Word: viets
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1950-1959
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...more than guerrillas behind him, was a long way out on a limb. But the French became more and more stubborn, and Ho saw his conquest fading. Ho made the mistake of relying for support upon French Communists, which further stiffened the French negotiators. Meanwhile, in Indo-China, French-Viet Minh relations were disintegrating: lives were taken on both sides...
...been attacked, bombarded the city. Ho prepared with guile for the onset of war. On Dec. 15 he congratulated the new French Premier Leon Blum (an old Socialist friend), and Ho's Interior Minister expressed a "sincere desire for fraternal cooperation." On Dec. 19 Ho ordered the Viet Minh army to attack the unsuspecting French army and civilian population in Hanoi. "For every ten men that you kill," Ho, man of war, warned the French, "we will kill one of yours. It is you who will have to give...
...seven years the fighting was a standoff: the French held the cities, but could not sweep the jungles; the Viet Minh presided over the jungles, but could not storm the towns. The political war was also a standoff: the French brought back Bao Dai, an ex-puppet of the Japanese, to reinspire Vietnamese nationalism on their behalf-but they got nowhere; the Viet Minh lost friends by their brutal emphasis upon forced labor, and by further purges of their nationalist element. But for the Indo-Chinese people, the war was an unrelenting horror: at war's end a staggering...
...many lands, for all their objection to Communism, could not help taking pride in the exploits of an Asian army against their old masters from Europe. Indo-China's wait-and-seeists no longer needed to wait and see. "We are winning! Why stay with the losers?" cried Viet Minh women, urging Vietnamese soldiers to desert. "Do you want your sons to curse your names...
Besides the heady stimulant of victory, the Viet Minh could also claim...