Võ Nguyên Giáp was born in 1911 or 1912 at An Xá (Vietnam). He was a Vietnamese general during the Guerre of Vietnam and the Guerre of Indo-China, victorious of the Bataille of Ðiện Biên Phủ.

Introduction

To simplest and shortest, the general Vo Nguyên Giap entered the military history and the military and strategic studies of Politologie of alive sound, admired by his honest friends and enemies, of which the French general Raoul Salan and the American general William Westmoreland. Even after the unconditional capitulation of the French garrison of Ðiện Well Phủ in May 1954, the French refused a long time to confer the title of " général" with Võ Nguyên Giáp, this last not having made any military academy and even less the Military academy of Paris. He learned how to make the war by doing it. Large intellectual, it blocked the operation " Xénophon" help for Ðiện Well Phủ, knowing that Xénophon was the general who ordered the " Reprocess of the Five Cents" army of Alexandre after the round in India and Persia.

Biography

Born in 1911 at An Xá, in the province of the Quảng Bình, Võ Nguyên Giáp is a son of Mandarin. As of the 14 years age, it starts to militate against the French presence. It receives the education of the French college and takes part in the communist movement as of the Années 1930. It continues studies of history, right and economy with Huế, then with Hanoï. In this city, the Poète Réunion be born Raphaël Barquisseau is its professor. In 1937, Giáp becomes itself professor of history at the school Thang-Length in Hanoï and adheres to the Communist party in 1939.

The following year, this one was declared illegal. He flees in China, where he becomes protected from Hồ Chí Minh, which will make of him a solid military aid. In 1944, it founds the Armée Popular Vietnamese (APV). After the takeover by force of the Japanese of the March 9th 1945, it benefits from the disappearance of the French administration to intensify the recruitment of members of the Vietnamese soldier-minh. http://www.country-data.com/frd/cs/vietnam/vn05_02a.jpg

Võ Nguyên Giáp becomes minister, in charge of the security forces, the first government Hồ Chí Minh, and for this reason organizes " purges". In 1946, it is named Minister for the National defense of the democratic republic of Vietnam. It is him which directs the military actions against the French. He is in particular the winner of the Bataille of Ðiện Biên Phủ (May 1954), which will cause the French departure and which will be worth to him a recognition and a great regard of its people and his army.

In 1960, the Guerre of Vietnam bursts against the Vietnameses and the the United States. Fine strategist, Giáp plays a determining role in the fights of independence of Vietnam. He directs the operations of the popular army of Vietnam and force the Americans to leave the South of the country. He obtains the victory during fall of Saigon in particular thanks to the “countryside Hồ Chí Minh” of 1975 during which Giáp launches its famous watchwords to the communist soldiers: “speed, audacity and sure victory”.

General Giap which thanks to its often anticonformist tactics was a military engineering with the reputation not to have never known the defeat, it is necessary to distinguish here the legend from reality, in 1972 its troops underwent a serious reverse at the time of the battle of Kontum, the man by whom Gl Giap was demolishes was an American civil strategist (old Lt Colonel excluded from the army for his critical positions vis-a-vis the strategy of Westmorland) and of the name of John Paul Vann, it was concealed on June 9th, 1972 in the crushing of its helicopter.

In 1975, it takes part in the reunification of Vietnam. He resigns of the post of minister of Defense in 1980. In 1982, it is excluded from the political office of the Vietnamese Communist party (PCV), officially for reasons of age and health, but one speaks about divergences with the two strong men of Vietnam, the general secretary of the PCV Duẩn and the chief of the commission of organization of the PCV, Đức Thọ. However, there remains Deputy Prime Minister until in 1991 and he is rehabilitated at the time of the 6th congress of the PCV in 1986. Võ Nguyên Giáp lives today withdrawn in Hanoï, but is expressed regularly on the political evolution of its country.

