possible to relax in the slightly humid, caressing air, which happens in very early spring before the eastern cherry blossoms bloom.

It was the day of victory. The mood of the people on the shore of the lake, disfigured by bomb shelters, was upbeat, but not exactly jubilant, although newspapers and street loudspeakers shouted about the historic victory. Everyone was waiting for news of the signing in Paris of an agreement to restore peace in Vietnam. The time difference with France is six hours, and the historical moment came in the evening.

In the Tass mansion on cozy Khao Ba Kuat, teletypes were already hammering out dispatches from Paris about the arrival of delegations on Avenue Kleber, when my colleagues and I gathered at a table near the open veranda to celebrate the event in Russian. Although we haven’t had time to realize it yet.

Just a month ago, at the same table, over a can of sprat, a bottle of Stolichnaya, and pickles from the embassy store, people were gathering for dinner in order to catch it before the night bombing. More often than not they didn’t have time and were startled by a nearby explosion...

The gift from the American Santa Claus was the finale of the war: in less than 12 days, one hundred thousand tons of bombs fell on the cities of North Vietnam - five non-nuclear Hiroshimas.

New Year 1972 in Haiphong. The “Christmas” bombings affected not only military targets. Photo by the author

From the branches of a spreading lija in the yard hung shiny beards of aluminum tinsel, which escort planes dropped to interfere with air defense radars.

In November I still “went to war.” Vietnam north of the 20th parallel was not bombed so as not to spoil the atmosphere of the Paris negotiations. Nixon promised the Americans to pull the country out of the Vietnam swamp with dignity, and negotiations seemed to be moving forward.

After 45 years, the world has changed a lot, but the political technologies of war and peace are similar. Hanoi insisted that in the south of Vietnam it was not its regular troops who were fighting against the Americans and the Saigon regime, but rebels and partisans (“we are not there”). The Americans and Saigon refused to talk to the “rebels,” and Hanoi did not recognize the Republic of Vietnam, an “American puppet.” Finally we found the form. The negotiations that began in 1969 were four-party: the United States, North Vietnam, the pro-American Republic of Vietnam and the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam (PRG RSV) created by Hanoi, which was recognized only by the socialist countries. Everyone understood that the war was between communist Vietnam and the United States, and the real bargaining was going on in parallel between Politburo member Le Duc Tho and presidential adviser Henry Kissinger.

In the fall of seventy-two, the Americans did not bomb the main part of North Vietnam with its largest cities. But everything south of the 20th parallel, on the way of the movement of North Vietnamese troops, equipment and ammunition to the south, US aircraft - tactical from Utapao in Thailand (this is the resort of Pattaya!), strategic from Guam and “sailors” from aircraft carriers - ironed to the fullest. They added their artillery to the ships of the 7th Fleet, the silhouettes of which appeared on the horizon in good weather. The narrow strip of coastal plain looked like the lunar surface.

Now it takes no more than two hours to drive from Hanoi to the Hamrong Bridge, the beginning of that former “fourth zone,” but back then it was better not to get on coastal highway number one, but to weave south through the mountains and jungle along the dirt roads of the “Ho Chi Minh Trail.” Past burnt-out fuel trucks and tanks, joking around with girls from repair crews at broken crossings.

The word “détente” was heard in the world, which the Vietnamese did not like (what kind of “détente” is there if you have to fight to unify the country?). They were painfully jealous of the America of both “older brothers” who were at war with each other.

Nixon became the first US president to travel to Beijing and Moscow and talk with Mao and Brezhnev. In mid-December 1972, the American press wrote about the Apollo 17 flight to the moon with three astronauts and the imminent end of the Vietnam War. As Kissinger put it, “the world was within reach.”

On October 8, Kissinger met with Le Duc Tho at a villa near Paris. He surprised the American by proposing a nine-point draft agreement that broke through the vicious circle of mutual demands. Hanoi proposed a ceasefire throughout Vietnam one day after the signing of the agreement, two months later the Americans were to withdraw their troops, and a coalition government was created in South Vietnam. That is, Hanoi recognized the Saigon administration as a partner. It was proposed to hold elections under the auspices of the Council of National Reconciliation and Accord.

