Map of combat operations in Vietnam. Reasons for the US attack on Vietnam (12 photos)

The Vietnam War is a pretty serious milestone in the Cold War. In the Unified State Exam tests in history, some tasks may test knowledge of World History, and if you don’t know anything about this war, you are unlikely to solve the test correctly at random. Therefore, in this article we will briefly examine this topic, as far as possible within the framework of the text.

Photos of war

Origins

The causes of the Vietnam War of 1964 - 1975 (also called the Second Indochina War) are very diverse. To sort them out, we need to delve a little deeper into the history of this exotic eastern country. From the second half of the 19th century until 1940, Vietnam was a colony of France. From the beginning, the country was occupied by Japan. During this war, all French garrisons were destroyed.

Since 1946, France wanted to regain Vietnam, and for this purpose launched the first Indochina War (1946 - 1954). The French could not cope with the partisan movement alone, and the Americans came to their aid. In this war, independent power in North Vietnam, led by Ho Chi Minh, strengthened. By 1953, the Americans took on 80% of all military expenses, and the French quietly merged. Things got to the point that Vice President R. Nixon expressed the idea of ​​dropping point nuclear charges on the country.

But everything somehow resolved itself: in 1954, the existence of North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) was formally recognized. The northern part of the country began to develop along the path of socialism and communism, and therefore began to enjoy the support of the Soviet Union.

Ho Chi Minh

And here we must understand that the division of Vietnam was only the first act. The second was the anti-communist hysteria in the United States, which accompanied them throughout. It was against the backdrop of such hysteria that J.F. Kennedy, who by the way was an ardent fighter against communism, came to power there. Nevertheless, he did not want to start a war in Vietnam, but simply to somehow achieve his goals politically, with the help of diplomacy. Here it must be said that since there were communists in the north, the south was supported by the United States.

Ngo Dinh Diem

South Vietnam was ruled by Ngo Dinh Diem, who actually introduced a dictatorship there: people were killed and hanged for nothing, and the Americans turned a blind eye to this: it was impossible to lose their only ally in the region. However, Ngo soon became tired of the Yankees and they staged a coup d'etat. Ngo was killed. By the way, JF Kennedy was assassinated here in 1963.

All barriers to war were erased. New President Lyndon Johnson signed a decree sending two helicopter groups to Vietnam. North Vietnam created an underground underground in the South called the Viet Cong. In fact, military advisers and helicopters were sent to fight him. But on August 2, 1964, two American aircraft carriers were attacked by North Vietnam. In response to this, Johnson signed an order to start the war.

J.F. Kennedy

In fact, most likely there was no attack in the Gulf of Tonkin. Senior NSA officers who received this message immediately realized it was a mistake. But they didn’t fix anything. Because the war in Vietnam was not started by the US military, but by the President, Congress, and big business that produced weapons.

Lyndon Johnson

Pentagon specialists understood perfectly well that this war was doomed to failure. Many experts spoke out openly. But they were obliged to obey the political elite.

Thus, the causes of the Vietnam War are rooted in the communist “infection” that the United States wanted to resist. The loss of Vietnam immediately led to the loss of Taiwan, Cambodia, and the Philippines by the Americans, and the “infection” could directly threaten Australia. This war was also spurred on by the fact that China had firmly taken the path of communism since the early 50s.

Richard Nixon

Events

In Vietnam, the United States tested a lot of weapons. More bombs were dropped during this entire war than during the entire Second World War! They also sprayed at least 400 kilograms of dioxin. And this was the most toxic substance created by man at that time. 80 grams of dioxin can kill an entire city if you add it to water.

Helicopters

The entire conflict can be divided into the following stages:

• The first stage was 1965 - 1967. It is characterized by the Allied offensive.
• The second stage in 1968 is called the Tet Offensive.
• The third stage 1968 - 1973. At this time, R. Nixon came to power in the United States under the slogans of ending the war. America was swept by anti-war protests. Nevertheless, the United States dropped more bombs in 1970 than in all previous years.
• The fourth stage 1973 - 1975 is the final stage of the conflict. Since the United States could no longer provide support to South Vietnam, there was no one left to stop the advance of the enemy troops. Therefore, on April 30, 1975, the conflict ended with the complete victory of Ho Chi Minh, all of Vietnam became communist!

Results

The consequences of this conflict are very varied. On a macro level, North Vietnam's victory meant the loss of Laos and Cambodia for the United States, as well as a significant reduction in American influence in Southeast Asia. The war had a serious impact on the values ​​of American society, it provoked anti-war sentiment in society.

Photos of war

At the same time, during the war, the Americans strengthened their armed forces, their military infrastructure and military technologies noticeably developed. However, many military personnel who survived suffered from the so-called “Vietnam syndrome”. The conflict also had a major impact on American cinema. For example, you can call the film “Rambo. First blood."

During the war, many war crimes were committed on both sides. However, of course, there was no investigation into the fact. The United States lost in this conflict about 60 thousand dead, more than 300 thousand wounded, South Vietnam lost at least 250 thousand people killed, North Vietnam more than 1 million people killed, the USSR, according to official data, lost about 16 people killed.

This topic is vast, and I think it is clear that we could not cover all its facets. However, what has been said is quite enough for you to get an idea of ​​it and not confuse anything in the exam. You can master all topics of the History course in our training courses.

