Ch.33 Communism in Asia
Ho Chi Minh and Viet Minh
- French Indochina War
- The new rebel army, called the ˝Viet Minh,˝ was commanded by Ho Chi Minh. Over ten thousand Vietnamese joined the Viet Minh. They spent the years of World War II fighting a guerrilla war against the Japanese, appearing from the brush of the jungles, attacking, and then melting back into the wilds.
- Finally, in 1954, the French agreed to give up their claim to Vietnam.
- But they would only surrender under certain conditions. They insisted that Ho Chi Minh divide the country in half. The northern part would still be the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, under Ho Chi Minh as president. The south wouldn‘t belong to France, but it wouldn‘t belong to the Democratic Republic either. Instead, it would be a separate country, with its own elections and a different president.
- Ho Chi Minh agreed to these terms. Vietnam was finally free of both France and Japan.
- But the decision to divide the country in two would turn out to be a disaster. Struggles between the north and south of Vietnam would continue for another twenty-one years, and would lead to yet another foreign country-the United States-fighting a war in Vietnam.
The Korean War
- The United States and the Soviet Union decided to divide up the responsibility for slowly giving Korea back its independence. For convenience, they agreed to split the country in two. They drew an imaginary line right at the “38th Parallel” the line of latitude that ran roughly across the middle of the country).
- In June of 1950, ninety thousand North Korean soldiers, given all the most recent and powerful weapons by the Soviets, marched past the 38th Parallel and into South Korea.
- By 1953, more than three million people had died in this pointless fight. Half of them were civilians who had not even been armed. Finally, after the death of Joseph Stalin, everyone involved agreed to a truce so that the Korean War would end. Korea would remain divided into two. The north would stay the People‘s Republic of Korea, and would be a communist nation. The south would still be the Republic of Korea, with an elected president. And the border between the two countries would be exactly where it had been placed the two countries would be exactly where it had been placed at the end of World War Il, almost ten years before-right along the 38th Parallel.