The reasons for Hanoi's softening approach are anyone's guess. His Easter offensive in the spring of seventy-two in the south cannot be called successful. The Americans responded with heavy bombing of major cities and infrastructure in North Vietnam. Détente raised doubts about the reliability of its allies - the USSR and China.

Kissinger and Le Duc Tho met three more times in October. Hanoi agreed to drop the demand for the release of all political prisoners in South Vietnam in exchange for the release of American prisoners of war. They also set a date for the end of the war—October 30. Kissinger flew to consult with Nixon.

Then came less and less clear news. The head of the Saigon regime, Nguyen Van Thieu, said that he would not make concessions to the communists, no matter what the Americans agreed with them. Washington demanded that the project be corrected and set as a precondition the withdrawal of regular units of North Vietnam from South Vietnam and the deployment of a five-thousand-strong international contingent there. On October 26, the State Department said that there would be no 30th signing. Hanoi responded by publishing a secret draft agreement. The Americans were outraged and the negotiations stalled. On December 13, Kissinger left Paris, and two days later Le Duc Tho.

Saturday December 16th turned out to be cool. In the morning, Hanoi was shrouded in “fung,” a winter mixture of rain and fog. In “Nyan Zan” there was a long statement by the GRP of the Republic of South Africa. The meaning is clear: if Washington does not revoke its amendments, the Vietnamese will fight to the bitter end. In other words, expect an attack during the dry season that has already begun in the south.

From the center of Hanoi to Gya Lam Airport is only eight kilometers, but the journey could take an hour, two, or more. Two one-way pontoon crossings across the Red River were connected and separated, allowing barges and scows to pass through. And the steel web of Eiffel’s brainchild, the Long Bien Bridge, was torn apart. One span, hunched over, buried itself in the red water.

I went to the airport on an official occasion. The Vietnamese party and state delegation was escorted to Moscow for the 55th anniversary of the revolution. The head of the National Assembly of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, Truong Tinh, was flying through Beijing.

Saturday was also the day to meet and see off the Aeroflot Il-18, which flew from Moscow via India, Burma and Laos once a week. It was a celebration of connection with the outside world. Saturday's get-together at the airport became a social event. In the small airport building you could not only see who had arrived and who was leaving, but also meet the cream of the foreign colony - diplomats, journalists, generals, get some information, just “trade faces.”

We had to stay at the airport longer than usual. Something strange happened. After boarding the plane, the passengers again went down the ramp and lined up under the wing with their bags and purses. Before this, no one paid attention to the noise of an aircraft invisible behind the low clouds. When the Il-18 retreated towards Vientiane, we learned that the cause of the commotion was an American drone.

On Sunday, the seventeenth, a representative of the USSR Ministry of Marine Fleet called me from Haiphong. He saw how in the morning for the first time after a two-month break, American planes mined the port fairway and fired several missiles at the city. The port of Haiphong was blocked by minefields for several months. Soviet supplies, primarily military supplies, reached Vietnam in a delicate manner: first to the ports of Southern China, from there by rail to the Vietnamese border and then on their own or by truck.

On Monday, the eighteenth, the cold “fun” was drizzling again. The leaves on the trees shone from the water sprayed in the air, moisture penetrated into the houses, settling as a slippery film on the stone tiles of the floors, and was absorbed into clothes. In Gya Lam we met the plane of the Chinese airline, on which Le Duc Tho arrived. He looked tired, depressed, and made no statements. On the way from Paris, he met in Moscow with Politburo member Andrei Kirilenko and Secretary of the Central Committee Konstantin Katushev. He was received in Beijing by Premier Zhou Enlai. Moscow and Beijing knew that this chance for peace in Vietnam had been lost.

Washington had already decided to bomb Hanoi and Haiphong in order to force the Vietnamese to peace. Operation Linebecker II approved, Nixon sent a secret telegram to Hanoi demanding acceptance of US conditions. She came on Monday evening.

That evening there was a reception and film screening at the Hanoi International Club to mark the 12th anniversary of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam. Seated in the front row were Foreign Minister Nguyen Duy Trinh and Hanoi Mayor Tran Duy Hung. They already knew that B-52s from Guam were flying to Hanoi. Later, the mayor will tell me that during the ceremonial part he received a call from the air defense headquarters.