The war, which went on with a short break in Indochina, primarily in Vietnam, in 1946-1975, became not only the longest, but also the most amazing military conflict of the second half of the 20th century. An economically weak, backward semi-colonial country managed to defeat first France, and then an entire coalition led by the most economically developed state in the world - the USA.

War for independence

French colonial rule in Indochina collapsed during World War II when Japan took over the region. After Japan's defeat in the war, France attempted to reclaim its former colony. But it turned out that it is not so simple. The Vietnamese fought for independence against the Japanese and now, for the most part, did not want to return to submission to the former colonialists.

After the surrender of Japan, the capital of Vietnam, Hanoi, was occupied by partisans of the Vietnam Independence League (Viet Minh), created by the communists. On September 2, 1945, Viet Minh and Communist Party leader Ho Chi Minh proclaimed the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV). In other countries of Indochina - Laos and Cambodia - the independence movement also intensified.

On September 23, French troops landed in Saigon, southern Vietnam. By the beginning of 1946, France sent troops to all major Vietnamese cities. The French government proposed to the leaders of national movements to transform the colonial empire into the French Union, where the colonies would enjoy autonomy but not have sovereignty. Ho Chi Minh did not agree with this plan, and negotiations dragged on.

In November 1946, armed clashes began between the colonialists and the forces of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Viet Minh troops were driven out of the cities. But the French could not defeat the Viet Minh. But they concentrated more than 100 thousand soldiers against 50-60 thousand partisans, not counting the militia of both sides (part of the local population served on the French side). Attempts by the French to go deeper into the jungle, which occupied 80% of the country's territory, ended in defeat. The Vietnamese knew the area well and could better tolerate the humid, stuffy and hot climate of their country. The French landed troops among the forests, hoping to capture the rebel leaders, but to no avail.

In 1949, the colonialists were forced to come to terms with the independence of Vietnam and formally transferred power to a representative of the local dynasty and their Catholic supporters. But this did not help deal with the communists.

The landing of American soldiers in South Vietnam. June 1965

In 1950, with Chinese support, Vietnamese troops under the command of Vo Nguyen Giap launched a counteroffensive. One after another they destroyed the French garrisons, despite the fact that the French were commanded by the famous general Jean de Lattre de Tassigny. He had to concentrate his forces around Hanoi and fight off attacks from all sides. Now under the command of Giap there were more than 100 thousand soldiers. Allied with the communists and nationalists of Laos, the Vietnamese communists expanded the theater of operations into Laos. To distract the Vietnamese from the onslaught on Hanoi and cut off their connections with Laos, the French created a Dien Bien Phu fortress in the rear, near the border with Laos, which was supposed to shackle the Viet Minh communications. But Giap besieged and took Dien Bien Phu.

After the defeat at Dien Bien Phu, the French had no choice but to leave Indochina. In July 1954, the Geneva Agreements were concluded, under which Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia gained independence. General elections were about to take place in Vietnam, but for now it was divided between the DRV and the imperial government along the 17th parallel. The conflict between the communists and their opponents in Vietnam continued.

US intervention

After the liberation of Vietnam from French colonial rule, the country was divided into the north, where the Democratic Republic of Vietnam existed, and the south, where the Republic of Vietnam was proclaimed in 1955. The United States began to provide increasing assistance to the south to stop the “communist expansion.” But the countries of Indochina were poor, and to millions of peasants it seemed that the communists offered a way out of poverty.

The DRV communists arranged for weapons and volunteers to be sent south along a route laid in the jungle through Taos and Cambodia. This road was called the “Ho Chi Minh Trail.” The monarchies of Laos and Cambodia were unable to resist the actions of the communists. The provinces of these countries adjacent to Vietnam, through which the “trail” passed, were captured by the DRV’s allies - the Patriotic Front of Laos led by Prince Souphanuvong and the Khmer Rouge (Cambodian) army led by Salot Sar (Pol Pot).

In 1959, communists began an uprising in southern Vietnam. The peasants of the south for the most part supported the partisans or were afraid of them. Formally, the uprising was led by the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam, but in reality, command in the south was exercised from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Washington decided that a communist victory in Indochina could lead to the West losing control over Southeast Asia. Under these conditions, American strategists decided on direct military intervention.

As a pretext for a large-scale invasion, the United States used the Vietnamese shelling of American ships dangerously approaching the Vietnamese coast in the Gulf of Tonkin. In response, the American Congress adopted the Tonkin Resolution in August 1964, authorizing President Lyndon Johnson to use any military means in Vietnam. In 1965, massive bombing of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam began, resulting in the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians. So that no one could escape, the Americans watered the Vietnamese soil with burning napalm, which burned out all living things, since it actually could not be extinguished. Johnson, he said, sought to “bomb Vietnam into the Stone Age.” Over half a million American soldiers landed in South Vietnam. Australia, South Korea and other US allies sent small contingents. This war became one of the main armed conflicts of the Cold War - the confrontation between the capitalist West and the state-socialist East.

