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Vo Nguyen GiapVietnamese military leader and politician
Date of Birth: 25.08.1911
Country:  Vietnam |
Content:
- Vo Nguyen Giap: Vietnamese General and Politician
- Political Activism and Imprisonment
- Meeting Ho Chi Minh and Military Leadership
- Exile and Return
- Post-War Politics and Retirement
Vo Nguyen Giap: Vietnamese General and Politician
Early Life and EducationVo Nguyen Giap was born on August 11, 1911, in Quang Binh Province, Central Vietnam. In 1924, he enrolled in the prestigious National Academy in Hue. He was expelled two years later for organizing a student organization and spent three months in prison for leading demonstrations on behalf of the New Vietnam Revolutionary Party.
Political Activism and Imprisonment
In 1930, Giap was imprisoned for two years for his membership in the Communist Party of Indochina (CPI). Upon his release, he attended the Albert Sarraut Lyceum in Hanoi, graduating with a degree in law and political economy. He became a history professor at Thanh Long Lyceum.
During the 1930s, Giap published numerous articles on Vietnam's socio-economic situation and international affairs in newspapers such as The Voice of the People, News and Information, Labor, The People, and The We. He co-authored the book The Peasant Question with another communist, Truong Chinh.
In 1939, the CPI was banned, and Giap fled to China. His wife and cousin were arrested by the French authorities and died in prison.
Meeting Ho Chi Minh and Military Leadership
In 1940, Giap met Ho Chi Minh and soon became one of his closest associates. In 1944, he organized the Armed Propaganda Brigade, the forerunner of the Vietnamese Liberation Army, which played a key role in seizing state power during the August Revolution of 1945. That same year, he became one of four members of the party's powerful Standing Secretariat of the Central Committee, a precursor to the Politburo.
During the First Indochina War, Giap served as the commander-in-chief of the Vietnamese armed forces and famously won the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954.
Exile and Return
During the deterioration of Sino-Soviet relations in the early 1960s, Giap was deemed a revisionist and was exiled to Do Son (near Haiphong), while many of his military commanders and communist comrades were arrested and jailed.
Giap was recalled when the Vietnam War escalated. He was appointed commander-in-chief of North Vietnam's armed forces. In late 1976, after the war ended, he was formally still the defense minister but stripped of all authority, which passed to General Van Tien Dung.
Post-War Politics and Retirement
In 1978, Giap opposed the invasion of Cambodia. In March 1982, he was removed from the Politburo but retained his position as Vice Chairman of the Council of Ministers for Scientific and Technological Development. In July 1991, Giap was removed from the party's Central Committee and all other positions.
