Word: giap
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1950-1959
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...enemy side, the pieces added up roughly to this: the Communist forces of goat-bearded Ho Chi Minh. far too large and well organized to be called guerrillas, total about 300,000 men. They are arranged in six regular divisions, under able, boyish-looking General Vo Nguyen Giap. The U.S.S.R. is supplying them with arms, moved by Red China via the railway from Nanning, which runs south into the huge Viet Minh concentration in northern Viet Nam, crucial sector of the war. The Reds are well supplied with artillery, mortars and recoilless cannon, as well as machine guns and automatic...
...fine opportunity, and the French made the most of it. Red General Vo Nguyen Giap had become overconfident, counting on French reluctance to leave the safety of their forts. He reckoned without France's offensive-minded new commander in Indo-China, General Henri Eugene Navarre. The attack at Langson cost the Reds two months' supplies, and gave notice that from now on Giap would have to think of his supply line before rampaging around the countryside...
Communist General Vo Nguyen Giap's Chinese-trained and equipped army of some 40,000, supported by another army of ragged coolie carriers, was swarming through the valleys and mountain passes as fast as their bare feet could carry them. They came in three columns, from the east, northeast, and north. There was plenty of room: Laos, one of the two kingdoms in the Associated States of French Indo-China, is as big as Oregon. In a fortnight they advanced almost 150 miles, leaving behind them French mountain-top outposts abandoned, surrounded, or in smoldering ruins, their tiny garrisons...
Luang Prabang would be defended, the French promised: "It is a matter of prestige." From Hanoi, the French began airlifting soldiers and equipment to Luang Prabang. Inside the Hanoi delta, Giap launched a surprise attack on Kien Airfield, clearly intending to delay air reinforcements to Laos. The Red guerrillas swarmed over the airfield, the finest in Indo-China and specially designed for jet aircraft, and dispersed the guard. They killed 20 Frenchmen, captured and executed Provincial Chief Trinh Nhu Tiep, burned the barracks, set off 3,000 tons of ammunition. A French counterattack killed 212 Viet Minh, captured...
...battle shaped up, King Sisavang Vong appealed to the U.N. to recognize the invasion of Laos as an act of external aggression, rather than as another phase of the Indo-China war, as the French prefer to regard it. His aim: to head off establishment by Giap of a Communist "Free Laotian Government" headed by Prince Souphranouvong, a distant relative. Meanwhile, the old King complained of rheumatism, and thought he might pay a visit to Paris. It would be a long time before the water was high enough for the fish to eat the ants...