When planning the defeat of the communists, American strategists relied on helicopters. With their help, soldiers were supposed to quickly appear in those areas of the jungle where communist activity was noted. But the helicopters were easily shot down by grenade launchers, which the Vietnamese communists received from the USSR and China. The Americans and their South Vietnamese allies struck blow after blow against the guerrillas and yet could not conquer the jungle. Supporters of Ho Chi Minh walked along the trail named after him and could penetrate through Laos and Cambodia into any region of South Vietnam, stretching from north to south. The communists killed not only soldiers, but also thousands of civilians who collaborated with the South Vietnamese regime. Soon the Americans had to move to the defense of their bases, limiting themselves to combing and bombing the jungle. American aircraft watered the jungle with chemicals, which dried out the vegetation covering the partisans, causing people and animals to get sick and die. However, this environmental war did not help. In January 1968, Vietnamese communist troops under the command of Giap launched an offensive during the Tet holiday.

Tet Offensive

Vietnamese celebrate New Year at the end of January - beginning of February (Tet holiday). By this date, communist leaders timed a general uprising against the United States and its allies.

Americans in North Vietnam. Winter 1965/66

On January 30, 1968, Giap expected to launch a simultaneous strike on dozens of points in South Vietnam - from American bases to large cities. According to Ho Chi Minh, the population should have joined the partisan columns. But by January 30, not all of Giap’s forces managed to reach the planned attack lines, and he postponed the attack by a day.

However, this news did not reach all the columns, so on January 30 the Americans were attacked in several places. The surprise factor was lost, the Americans and Saigon soldiers prepared for defense. But they did not expect the scale of Giap's offensive. The partisans managed to quietly concentrate in an area of ​​more than 50 points, so that the Americans did not know about it. The local population did not report anything to the Saigon authorities. Particularly dangerous for the Americans were attacks on Saigon and Hue, which was taken by partisans. The fighting in Saigon continued for more than a month. Already in the first days of the fighting, it became clear that the population was not ready for an uprising. The Vietnamese did not like the American occupation, but most residents were not going to shed blood for the communists. Especially on a holiday, when people intended to relax and have fun. After Giap realized that there would be no uprising, he withdrew most of his columns. However, the Tet Offensive showed that the Americans and their allies were not in control of South Vietnam and that the Communists were at home there. This became a moral turning point in the war.

The United States became convinced that it could not defeat communism through direct military intervention.

After American casualties in Indochina reached tens of thousands, the popularity of this war in the United States began to plummet. In America, anti-war sentiments intensified, anti-war rallies took place, often escalating into massacres between students and the police.

In March 1968, a significant event occurred in the Vietnam War: Lieutenant William Kelly's company killed almost all the inhabitants of the Vietnamese village of Song My, including women and children. This massacre caused a new outburst of outrage in the United States. More and more Americans believed that their army was no better than the Nazis.

America's Lost World

Due to the sharp deterioration of Soviet-Chinese relations in the late 60s. The Democratic Republic of Vietnam began to experience difficulties in supplies from the “socialist camp”. US President Richard Nixon ordered the DRV ports to be mined, even at the risk that these mines could blow up Soviet ships. The conflict in Vietnam would turn into a global one. Then the Vietnamese sailors began to clear the bay of the port of Hai Phong, “driving” along it on boats. The mines exploded - if you were lucky, then behind the boat. But not everyone was lucky. However, the comrades of the victims went to these dangerous “races” again and again. As a result, the bay fairway was cleared of mines.

In 1970-1971 The Americans repeatedly invaded Laos and Cambodia, destroying bases along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. At the same time, a policy of “Vietnamization of the war” was pursued - under the leadership of American instructors, a more combat-ready army was created in Saigon (the so-called regime of South Vietnam after the name of its capital). Saigon soldiers bore the brunt of the war. But this army could only fight with the constant help of the United States.

A war photographer captured the tragedy of American soldiers. While retreating into the jungle, death awaits on all sides.

In 1972, communist troops launched a new offensive against South Vietnam from Laos and Cambodia. In response, the United States launched massive bombings of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Ho Chi Minh Trail. However, they again did not achieve a turning point in the situation in their favor. It became clear that the war had reached a dead end.

In January 1973, the Paris Agreement was concluded between the United States, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and South Vietnam, according to which America and North Vietnam withdrew their troops from South Vietnam. The DRV promised not to send weapons or volunteers to South Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. These countries should have held free elections. But after the resignation of President Nixon in 1974, the United States sharply reduced aid to the allied regimes in Indochina. In the spring of 1975, local communists, who, contrary to agreements, continued to receive large amounts of help from the USSR, China and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, went on the offensive in Laos, Cambodia and South Vietnam. In March, the South Vietnamese army was defeated, and on April 30, 1975, the communists entered Saigon, which was soon renamed Ho Chi Minh City (the Vietnamese communist leader died in 1969). In April, the communists won in Cambodia and Laos. In 1976, a unified Socialist Republic of Vietnam was proclaimed.

American soldiers in Vietnam left behind many victims.

Former US President Nixon said that America won the Vietnam War but “lost the world.” Indeed, the US lost the fight after the Paris Accords. But they didn’t win the war either. It was won by the Vietnamese people, who strived for unification and social justice. The US defeat in Vietnam was America's biggest failure during the Cold War.

