Ho Chi Minh (1890–1969)

Leader of the Vietnamese Communist movement and president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) from 1945 to 1969. Ho Chi Minh has been recognized historically for inflicting a brand of relentless guerilla warfare on both the French and the U.S. militaries, which were successively forced out of the country in 1954 and 1973, respectively. A dedicated communist, Ho combined communist ideology with anticolonialist nationalism as the best method for achieving a unified, independent Vietnam. His single-minded pursuit of that goal, despite horrific losses of North Vietnamese lives through many years of war, earned him an international reputation as a formidable enemy.

Beginnings

Ho Chi Minh was born as Nguyen Sinh Cung on May 19, 1890, in the central Vietnamese region of Annam. At the time of his birth, his father was employed as a public servant at the court of the French-controlled Vietnamese emperor, but he later resigned from that position. In 1911, the young Nguyen—soon to assume the name Ho Chi Minh, meaning “one who enlightens”—left [Page 326]Vietnam for France, where he worked different odd jobs and became active in the socialist movement.

In 1920, Ho became one of the founding members of the French Communist Party. Three years later, he traveled to Moscow, where he studied Marxism and received revolutionary training. He was then sent to the Far East to further the communist cause and recruit future militants. In June 1931, Ho Chi Minh was jailed by the British police in Hong Kong for revolutionary activities. Released in 1933, he went back to Moscow, where he remained for the next few years while he recovered from tuberculosis. In 1938, Ho returned to China, where he served as a guerilla training instructor for the Chinese Communist Army. Two years later, he was ready for his Vietnamese homecoming.

The Leader

In 1941, imperial Japan occupied Vietnam, only to find a burgeoning Communist national movement (the Vietminh) controlled by Ho Chi Minh. When the Japanese surrendered to the Allies at the end of World War II, the Vietminh took over and proclaimed the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, with Ho as its president.

The French, Vietnam's former colonial masters, however, did not wish to see an independent Communist state, and war broke out in the region once again. Eight years later, in 1954, Ho's guerilla troops won a decisive victory over the French, who decided to pull out of Vietnam. Under the watchful eye of the great powers, the country was subsequently divided in two parts, with the Communists receiving control only over the northern half.

After a few years of uneasy tranquility, the American-backed South Vietnam and Ho's Democratic Republic of Vietnam began the conflict now known as the Vietnam War, which ultimately claimed almost 4 million lives. When U.S. troops came to the aid of their ally South Vietnam, they entered a military nightmare that ended in America's defeat and withdrawal in 1973 and the subsequent unification of Vietnam under the Communist banner.

Ho Chi Minh did not live to see his goal of a united Vietnam fulfilled, however; he died of a heart attack on September 3, 1969. In 1975, the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City in honor of the brilliant political and guerilla leader.

...