They showed a newsreel in which the cannonade roared. When the session was interrupted, the roar did not stop, because it also came from the street. I went out onto the square - the glow covered the northern half of the horizon.

The first raid lasted about forty minutes, and the siren at the National Assembly monotonously howled the all-clear. But minutes later, heart-rendingly intermittently, she warned of a new alarm. I didn’t wait until lights out, when the street lights came on, and went home in the dark. Fortunately, it’s nearby: three blocks. The horizon was burning, roosters were crowing in the courtyards, mistaking it for dawn...

I was not a military expert, but from the running chains of fountains of fire I guessed that these were carpet bombings from the B-52. In my work, I had a competitive advantage over my AFP colleague Jean Thoraval, the only Western reporter in Hanoi: I did not need to obtain a censorship stamp before transmitting the text. That's why I was the first. A few hours later, the start of the operation was confirmed from Washington.

The next morning, at the International Club, the Vietnamese organized a press conference with the American pilots shot down at night. They brought in survivors and not badly injured ones. Then, until the new year, such press conferences were held almost every day, and each time they brought “fresh” prisoners. Most are still in mud-splattered flight suits, and some are in bandages or plaster - already in striped pajamas.

These were different people - from the twenty-five-year-old Bachelor of Arts Lieutenant Robert Hudson to the forty-three-year-old “Latino”, Korean War veteran Major Fernando Alexander, from the unfired Paul Granger to the commander of the flying “superfortress” Lieutenant Colonel John Yuinn, who had twenty years of service under his belt, one hundred and forty combat flights to South Vietnam and twenty-two to the “fourth zone” of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. By their surnames one could judge where their ancestors came from to America: Brown and Gelonek, Martini and Nagahira, Bernasconi and Leblanc, Camerota and Vavroch...

In the light of the spotlights, they entered one after another into a cramped room filled with people and tobacco smoke. In front of the public, among whom there were few foreigners, and not so many journalists, they behaved differently: confusion with a shadow of fear, a detached look into the void, arrogance and contempt... Some simply remained silent, while the little Vietnamese officer, mutilating names and surnames, he read out personal data, ranks, service numbers, types of aircraft, place of captivity. Others identified themselves and asked to tell their relatives that “they are alive and are being treated humanely.”

The first press conference was dominated by silence. They probably thought that this was an unfortunate accident and that Hanoi would capitulate tomorrow under blows from the sky. But each subsequent group became more talkative. By Christmas, almost everyone congratulated their relatives on the holiday and expressed hope that “this war will end soon.” But they also said that they were fulfilling military duty, bombing military targets, although they did not rule out “collateral losses” (maybe they damaged housing a little).

On December 19, a cabin with American officers Cernan, Schmitt and Evans parachuted into the Pacific Ocean south of the Samoan Islands. This was the descent module of Apollo 17, which returned from the Moon. Astronaut heroes were welcomed aboard the USS Ticonderoga. At the same hour, the plane of Lieutenant Colonel Gordon Nakagawa took off from another aircraft carrier, the Enterprise. His parachute opened over Haiphong, and the Vietnamese in the flooded rice field did not greet him at all cordially. A little earlier, the navigator-instructor of the B-52 squadron, Major Richard Johnson, was captured. He and Captain Richard Simpson managed to eject. The remaining four crew members were killed. Their “superfortress” opened the scoring with a shot down over Hanoi.

The Christmas bombings of Hanoi and Haiphong, which lasted almost continuously for twelve days, became a test of strength for both sides. American air losses were serious. According to American information, fifteen B-52s were lost - the same number as in the entire previous war in Vietnam. According to the Soviet military, 34 of these eight-engine vehicles were shot down in the December air battle. In addition, 11 other aircraft were destroyed.

The picture of giants burning in the night sky and falling apart was enchanting. At least thirty American pilots were killed, more than twenty were missing, and dozens were captured.

I did not see any air battles, although the Vietnamese later reported the loss of six MiG-21s. But a mass of metal rose into the air towards the planes from below, including bullets from the rifle of the barmaid Minh from the roof of the Hanoi Metropol and from the Makarov of the policeman at our house. Anti-aircraft guns worked in every quarter. But all B-52s were shot down by Soviet-made S-75 air defense systems. The Soviet military did not directly participate in this; at that time they were only advisers and instructors, but Soviet equipment played an obvious role.