Officially, the Vietnam War began in August 1964 and continued until 1975 (although direct American intervention ceased two years before the end of hostilities). This clash is the best illustration of the instability of relations between the USSR and the United States during the Cold War. Let us analyze the prerequisites, highlight the main events and results of the military conflict that lasted eleven years.

Prerequisites for the conflict

The actual root cause of the conflict is the logical desire of the United States to surround the Soviet Union with those states that will be controlled by it; if not formally, then in fact. At the time the clash began, South Korea and Pakistan were already “conquered” in this regard; then the leaders of the United States made an attempt to add North Vietnam to them.

The situation was conducive to active action: at that time, Vietnam was divided into North and South, and a civil war was raging in the country. The South side requested assistance from the United States. At the same time, the northern side, which was ruled by the Communist Party led by Ho Chi Minh, received support from the USSR. It is worth noting that the Soviet Union did not openly - officially - enter the war. The Soviet document specialists who arrived in the country in 1965 were civilians; however, more on this later.

Course of events: the beginning of hostilities

On August 2, 1964, an attack was carried out on a US destroyer that was patrolling the Gulf of Tonkin: North Vietnamese torpedo boats entered the battle; A similar situation repeated itself on August 4, resulting in Lyndon Johnson, then President of the United States, ordering an air strike against naval installations. Whether the boat attacks were real or imaginary is a separate discussion topic that we will leave to professional historians. One way or another, on August 5, an air attack and shelling of the territory of northern Vietnam by ships of the 7th Fleet began.

On August 6-7, the “Tonkin Resolution” was adopted, which made military action sanctioned. The United States of America, which had openly entered the conflict, planned to isolate the North Vietnamese army from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, creating the conditions for its destruction. On February 7, 1965, Operation Burning Spear was carried out, which was the first global action to destroy important objects of North Vietnam. The attack continued on March 2 - already as part of Operation Rolling Thunder.

Events developed rapidly: soon (in March) about three thousand American Marines appeared in Da Nang. After three years, the number of United States soldiers fighting in Vietnam had risen to 540,000; thousands of units of military equipment (for example, about 40% of the country’s military tactical aircraft were sent there). In the 166th, a conference of states belonging to SEATO (US allies) was held, as a result of which about 50 thousand Korean soldiers, about 14 thousand Australian soldiers, about 8 thousand from Australia and more than two thousand from the Philippines were brought in.

The Soviet Union also did not sit idly by: in addition to those sent as civilian military specialists, the DRV (Northern Vietnam) received about 340 million rubles. Weapons, ammunition and other means necessary for the war were supplied.

Developments

In 1965-1966, a large-scale military operation took place on the part of South Vietnam: more than half a million soldiers tried to capture the cities of Pleiku and Kontum using chemical and biological weapons. However, the attack attempt was unsuccessful: the offensive was disrupted. In the period from 1966 to 1967, a second attempt at a large-scale offensive was made, but the active actions of the SE JSC (attacks from the flanks and rear, night attacks, underground tunnels, the participation of partisan detachments) stopped this attack as well.

It is worth noting that at that time more than a million people were fighting on the US-Saigon side. In 1968, the National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam switched from defense to offensive, as a result of which about 150 thousand enemy soldiers and more than 7 thousand pieces of military equipment (cars, helicopters, planes, ships) were destroyed.

There were active air attacks by the United States throughout the conflict; According to available statistics, more than seven million bombs were dropped during the war. However, such a policy did not lead to success, since the government of the Far Eastern Republic carried out mass evacuations: soldiers and people hid in the jungle and mountains. Also, thanks to the support of the Soviet Union, the northern side began to use supersonic fighters, modern missile systems and radio equipment, creating a serious air defense system; as a result, more than four thousand United States aircraft were destroyed.

Final stage

In 1969, the RSV (Republic of South Vietnam) was created, and in 1969, due to the failure of the bulk of operations, US leaders gradually began to lose ground. By the end of 1970, more than two hundred thousand American soldiers had been withdrawn from Vietnam. In 1973, the United States government decided to sign an agreement to cease hostilities, after which it finally withdrew troops from the country. Of course, we are talking only about the formal side: thousands of military specialists remained in South Vietnam under the guise of civilians. According to available statistics, during the war the United States lost about sixty thousand people killed, more than three hundred thousand wounded, as well as a colossal amount of military equipment (for example, more than 9 thousand airplanes and helicopters).

Hostilities continued for several more years. In 1973-1974, South Vietnam again went on the offensive: bombing and other military operations were carried out. The result was reached only in 1975, when the Republic of South Vietnam carried out Operation Ho Chi Minh, during which the Saigon army was completely defeated. As a result, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and South Vietnam were united into one state - the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

The Vietnam War (sometimes also called the Second Indochina War) actually began in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia on November 1, 1955 and continued until the fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975. It was fought between North and South Vietnam. The North Vietnamese army was supported by the Soviet Union, China and other communist allies, and the South Vietnamese army was supported by the United States of America, the Philippines and some other anti-communist states. Therefore, the Vietnam War is considered one of the “proxy” battles Cold War.