The man and his work

Born in 1911 in An Xá (province of Quảng Bình), wire of Mandarin of 2nd francophobe class, Võ Nguyên Giáp made of solids studies of history, right and political economy in Huế, then in Hanoï. Meanwhile, stopped in 1930 for subversive activities, he is condemned to three years of prison but is released on word shortly after. He becomes professor of history at the school Thang-Length in Hanoï in 1937. In 1939, member of the Indochinese Communist party, it flees in China with the declaration of war which sees the prohibition of the party related to the Soviet Union, itself allied of the Nazis in the pact germano-Soviet. Convinced Marxist, it carries a true hatred to the capitalism which it makes in particular responsible for the death of his first wife died in prison in 1941 and his/her sister-in-law guillotinée in Saigon by the French Colonial Administration. He takes share with the Tsin-Ti Congress which sees the creation of Việt Minh, then is charged by Hồ Chí Minh with the organization with the Guérilla against the Japanese in Indo-China. After the takeover by force of the Japanese of March 9th, 1945, it benefits from the disappearance of the French administration to intensify the recruitment of members of Việt Minh (League for the Independence of Vietnam).

Named member of the committee of release, he is minister, in charge of the security forces, the first government Hồ Chí Minh. For this reason it practices bloody purgings in the noncommunist nationalist rows. Police chief with the armies in May 1946, Minister with the armies, then Minister for the National defense of the Democratic republic of Vietnam in November 1946, it is most probably directly responsible for the release of the takeover by force strapping of December 19th, 1946 on Hanoï, Tonkin and Annam which results in a failure.

Thereafter, it directs the military actions against the French during the First Guerre of Indo-China. It is finally victorious in May 1954 with the Bataille of Ðiện Biên Phủ.

Minister for the Defense of the Democratic republic of Vietnam, it carries out, as a Commander-in-chief, the Second War of Indo-China or Guerre of Vietnam against the United States and their allies of the O.T.A.S.E (Organization of the Treaty of the South Asia East), until the final victory of 1975 which sees the reunification of Vietnam.

There resigns of the post of minister of Defense in 1980, is excluded from the political office of the Communist party in 1982 while remaining Deputy Prime Minister until in 1991. He is the author of " War of the people - Army of the people " published in 1967 at François Maspero.

March 8th, 1946, the general Raoul Salan, ordering French forces of Indo-China of North, receives with its request, in Hanoï, Võ Nguyên Giáp which he does not know directly. It comes to discuss the conditions for application, under the military aspect, of convention signed free-Vietnamese the previous on March 6th. These discussions lead, on April 3rd, with the signature of an agreement between Raoul Salan and Võ Nguyên Giáp. Raoul Salan re-examines Võ Nguyên Giáp on April 7th, 1946 in the morning, when this one comes in its residence to offer a small folding screen enamelled for his wife (their Dominique daughter was born three weeks earlier), and in the evening at the time of a dinner with Hồ Chí Minh, dinner during which the disagreements relating to the implementation of the Agreements of March appear at the great day. Behind the bloody acts of the war leader, there was the courteous and delicate man.

During the preparatory conference of Đà Lạt, from April 17th to May 11th, 1946, Raoul Salan, chief of the French military mission, has for principal interlocutor Võ Nguyên Giáp with whom it ties personal relations during the evenings according to the official sessions. Giáp would have been then until offering to Raoul Salan the command troops of the Democratic republic of Vietnam. Much later, the US general William Westmoreland paid homage in a book to him which he wrote with for title simply " Võ Nguyên Giáp".

It re-examines it in Hanoï the next on May 16th, at the time of an abstract dinner, before accompanying Hồ Chí Minh by the way by the airs to the conference of Fontainebleau with Phạm Văn Đồng, the diplomat, remained in Paris in reserve.

When Raoul Salan returns to Indo-China on May 19th, 1947, the war is there and its adversary relentless will be Võ Nguyên Giáp until May 28th, 1953, date of its return in metropolis. In July 1984, to the Val de Grâce, a Vietnamese diplomat comes to greet the mortal remains of the Salan general in the name of the general Võ Nguyên Giáp who held it in great regard, in honest adversaries.