According to Vietnamese data, 1,624 people died on the ground in the New Year's air war. Civilian. The Vietnamese did not report about the military.

The expectation of completely suppressing the will of the population did not materialize. There was no panic, but it was felt that people were on edge. This was told to me by a classic of Vietnamese literature, Nguyen Cong Hoan, who came to visit, with whom we had been closely acquainted for a long time.

During the Christmas peace break, our group went to mass at St. Joseph's Cathedral. Even Makhlouf, Egypt's charge d'affaires. Prayed for peace. And in the lobby of the Metropol, the role of Santa Claus at the Christmas tree was played by the American pastor Michael Allen, who before the bombings arrived as part of a delegation of pacifists led by the former US prosecutor at Nuremberg Telford Taylor. Singer Joan Baez was also in it. She sang Christmas songs, and when she learned that I was Russian, she suddenly hugged me and started singing “Dark Eyes”... After Christmas, they bombed me again.

We celebrated the New Year in tense silence, waiting for the bombing. But when Le Duc Tho flew to Paris, it became somehow more fun. Negotiations resumed, and the agreement was signed in almost the same form as the draft published in October. The December air war over Hanoi and Haiphong changed nothing.

The main results of the agreement were the complete withdrawal of American troops from South Vietnam (March 29, 1973) and the exchange of prisoners, which was carried out in several stages. It was a solemn event. American Hercules from Saigon and Da Nang and ambulance C-141s from Clark Field in the Philippines flew to the Gya Lam airfield. In the presence of a commission of officers from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, the United States, the GRP of the Republic of South Vietnam, the Saigon regime, Indonesia, Hungary, Poland and Canada, the Vietnamese authorities handed over the released prisoners to the American general. Some were simply pale and exhausted, others left on crutches, and others were carried on stretchers. Among them was John McCain, whom I did not pay attention to at the time. But then, at a meeting in Brussels, I reminded him of that day.

The other articles of the agreement were worse. The ceasefire between the Vietnamese communist forces and the Saigon army in the south was shaky, with the parties constantly accusing each other of violating the Paris Agreement. The letter of the agreement, which each side read in its own way, itself became an argument for war. The fate of the 1954 Geneva Agreement, which ended France's war for the former colony, repeated itself. The communists accused the Saigonese of holding separate elections in the south and proclaiming their anti-communist state. The Saigonese accused the communists of launching terrorist attacks against the authorities in the south and organizing military penetration from North Vietnam to South Vietnam through Laos and Cambodia. Hanoi assured that its troops were nowhere there, and the GRP of the Republic of South East was fighting for the creation of an independent and neutral country in the south.

Le Duc Tho, unlike Kissinger, did not go to receive the Nobel Prize because he knew that the agreement would not last long. Within two years, the communists became convinced that America had left Vietnam and was not going to return. The Spring Offensive of 1975 buried the Paris Agreement with all its decorative republics and control mechanisms. Guarantees from the USSR, France, Great Britain and China did not interfere with the course of events. Vietnam was united militarily.

State thought is characterized by inertia. The French began to fight for Indochina when the era of territories was ending and other mechanisms for using resources took the place of military-political control over the territories. The Americans got involved in Vietnam when the main issue was the confrontation between two systems. The communists denied America's sacred principles of free trade and capital movement and interfered with transnational business. Eastern Europe is already closed, and Southeast Asia is under threat. Maoist China influenced the region. On September 30, 1965, an attempt at a communist coup in Indonesia was foiled at the cost of great blood. The rebels fought guerrilla wars in Thailand, Burma, and the Philippines. In Vietnam, the communists controlled half the country and had a chance to take control of the other... In Washington, the “domino theory” was seriously considered, in which Vietnam was the critical domino.

What was this war for, in which more than 58 thousand Americans were killed, millions of Vietnamese were killed, millions were maimed physically and mentally, not to mention the economic costs and environmental damage?

The goal of the Vietnamese communists was a nation state under strict party rule, with an independent, bordering on autarky, economy, without private property and foreign capital. For this they made sacrifices.

