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The Omnipresence Of Ho Chi Minh's First Indochina War

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Lurking in the shadows of the infamous Vietnam War is its predecessor, the First Indochina War. Consequently, the comprehension of the innumerable causes of the First Indochina War is essential to the understanding of modern Vietnam. Factors range from French Imperialism to new leadership to Vietnam’s involvement in World War II, and even go as far back as the Paris Peace Conference or Vietnam’s ancient inclination towards revolution. Of these causes the commencement of what historians see as an inevitable war, the omnipresence of Ho Chi Minh’s cult of personality is definitively set apart as most significant, as Ho Chi Minh’s declaration of Vietnam’s independence is seen as the catalyst for the First Indochina War. The persistence of both …show more content…

Ho Chi Minh sought to rectify these wrongs by confirming and solidifying Vietnam’s declaration of independence in 1945 when he rose to presidency in the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (Tønnesson 12). This was a culmination of decades of attempts on Ho Chi Minh’s part to gain support and ultimately to give Vietnam basic recognition and freedom from international exploitation. As early as 1919, Ho Chi Minh, under a different pseudonym, presented his vision for Vietnam and sought aid to make it reality (Brocheux 13). Predictably, he was ignored, beginning a cycle of rejection that fueled Ho Chi Minh’s desperation for allies and paralleled the constant dismissal of Vietnam and other developing nations by world powers. The few instances that Ho Chi Minh was successful in forging alliances with other nations also played a major role in the causation of the First Indochina War, as is seen in the repercussions of Ho Chi Minh’s relations with various world powers in the beginning of the 20th …show more content…

One historian reflected on Ho, asserting that “so inseparable is the man from the revolution” (Willmott 587). Most notable of Vietnam’s revolutionary groups is the League for the Independence of Vietnam (more commonly known as the Viet Minh), which Ho organized in May, 1941 (Skinner 3). The Viet Minh were instrumental in the two 1946 events that immediately resulted in the First Indochina War: the Haiphong Incident and the Battle of Hanoi (Schuler 1). Thus the Viet Minh also represented a threat that the French and their allies were determined to quell. Essentially, the Viet Minh was Ho Chi Minh’s army of revolutionary supporters, who became a tangible representation of Ho’s ideologies and

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