Điện Well Phủ. The historical appointment

Võ Nguyên Giáp was commander-in-chief it of the Popular Army of Vietnam lasting thirty years and one of the main actors of the Bataille of Điện Biên Phủ consulted many documents, as well Vietnamese, as Western, on this decisive event of the Guerre of Indo-China. Several works published affirm that Navarre, the commander-in-chief of the French task force, has, at the time of the Castor operation, released its parachutists on Ðiện Biên Phủ trusting information which announced the movement towards the North-West of units of the army Vietnamese having crossed Da (Noire river). For the Giáp general, the occupation of Ðiện Well Phủ during the winter and of spring 1953-1954 was intentional and succeeded the “Operation Gull” in the delta of the North, which was to make it possible Navarre to have the freehands to be able, to launch the Atlante operation aiming at occupying the three free provinces of Ve interzone, in the southernmost Center. It estimates it was a reasonable action there, a need in the execution of the Navarre plan and that, consequently, he was not absolutely necessary, at least initially, of an error.

Fifty years after, the Giáp general told in particular how it succeeds by twice saving its troops, abstaining from even sometimes fighting and letting in Navarre believe itself victorious. It was its Psychological warfare. Volume III of the Memories of the Giáp general does not describe only the battle of Ðiện Biên Phủ, it recalls the very whole history of resistance Vietnamese. According to the author, if the Vietnameses left victorious the conflict, it is that they knew, while being based on their ancestral tradition of the combat and the thought of Hồ Chí Minh, to carry out true a " war of the people ".

• " The Bataille of Điện Biên Phủ was a gigantic tangle of lives and destinies. It was lost, French side, by the staff. But gained, on the two sides, by men who sacrificed all: Vietnameses to obtain with the snatch a decisive victory; French, Senegalese riflemen, Moroccan tabors to finish captive, taken in the vice of a war which them échappait".

The lines more moving by Võ Nguyên Giáp, general with the very socialist reserve of feather, concern the commando of the Populaire army of the Vietnam who, on May 6th, 1954 towards 23:00, made jump the hill Éliane 2 after having dug a tunnel under defenses French and stuffed her entrails of explosives. It was Division 308 of Infantry of the general Vuong Thua Considering whom gave the thrust. The decision to engage the Battle of Ðiện Biên Phủ was most important of its life, with the assistance of Phạm Văn Đồng. http://www.leksikon.org/images/vo_nguyen_giap.jpg

The two important books of Võ Nguyên Giáp are “War of the people, army of the people. the experiment of the Vietnamese people in the armed struggle” and the 3 volumes of the “Memories”, in many editions and republications, without counting many books on him.

Võ Nguyên Giáp and Thomas Edward Lawrence

Beyond the myth, Lawrence of Arabia remains one of the most influential officers in the development of insurrectionary doctrines at last century. In 1946, the French general Raoul Salan carried out several discussions with the Vietnamese General Võ Nguyên Giáp who planned and lead military operations against the French until their defeat to the Bataille of Điện Biên Phủ in 1954 and the Offensive of Tết in 1968. Salan belonged to a mission of negotiation created to finalize the return of the French authority to Việt Nam. Later, it will order the French Task force in Việt Nam of May 20th, 1951 until May 1953, and it led the last military action successful against Hồ Chí Minh: a named offensive Lorraine operation, on October 11th, 1952, in which the forces of Salan swept the Red valley and the jungles of the Nam North-Vietnamese soldier. The following year, it will give its command to the general Henri-Eugene Navarre, who will govern the disaster of Điện Biên Phủ. Giáp said:

• " Lawrence combined wisdom, the integrity, humanity, courage and the discipline with the empathy, is the aptitude to be identified émotionnellement as well with the subordinates as with the supérieurs".

During these talks of 1946, Salan was struck by the influence of a man on the thought of Giáp; this man was Thomas Edward Lawrence. Giáp said to Salan:

• " the Seven Pillars of Wisdom of T.E. Lawrence is my Gospel of the combat. It does not leave me jamais."

The gasoline of the theory of the Guérilla to which Giáp refers can be found at two places. The most accessible first and is not other than the many editions of the Seven Pillars of Wisdom, in particular chapter 33. The second is an article carrying the title " The Evolution off has Revolt" , published in October 1920 in Army Quarterly and Defense Newspaper. Both are based on the evaluation practices and considered by Lawrence of the situation to which the Arab forces in the area of Hedjaz faced, within the Saoudi desert, in March 1917.