The dreams of those who fought against American imperialism did not come true, the fears that prompted the Americans to one of the bloodiest wars of the century did not come true. Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Burma and the Philippines did not become communist, but rushed forward along the capitalist path in the economy and joined globalization. In Vietnam, an attempt at “socialist change” in the south led in 1979 to a collapsed economy, a terrible refugee problem (“boat people”), and war with China. Actually, China had already abandoned classical socialism by that time. The Soviet Union collapsed.

From the veranda of the once “journalistic” bar on the roof of the Caravella Hotel, a panorama of Ho Chi Minh City opens up, on whose futuristic skyscrapers are the brands of world banks and corporations. Down in Lam Son Square, a Japanese firm is building one of the world's most modern subways. Nearby, on a red banner, there is a slogan: “Warm greetings to the delegates of the city party conference.” And state television talks about America's solidarity with Vietnam against Beijing's attempts to take away its islands in the South China Sea...

Photo taken with an amateur Zenit camera

The Vietnam War (sometimes also called the Second Indochina War) actually began in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia on November 1, 1955 and continued until the fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975. It was fought between North and South Vietnam. The North Vietnamese army was supported by the Soviet Union, China and other communist allies, and the South Vietnamese army was supported by the United States of America, the Philippines and some other anti-communist states. Therefore, the Vietnam War is considered one of the “proxy” battles Cold War.

The Complete History of the Vietnam War, 1964-1973. Part 1

National Liberation Front of South Vietnam ( NLF, often called the Viet Cong in the USA), a pro-communist organization in the south of the country, which received help from the north, waged a guerrilla war against anti-communist forces, and the People's Army of North Vietnam carried out broader actions, often with large forces. As the war progressed, the role of the NLF declined, and the participation of the North Vietnamese army grew. South Vietnamese and American forces, relying on air superiority and overwhelming firepower, mounted search-and-destroy missions involving ground forces, artillery, and airstrikes. The United States carried out a large-scale bombing campaign against North Vietnam.

The communists fought for the subjugation of the entire country to their power, although propaganda presented the conflict as a war “against the colonialists,” a continuation of the Indochina War against France. The US government saw its intervention as a way to prevent a communist takeover of South Vietnam, part of a "policy of containment" to stop the spread of communism.

The Complete History of the Vietnam War, 1964-1973. Part 2

Already in 1950, American military advisers arrived in what was then French Indochina. US involvement increased in the early 1960s. The number of American soldiers sent to Vietnam tripled in 1961 and tripled again in 1962. US involvement increased even more after " Tonkin incident" (1964), when an American destroyer engaged North Vietnamese torpedo boats. He was followed by " Tonkin resolution" of the US Congress, which gave the president Johnson the right to use military force if necessary in Southeast Asia.

In 1965, regular US military units were deployed in Vietnam. The war soon spread beyond the borders of this country: neighboring areas of Laos and Cambodia were subjected to American bombing. US involvement in the war peaked in 1968. That same year, the Communists launched their famous Tet Offensive. With its help, it was not possible to overthrow the government of South Vietnam, but this operation became a turning point in the war: it convinced broad US public circles that the American government's assurances of an imminent victory were not true, despite many years of and expensive assistance to South Vietnam.

The Complete History of the Vietnam War, 1964-1973. Part 3

The United States began a gradual withdrawal of its ground forces, declaring a policy of “Vietnamization” of the conflict, designed to end American involvement and place the task of fighting the communists on the South Vietnamese themselves. Despite Paris Peace Agreement, signed by all belligerents in January 1973, fighting continued. In the USA and throughout the Western world, a powerful movement against the Vietnam War developed, which became part of the then “counterculture”. The war greatly changed the balance of power between the Eastern and Western blocs, as well as the relationship of the “civilized” world with the “Third”.

Direct US military intervention ended on August 15, 1973. Capture of Saigon by the North Vietnamese army in April 1975 put the final end to the war. North and South Vietnam were united under communist rule.

The war was accompanied by enormous casualties. Estimates of the number of Vietnamese soldiers and civilians killed range from 800 thousand to 3.1 million. 200-300 thousand Cambodians, 20-200 thousand Laotians and 58,220 American troops also died during the conflict. Another 1,626 are still missing.