Dien Bien Phu campaign - high peak of Vietnamese military operation art in resistance war against French colonialism

(Bqp.vn) - In the history of resistance war against French colonialism, Dien Bien Phu campaign is a brilliant landmark, representing a great victory of potential strength of the Vietnamese nation’s patriotism in Ho Chi Minh era.

Our armed forces was attacking Him Lam entrenched fortification (13/3/1954). (Picture: documentary)

In the aspect of military art, Dien Bien Phu campaign represents special and unique features of the traditionally military operation art and is the high peak of Vietnamese military operation art in the resistance war against French colonialism. Those were shown in three fields: leadership, war management (military strategy), and tactics and campaign operation art. Based on the following theoretical points, we want to clarify the great development of Vietnam military operation art in Dien Bien Phu campaign which resulted in the victory in the war against France.

Firstly, Dien Bien Phu is the victory of people’s war policy in the resistance war against French colonialism.

It could be said that the victory of Dien Bien Phu campaign is clear proof for the success of  people’s war policy initiated and directed by the Party and president Ho Chi Minh.

From the beginning of the resistance war against French colonialism, applying the idea of “resistance war, country restoration”, the Party and president Ho Chi Minh have early planned and formed the war policy which was featured: “All-people, comprehensive, long-term, self-dependent”. So our resistance war attracted the participation of all Vietnames people in using comprehensive methods (military, politics, economy and culture) to gradually obtain victory based on the strength of our people.

The ideas and policy of war was initially determined for all people. This battle was  to just fight against the unjust invaders, therefore we had to gain efforts and cooperation from all people, all organizations and forces in the cause of “resistance war, country restoration”. The just nature of Vietnamese people’s war received the support of people from all over world, including many other nations, especially the China’s government and people.

The policy of war clearly reflected the comprehensive methods: military, politics, economy and culture, in which the military method was to embark resistance war against French colonialism. The early determination of long-term fighting guidelines were created so that there was enough necessary time for building, organizing and strengthening forces. This was the foundation for all people in the war, forming people’s armed forces with increasing development and being used as a core element for all people to fight the enemy.

The right and creative war implementation way were not only enhanced by the strength of people but also inspired the patriotism of all people and entire armed forces. It was a decisive factor for the victory of resistance war against French colonialism in which Dien Bien Phu campaign was the evidence of the rebellion strength of whole nation.

Secondly, Dien Bien Phu victory is the result of the force and battle-array building and developing process and military operation art.

Thanks to right and sharp strategic thinking and policy, Vietnamese people and armed forces, with insufficient and simple weapons, bravely combated with the spirit “We rather sacrifice everything but never accept losing our country to the French, never accept to be a slave again” and with the will and determination “We are ready to fight to the last breath for the existence of our great fatherland!".

After preventing French armed forces from the battlefield in the South and South Central Coast in late 1945 and in Hanoi Nam Dinh in late 1946, our army and people  implemented Viet Bac (Northern Vietnam) Autumn-Winter campaign 1947 from which  they combated and defeated French armed forces and captured the leaders of enemy. Viet Bac victory together with other victories across our country crushed the plot “fast fight, quick victory” of French colonial.

Due to a increasingly firmly - strong victories, our army and people step by step gained initiative in combat, pushing the French armed forces into a defensive stands. Vietnamese people’s armed forces have improved not only quantity but also quality and operation ability. Late 1949 to early 1950, mobile mainstay brigades (Brigade 308 (28/801949) and Brigade 304 (1/3/1950[1]) came out, marking a great advance in the forces of the Vietnam People’s Army.

Vietnamese people’s resistance war cause had gained increasingly big victories and armed forces strengthened. This proved the right, creative and reasonable people’s war policy. Moreover, the appearance of mobile mainstay brigades created a foundation for the formation and campaign practice, the collaboration of guerilla tactics with mobilization. The important victory in Autumn-Winter Border Campaign 1950 is vivid proof for the development in strategy and formation art, attacking campaign practice in the scale of brigades. In this campaign, our soldiers developed the tactics “attack an outpost to lure in and destroy the relief force” into military campaigns with the key goal as Dong Khe and to wipe out two French units. This Border Campaign victory had an important meaning because it broke surrounding circle and opened the door to the international relations outside the border of Vietnam-China.