• Algebraic, biological and psychological

Until this time, Lawrence had spent more than one year to the sides of the Arab Bedouins against the Turks. It had drawn from this experiment two theorems of the guerilla which form a theoretical base and a starting point for the remainder of its ideas related to the conduit of an insurrection. Lawrence affirmed in first that irregular troops are unable to defend a position against conventional forces, and that they are also unable to effectively tackle a strongly defended position. If these theorems are correct, Lawrence, which value wondered can thus have its irregular forces? That became the basic question which he sought in first to clarify.

While being rotated, Lawrence understood that following the example very other officer educated in the Western thought and military traditions, its attitude towards the war was dominated by the dogma of the destruction: an obsession according to which " the principle of the modern war consists to seek the enemy army, the center of its power, and to destroy it with the combat. " But it appeared in Lawrence that in spite of the absence of any battle of destruction, the Arabs were gaining the war:

• " whereas I thought of it, I understood that we had gained the war of Hedjaz. We occupied 99% of the territory. The Turks were welcome in the remainder. They had quietly sat Médine; if we made them captive, they would cost us food and guards in Egypt. From all points of view, it was preferable that they remain there, that they are due to Médine and want to keep it. Let us leave them! "

Lawrence wondered then if there did not exist other wars, different from the wars of destruction which praised of the French generals like Ferdinand Foch and other contemporaries and about which they spoke with such an enthusiasm. He concludes from it, after a reminiscence of his study of Clausewitz, that there was indeed more than one type of war, than the determining factor was the objective for which the war was initially carried out. He did not enter simply within the framework of the Arab interests, nor in that their capacities, to destroy the Turks. The objective of the Arabs was geographical: to occupy the greatest possible part of the Arab Middle East. Now, if the objective of the Arabs were a geographical interest rather than the destruction of the enemy forces, it threw an entirely new light on the role of the irregular ones. Being given the validity of these two theorems, which role the Arab insurrectionist did it have in a war of occupation?

In order to answer this question, Lawrence developed a simple conceptual framework, anything else that a kind of mental table with holes to hang concepts and ideas in relation one with the other, but with a sufficient structure to think of all the ideas like a whole. The table of Lawrence included/understood three concepts or categories of analysis, of the conceptual hooks which it called the algebraic one, the biological one and the psychological one.

- The physical element of the soldier power struggles and the material Capacity.

By “algebraic”, Lawrence understood these space-time factors which are prone to calculation. It thus started to calculate the size of the sector which the Arabs should conquer and how much Turks it would be necessary to defend it. Lawrence determined that one would need at least 600.000 soldiers to provide an adequate defense. The Turks had only 100.000 men and the majority were concentrated inside and around Médine. Lawrence also recognized that the Turks, with their mental luggage filled with ideas on the battles of destruction, would approach the rebellion from the point of view of an all-out war. But that would be an error, because to make the war " with a rebellion is slow and chaotic, like eating soup with a couteau".

- The factor of the wear of Wanting.

The “biological one” was the second element within the conceptual framework of Lawrence. Later, it used the term of " bionomiques" to represent the idea of wear and friction within a military system. Lawrence arrived at the conclusion that instead of destroying the Turkish army, the Arabs needed simply to use it. Exhaustion, and not the destruction, would cause that, by the means of direct attacks on the material of the enemy: " the death of a bridge or a Turkish railway, a machine-gun, a gun or explosives was more advantageous to us than the death of a Turk. " So the weakness of the irregular ones - their incapacity to face face to face the regular ones with the combat - could be returned without object since the Arabs were caught some with the material accessible from the enemy. But the key of such a strategy was the availability of almost perfect information. Lawrence, itself officer of information, noted that the knowledge of the enemy was to be " without fault, not leaving any place to the risk. We made more efforts in this field that any other staff which I have vu".

- The factor of the popular support in a “War of the people”.

The last factor of analysis was the psychological one. Lawrence understood that in an insurrection, the true battle was played in the spirit of the opponents. To be victorious, the Arabs were " to arrange their spirits in battle order, as prudently and formally as other officers aligned their corp". That also meant that the moral support within the population was to be mobilized for the rebellion.

External bond

• Red Star - Texts of Giáp (of which armed with the people)

• (in) http://edition.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episodes/11/interviews/giap/

Random links:

Blangy-under-pitch | Yogi Rock'n'roll | Frederic Pintail-Will | Square miles | Synéchie