The Complete History of the Vietnam War, 1964-1973. Part 1

National Liberation Front of South Vietnam ( NLF, often called the Viet Cong in the USA), a pro-communist organization in the south of the country, receiving help from the north, waged a guerrilla war against anti-communist forces, and the People's Army of North Vietnam carried out broader actions, often with large forces. As the war progressed, the role of the NLF declined, and the participation of the North Vietnamese army grew. South Vietnamese and American forces, relying on air superiority and overwhelming firepower, mounted search-and-destroy missions involving ground forces, artillery, and airstrikes. The United States carried out a large-scale bombing campaign against North Vietnam.

The communists fought for the subjugation of the entire country to their power, although propaganda presented the conflict as a war “against the colonialists,” a continuation of the Indochina War against France. The US government saw its intervention as a way to prevent a communist takeover of South Vietnam, part of a "policy of containment" to stop the spread of communism.

The Complete History of the Vietnam War, 1964-1973. Part 2

Already in 1950, American military advisers arrived in what was then French Indochina. US involvement increased in the early 1960s. The number of American soldiers sent to Vietnam tripled in 1961 and tripled again in 1962. US involvement increased even more after " Tonkin incident" (1964), when an American destroyer engaged North Vietnamese torpedo boats. He was followed by " Tonkin resolution" of the US Congress, which gave the president Johnson the right to use military force if necessary in Southeast Asia.

In 1965, regular US military units were deployed in Vietnam. The war soon spread beyond the borders of this country: neighboring areas of Laos and Cambodia were subjected to American bombing. US involvement in the war peaked in 1968. That same year, the Communists launched their famous Tet Offensive. With its help, it was not possible to overthrow the government of South Vietnam, but this operation became a turning point in the war: it convinced broad US public circles that the American government's assurances of an imminent victory were not true, despite many years of and expensive assistance to South Vietnam.

The Complete History of the Vietnam War, 1964-1973. Part 3

The United States began a gradual withdrawal of its ground forces, declaring a policy of “Vietnamization” of the conflict, designed to end American involvement and place the task of fighting the communists on the South Vietnamese themselves. Despite Paris Peace Agreement, signed by all belligerents in January 1973, fighting continued. In the USA and throughout the Western world, a powerful movement against the Vietnam War developed, which became part of the then “counterculture”. The war greatly changed the balance of power between the Eastern and Western blocs, as well as the relationship of the “civilized” world with the “Third”.

Direct US military intervention ended on August 15, 1973. Capture of Saigon by the North Vietnamese army in April 1975 put the final end to the war. North and South Vietnam were united under communist rule.

The war was accompanied by enormous casualties. Estimates of the number of Vietnamese soldiers and civilians killed range from 800 thousand to 3.1 million. 200-300 thousand Cambodians, 20-200 thousand Laotians and 58,220 American troops also died during the conflict. Another 1,626 are still missing.

I took these photographs 45 years ago. At the end of the Vietnam War. Not its complete completion, when Vietnam was united, but the Vietnam War, which was waged by America, about which so much has been written and filmed that there seems to be nothing to add.

On the morning of January 27, 1973, downtown Hanoi along the shores of the Lake of the Returned Sword was unusually crowded. During the war, few people lived in cities. The Vietnamese explained this with the exhaustive word so tan - “evacuation” or, more precisely, “dispersal.” But the winter chill gave way to warmth, and it was possible to relax in the slightly humid, caressing air, which happens in very early spring before the eastern cherry trees bloom.

It was the day of victory. The mood of the people on the shore of the lake, disfigured by bomb shelters, was upbeat, but not exactly jubilant, although newspapers and street loudspeakers shouted about the historic victory. Everyone was waiting for news of the signing in Paris of an agreement to restore peace in Vietnam. The time difference with France is six hours, and the historical moment came in the evening.

In the Tass mansion on cozy Khao Ba Kuat, teletypes were already hammering out dispatches from Paris about the arrival of delegations on Avenue Kleber, when my colleagues and I gathered at a table near the open veranda to celebrate the event in Russian. Although we haven’t had time to realize it yet.

Just a month ago, at the same table, over a can of sprat, a bottle of Stolichnaya, and pickles from the embassy store, people were gathering for dinner in order to catch it before the night bombing. More often than not they didn’t have time and were startled by a nearby explosion...

The gift from the American Santa Claus was the finale of the war: in less than 12 days, one hundred thousand tons of bombs fell on the cities of North Vietnam - five non-nuclear Hiroshimas.

New Year 1972 in Haiphong. The “Christmas” bombings affected not only military targets. Photo by the author

From the branches of a spreading lija in the yard hung shiny beards of aluminum tinsel, which escort planes dropped to interfere with air defense radars.

In November I still “went to war.” Vietnam north of the 20th parallel was not bombed so as not to spoil the atmosphere of the Paris negotiations. Nixon promised the Americans to pull the country out of the Vietnam swamp with dignity, and negotiations seemed to be moving forward.

After 45 years, the world has changed a lot, but the political technologies of war and peace are similar. Hanoi insisted that in the south of Vietnam it was not its regular troops who were fighting against the Americans and the Saigon regime, but rebels and partisans (“we are not there”). The Americans and Saigon refused to talk to the “rebels,” and Hanoi did not recognize the Republic of Vietnam, an “American puppet.” Finally we found the form. The negotiations that began in 1969 were four-party: the United States, North Vietnam, the pro-American Republic of Vietnam and the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam (PRG RSV) created by Hanoi, which was recognized only by the socialist countries. Everyone understood that the war was between communist Vietnam and the United States, and the real bargaining was going on in parallel between Politburo member Le Duc Tho and presidential adviser Henry Kissinger.

