Outline of Vietnam
Vietnam was under Chinese control for a thousand years before becoming a nation-state in the 10th century. Successive dynasties flourished along with geographic and political expansion deeper into Southeast Asia, until it was colonized by the French in the mid-19th century. Efforts to resist the French eventually led to their expulsion from the country in the mid-20th century, leaving a nation divided politically into two countries. Bitter fighting between the two sides continued during the Vietnam War, ending with a communist victory in 1975.
Western imperialism in Asia
France remained determined to retain its control of Indochina. However, in Hanoi, in 1945, a broad front of nationalists and communists led by Ho Chi Minh declared an independent Republic of Vietnam, commonly referred to as the Viet Minh regime by Western outsiders. France, seeking to regain control of Vietnam, countered with a vague offer of self-government under French rule. France's offers were unacceptable to Vietnamese nationalists; and in December 1946 the Việt Minh launched a rebellion against the French authority governing the colonies of French Indochina. The first few years of the war involved a low-level rural insurgency against French authority. However, after the Chinese communists reached the Northern border of Vietnam in 1949, the conflict turned into a conventional war between two armies equipped with modern weapons supplied by the United States and the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, the France granted the State of Vietnam based in Saigon independence in 1949 while Laos and Cambodia received independence in 1953. The US recognized the regime in Saigon, and provided the French military effort with military aid.