War plane B26 of the enemy was on fire. (Picture: documentary)

After the Border Campaign, we used main brigades to pass through northern midland and delta regions in order to open campaigns, including Tran Hung Dao (15/12/1950-17/1/1951), Hoang Hoa Tham (20/3-7/4/1951), Quang Trung (28/5-20/6/1951), using the tactics “attack an outpost to lure in and destroy the relief force”. All these campaigns failed because we inexactly revaluated  the French forces, resulting in unsuitable attack time. However, the operation of our army in the campaigns forced French army to reevaluate the position of Nothern midland delta region in their invasion war.

In Hoa Binh campaign (10/12/1951-25/2/1952), with three brigades [2], we applied strategy of counter - attacking the enemy’s attack. The Hoa Binh counter-attack marked the development of leading art in cooperation with two basic methods of armed fight: guerilla war and regular war; the combination of main soldiers and local ones; of army forces and people; resulting in the strong development of both guerilla war and regular war. After Hoa Binh campaign, our troops passed through the enemy’s area to disperse the enemy’s forces.

On forestry and mountainous battlefields, we opened to Tay Bac (Northwest) (10/1952-12/1952), bringing freedom to a large area, creating a new revolutionary base linking with Viet Bac base. Then, our armed forces in cooperation with Pathet army of Laos opened Thuong Lao campaign (April-May/1953), liberating Sam Nua [3].

Until the middle of 1953, our people’s war battle-array spread French troops to many regions, forcing the enemy to change their strategy with a comprehensive military plan which named under the name of France’s new commander-in-chief in Indochina - “Navarre plan (Henry Navarre)"[4] in order to concentrate the forces and attack “turn failure into victory”.

Thirdly, great development steps in campaign and strategy guidelines

When French armed forces deployed Navarre plan in October, 1953 in Tin Keo (Diem Mac commune, Dinh Hoa district, Thai Nguyen province), the Political Bureau of the Party Central Committee held a meeting to discuss and pass Winter-Spring fight plan 1953-1954. After listening the Winter-Spring fight plan presented by General Vo Nguyen Giap, President Ho Chi Minh said: “The enemy focused on mobile forces to create their strength…! We must disperse military power to lower such strength…” [5]. He emphasized the strategic guideline and fight guideline principles: Mobilize forces to open attacks not only to strategic directions in which the enemy was weak but also to the areas that they could overlook due to their importance, forcing them to disperse the troops.

In the conclusion of the meeting, President Ho Chi Minh confirmed that: Northeast direction would be the main one and other directions would play cooperated roles. However, the flexible change could be made during the operation based on situations [6].

Implementing the strategy, from November 19-23, 1953, the Central Committee in the army and the Ministry of Defence convened officers at regiment level upward to disseminate the Winter-Spring fight plan 1953-1954. During the time the meeting was being held, on November 20, 1953, H. Navarre discovered the operation of our troops to Northwest (Brigade 316) and commanded his armed forces to parachute to occupy Dien Bien Phu. This intention of Navarre’s was discussed in the meeting with the following conclusion: Before our attack, the enemy was pushed into passive position and had to disperse their mobile troops to Dien Bien Phu to break our attack plan. This created an advantage for us and reflected the conflict of French forces between land occupation and force mobilization; between mountainous battlefield and delta battlefield consolidation. [7].

According to the fight plan Spring 1954 which was passed by the Ministry of Politics in early December, 1953, the General Headquarters directed forces to attack the enemy. From December 10-25, 1953, our troops wiped out 20 brigades of the enemy, liberating Lai Chau, creating  active situation in Dien Bien Phu. In the middle of December, 1953, our army in cooperation with Pha-thet troops of Laos crushed “banned line” of France at parallel of latitude 18, liberating many regions in Trung Lao. Then, allied troops Vietnam-Laos-Cambodia liberated Congpongcham, Ha Lao and Trung Lao. In February, 1954, our army attacked the enemy in Kon Tum and North Central highland, defeating the Atlang operation of French troops.