In the fall of seventy-two, the Americans did not bomb the main part of North Vietnam with its largest cities. But everything south of the 20th parallel, on the way of the movement of North Vietnamese troops, equipment and ammunition to the south, US aircraft - tactical from Utapao in Thailand (this is the resort of Pattaya!), strategic from Guam and “sailors” from aircraft carriers - ironed to the fullest. They added their artillery to the ships of the 7th Fleet, the silhouettes of which appeared on the horizon in good weather. The narrow strip of coastal plain looked like the lunar surface.

Now it takes no more than two hours to drive from Hanoi to the Hamrong Bridge, the beginning of that former “fourth zone,” but back then it was better not to get on coastal highway number one, but to weave south through the mountains and jungle along the dirt roads of the “Ho Chi Minh Trail.” Past burnt-out fuel trucks and tanks, joking around with girls from repair crews at broken crossings.

The word “détente” was heard in the world, which the Vietnamese did not like (what kind of “détente” is there if you have to fight to unify the country?). They were painfully jealous of the America of both “older brothers” who were at war with each other.

Nixon became the first US president to travel to Beijing and Moscow and talk with Mao and Brezhnev. In mid-December 1972, the American press wrote about the Apollo 17 flight to the moon with three astronauts and the imminent end of the Vietnam War. As Kissinger put it, “the world was within reach.”

On October 8, Kissinger met with Le Duc Tho at a villa near Paris. He surprised the American by proposing a nine-point draft agreement that broke through the vicious circle of mutual demands. Hanoi proposed a ceasefire throughout Vietnam one day after the signing of the agreement, two months later the Americans were to withdraw their troops, and a coalition government was created in South Vietnam. That is, Hanoi recognized the Saigon administration as a partner. It was proposed to hold elections under the auspices of the Council of National Reconciliation and Accord.

The reasons for Hanoi's softening approach are anyone's guess. His Easter offensive in the spring of seventy-two in the south cannot be called successful. The Americans responded with heavy bombing of major cities and infrastructure in North Vietnam. Détente raised doubts about the reliability of its allies - the USSR and China.

Kissinger and Le Duc Tho met three more times in October. Hanoi agreed to drop the demand for the release of all political prisoners in South Vietnam in exchange for the release of American prisoners of war. They also set a date for the end of the war—October 30. Kissinger flew to consult with Nixon.

Then came less and less clear news. The head of the Saigon regime, Nguyen Van Thieu, said that he would not make concessions to the communists, no matter what the Americans agreed with them. Washington demanded that the project be corrected and set as a precondition the withdrawal of regular units of North Vietnam from South Vietnam and the deployment of a five-thousand-strong international contingent there. On October 26, the State Department said that there would be no 30th signing. Hanoi responded by publishing a secret draft agreement. The Americans were outraged and the negotiations stalled. On December 13, Kissinger left Paris, and two days later Le Duc Tho.

Saturday December 16th turned out to be cool. In the morning, Hanoi was shrouded in “fung,” a winter mixture of rain and fog. In “Nyan Zan” there was a long statement by the GRP of the Republic of South Africa. The meaning is clear: if Washington does not revoke its amendments, the Vietnamese will fight to the bitter end. In other words, expect an attack during the dry season that has already begun in the south.

From the center of Hanoi to Gya Lam Airport is only eight kilometers, but the journey could take an hour, two, or more. Two one-way pontoon crossings across the Red River were connected and separated, allowing barges and scows to pass through. And the steel web of Eiffel’s brainchild, the Long Bien Bridge, was torn apart. One span, hunched over, buried itself in the red water.

I went to the airport on an official occasion. The Vietnamese party and state delegation was escorted to Moscow for the 55th anniversary of the revolution. The head of the National Assembly of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, Truong Tinh, was flying through Beijing.

Saturday was also the day to meet and see off the Aeroflot Il-18, which flew from Moscow via India, Burma and Laos once a week. It was a celebration of connection with the outside world. Saturday's get-together at the airport became a social event. In the small airport building you could not only see who had arrived and who was leaving, but also meet the cream of the foreign colony - diplomats, journalists, generals, get some information, just “trade faces.”

We had to stay at the airport longer than usual. Something strange happened. After boarding the plane, the passengers again went down the ramp and lined up under the wing with their bags and purses. Before this, no one paid attention to the noise of an aircraft invisible behind the low clouds. When the Il-18 retreated towards Vientiane, we learned that the cause of the commotion was an American drone.

On Sunday, the seventeenth, a representative of the USSR Ministry of Marine Fleet called me from Haiphong. He saw how in the morning for the first time after a two-month break, American planes mined the port fairway and fired several missiles at the city. The port of Haiphong was blocked by minefields for several months. Soviet supplies, primarily military supplies, reached Vietnam in a delicate manner: first to the ports of Southern China, from there by rail to the Vietnamese border and then on their own or by truck.

On Monday, the eighteenth, the cold “fun” was drizzling again. The leaves on the trees shone from the water sprayed in the air, moisture penetrated into the houses, settling as a slippery film on the stone tiles of the floors, and was absorbed into clothes. In Gya Lam we met the plane of the Chinese airline, on which Le Duc Tho arrived. He looked tired, depressed, and made no statements. On the way from Paris, he met in Moscow with Politburo member Andrei Kirilenko and Secretary of the Central Committee Konstantin Katushev. He was received in Beijing by Premier Zhou Enlai. Moscow and Beijing knew that this chance for peace in Vietnam had been lost.

Washington had already decided to bomb Hanoi and Haiphong in order to force the Vietnamese to peace. Operation Linebecker II approved, Nixon sent a secret telegram to Hanoi demanding acceptance of US conditions. She came on Monday evening.

That evening there was a reception and film screening at the Hanoi International Club to mark the 12th anniversary of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam. Seated in the front row were Foreign Minister Nguyen Duy Trinh and Hanoi Mayor Tran Duy Hung. They already knew that B-52s from Guam were flying to Hanoi. Later, the mayor will tell me that during the ceremonial part he received a call from the air defense headquarters.

They showed a newsreel in which the cannonade roared. When the session was interrupted, the roar did not stop, because it also came from the street. I went out onto the square - the glow covered the northern half of the horizon.

The first raid lasted about forty minutes, and the siren at the National Assembly monotonously howled the all-clear. But minutes later, heart-rendingly intermittently, she warned of a new alarm. I didn’t wait until lights out, when the street lights came on, and went home in the dark. Fortunately, it’s nearby: three blocks. The horizon was burning, roosters were crowing in the courtyards, mistaking it for dawn...

I was not a military expert, but from the running chains of fountains of fire I guessed that these were carpet bombings from the B-52. In my work, I had a competitive advantage over my AFP colleague Jean Thoraval, the only Western reporter in Hanoi: I did not need to obtain a censorship stamp before transmitting the text. That's why I was the first. A few hours later, the start of the operation was confirmed from Washington.

The next morning, at the International Club, the Vietnamese organized a press conference with the American pilots shot down at night. They brought in survivors and not badly injured ones. Then, until the new year, such press conferences were held almost every day, and each time they brought “fresh” prisoners. Most are still in mud-splattered flight suits, and some are in bandages or plaster - already in striped pajamas.

These were different people - from the twenty-five-year-old Bachelor of Arts Lieutenant Robert Hudson to the forty-three-year-old “Latino”, Korean War veteran Major Fernando Alexander, from the unfired Paul Granger to the commander of the flying “superfortress” Lieutenant Colonel John Yuinn, who had twenty years of service under his belt, one hundred and forty combat flights to South Vietnam and twenty-two to the “fourth zone” of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. By their surnames one could judge where their ancestors came from to America: Brown and Gelonek, Martini and Nagahira, Bernasconi and Leblanc, Camerota and Vavroch...

In the light of the spotlights, they entered one after another into a cramped room filled with people and tobacco smoke. In front of the public, among whom there were few foreigners, and not so many journalists, they behaved differently: confusion with a shadow of fear, a detached look into the void, arrogance and contempt... Some simply remained silent, while the little Vietnamese officer, mutilating names and surnames, he read out personal data, ranks, service numbers, types of aircraft, place of captivity. Others identified themselves and asked to tell their relatives that “they are alive and are being treated humanely.”

The first press conference was dominated by silence. They probably thought that this was an unfortunate accident and that Hanoi would capitulate tomorrow under blows from the sky. But each subsequent group became more talkative. By Christmas, almost everyone congratulated their relatives on the holiday and expressed hope that “this war will end soon.” But they also said that they were fulfilling military duty, bombing military targets, although they did not rule out “collateral losses” (maybe they damaged housing a little).

On December 19, a cabin with American officers Cernan, Schmitt and Evans parachuted into the Pacific Ocean south of the Samoan Islands. This was the descent module of Apollo 17, which returned from the Moon. Astronaut heroes were welcomed aboard the USS Ticonderoga. At the same hour, the plane of Lieutenant Colonel Gordon Nakagawa took off from another aircraft carrier, the Enterprise. His parachute opened over Haiphong, and the Vietnamese in the flooded rice field did not greet him at all cordially. A little earlier, the navigator-instructor of the B-52 squadron, Major Richard Johnson, was captured. He and Captain Richard Simpson managed to eject. The remaining four crew members were killed. Their “superfortress” opened the scoring with a shot down over Hanoi.

The Christmas bombings of Hanoi and Haiphong, which lasted almost continuously for twelve days, became a test of strength for both sides. American air losses were serious. According to American information, fifteen B-52s were lost - the same number as in the entire previous war in Vietnam. According to the Soviet military, 34 of these eight-engine vehicles were shot down in the December air battle. In addition, 11 other aircraft were destroyed.

The picture of giants burning in the night sky and falling apart was enchanting. At least thirty American pilots were killed, more than twenty were missing, and dozens were captured.

I did not see any air battles, although the Vietnamese later reported the loss of six MiG-21s. But a mass of metal rose into the air towards the planes from below, including bullets from the rifle of the barmaid Minh from the roof of the Hanoi Metropol and from the Makarov of the policeman at our house. Anti-aircraft guns worked in every quarter. But all B-52s were shot down by Soviet-made S-75 air defense systems. The Soviet military did not directly participate in this; at that time they were only advisers and instructors, but Soviet equipment played an obvious role.

According to Vietnamese data, 1,624 people died on the ground in the New Year's air war. Civilian. The Vietnamese did not report about the military.

The expectation of completely suppressing the will of the population did not materialize. There was no panic, but it was felt that people were on edge. This was told to me by a classic of Vietnamese literature, Nguyen Cong Hoan, who came to visit, with whom we had been closely acquainted for a long time.

During the Christmas peace break, our group went to mass at St. Joseph's Cathedral. Even Makhlouf, Egypt's charge d'affaires. Prayed for peace. And in the lobby of the Metropol, the role of Santa Claus at the Christmas tree was played by the American pastor Michael Allen, who before the bombings arrived as part of a delegation of pacifists led by the former US prosecutor at Nuremberg Telford Taylor. Singer Joan Baez was also in it. She sang Christmas songs, and when she learned that I was Russian, she suddenly hugged me and started singing “Dark Eyes”... After Christmas, they bombed me again.

We celebrated the New Year in tense silence, waiting for the bombing. But when Le Duc Tho flew to Paris, it became somehow more fun. Negotiations resumed, and the agreement was signed in almost the same form as the draft published in October. The December air war over Hanoi and Haiphong changed nothing.

The main results of the agreement were the complete withdrawal of American troops from South Vietnam (March 29, 1973) and the exchange of prisoners, which was carried out in several stages. It was a solemn event. American Hercules from Saigon and Da Nang and ambulance C-141s from Clark Field in the Philippines flew to the Gya Lam airfield. In the presence of a commission of officers from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, the United States, the GRP of the Republic of South Vietnam, the Saigon regime, Indonesia, Hungary, Poland and Canada, the Vietnamese authorities handed over the released prisoners to the American general. Some were simply pale and exhausted, others left on crutches, and others were carried on stretchers. Among them was John McCain, whom I did not pay attention to at the time. But then, at a meeting in Brussels, I reminded him of that day.

The other articles of the agreement were worse. The ceasefire between the Vietnamese communist forces and the Saigon army in the south was shaky, with the parties constantly accusing each other of violating the Paris Agreement. The letter of the agreement, which each side read in its own way, itself became an argument for war. The fate of the 1954 Geneva Agreement, which ended France's war for the former colony, repeated itself. The communists accused the Saigonese of holding separate elections in the south and proclaiming their own anti-communist state. The Saigonese accused the communists of launching terrorist attacks against the authorities in the south and organizing military penetration from North Vietnam to South Vietnam through Laos and Cambodia. Hanoi assured that its troops were nowhere there, and the GRP of the Republic of South Vietnam was fighting for the creation of an independent and neutral country in the south.

Le Duc Tho, unlike Kissinger, did not go to receive the Nobel Prize because he knew that the agreement would not last long. Within two years, the communists became convinced that America had left Vietnam and was not going to return. The Spring Offensive of 1975 buried the Paris Agreement with all its decorative republics and control mechanisms. Guarantees from the USSR, France, Great Britain and China did not interfere with the course of events. Vietnam was united militarily.

State thought is characterized by inertia. The French began to fight for Indochina when the era of territories was ending and other mechanisms for using resources took the place of military-political control over the territories. The Americans got involved in Vietnam when the main issue was the confrontation between two systems. The communists denied America's sacred principles of free trade and capital movement and interfered with transnational business. Eastern Europe is already closed, and Southeast Asia is under threat. Maoist China influenced the region. On September 30, 1965, an attempt at a communist coup in Indonesia was foiled at the cost of great blood. The rebels fought guerrilla wars in Thailand, Burma, and the Philippines. In Vietnam, the communists controlled half the country and had a chance to take control of the other... In Washington, the “domino theory” was seriously considered, in which Vietnam was the critical domino.

What was this war for, in which more than 58 thousand Americans were killed, millions of Vietnamese were killed, millions were maimed physically and mentally, not to mention the economic costs and environmental damage?

The goal of the Vietnamese communists was a nation state under strict party rule, with an independent, bordering on autarky, economy, without private property and foreign capital. For this they made sacrifices.

The dreams of those who fought against American imperialism did not come true, the fears that prompted the Americans to one of the bloodiest wars of the century did not come true. Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Burma and the Philippines did not become communist, but rushed forward along the capitalist path in the economy and joined globalization. In Vietnam, an attempt at “socialist change” in the south led in 1979 to a collapsed economy, a terrible refugee problem (“boat people”), and war with China. Actually, China had already abandoned classical socialism by that time. The Soviet Union collapsed.

From the veranda of the once “journalistic” bar on the roof of the Caravella Hotel, a panorama of Ho Chi Minh City opens up, on whose futuristic skyscrapers are the brands of world banks and corporations. Down in Lam Son Square, a Japanese firm is building one of the world's most modern subways. Nearby, on a red banner, there is a slogan: “Warm greetings to the delegates of the city party conference.” And state television talks about America's solidarity with Vietnam against Beijing's attempts to take away its islands in the South China Sea...

Photo taken with an amateur Zenit camera