Abovementioned strategic attacks together with operations of our army and people at the enemy’s back made the French forces “split” and disperse into many directions. Among 52 mobile battalions, French troops could only arrange 17 in Dien Bien Phu and 20 in North delta region.

The fact proved that our army and people rightly implemented the strategic guideline, which attracted and impounded French mobile forces, liberated many large and special regions, and encircled French troops in Dien Bien Phu entrenched fortification. France’s organizing and building their forces in Dien Bien Phu to become an entrenched fortification lied in our initial orientation and therefore, we held strategic initiative.

The initial victory played an important role in Winter-Spring fight 1953-1954. This confirmed the rightness and accuracy in the strategic guideline and was prerequisite condition for the Political Bureau of the Party Central Committee to mobilize main forces in order to attack and wipe out Dien Bien Phu entrenched fortification. This created a new change in the war situation from “Avoid enemy's strength, attack their weakness” to “attack directly to enemy’s weak points” to gain the decisive victory.

Fourthly: organizing forces; building firm strategic battle-array; implementing large blockage; and splitting and isolating Dien Bien Phu from other battlefields.

The war direction and management had a prerequisite meaning for the organization and construction of forces and campaign battle-array.

In Dien Bien Phu campaign, the most important thing was the campaign fight method and the acuracy of campaign operation motto as a basic for fight readiness. Those originated from objective and subjective facts. It could be seen that the strongest will of the leadership of French armed forces was to rebuild Dien Bien Phu hollow as a strong entrenched fortification in both forces (17 infantry battalions and other forces with 16,000 troops) and weapons, equipment and airway and roadways.  In their views, “fight against them” means…to “crush”. This meant that they could “crush’ the main forces of Viet Minh. Meanwhile, our main brigades were in first to attack uninterrupted entrenched fortifications (exactly there are 49 of those) with enforced defensive systems. The motto “fast fight, quick victory” in 2-3 days and nights created a sudden, strong determination and facilitated logistics. The motto of determination operation for an important campaign required the General Command and the Commander to accurately consider and decide. On the basis of correlation comparison and ability evaluation of our army and French forces in Dien Bien Phu with the motto “ensure to be certain of victory” according to President Ho Chi Minh’s instruction. As a Commander and the Campaign Party Secretary, General Vo Nguyen Giap in cooperation with the campaign Party Committee team decided to change the motto from “fast fight, quick victory” to “certain attack and success” (26/01/1954).

The change of operation motto needed a high determination as it required a prolonging preparation, faced difficulties in ensure logistics and some disagreement...

To implement the motto “firmly attack and firmly success”, we organized the forces and battle-array to encircle all Dien Bien Phu entrenched fortifications and especially each resistance center. We built infantry and artillery battlefields, campaign headquarter, brigade and regiment headquarters for discontinued operation. We prepared forces and prevented the enemy’s provision supply line and protect ours.

During the campaign, we applied creatively encircled strategy, dugging  systems of trench to surround and occupy French battlefield. “With hundreds of kilometer of trenches, sleep tunnels, ambulance tunnels…we ensured force mobilization, combated continuously and ensured the life for soldiers in front of the enemy’s fierce resistance”[8].

Thanks to firm battle-array, our troops encircled Dien Bien Phu entrenched fortification, pushing the enemy into isolated position. In addition, with active advantages, we attacked in many different directions, wiping out each blockhouse, entrenched fortification and battalion of French troops, and effectively limited artillery forces of the enemy. The trench system together with “encroaching-poking” tactics reduced the effectiveness of fire tactics of the enemy.

French armed forces could not intensify the forces in Dien Bien Phu because of our increasingly tightened blockage. Besides Dien Bien, our army and people also attacked and destroyed the French airplanes stored at Gia Lam airport (Hanoi) and Cat Bi airport (Haiphong) to prevent the enemy’s airforce from supporting their troops in Dien Bien Phu. This showed the tight cooperation between Tay Bac-Dien Bien Phu battlefields and other places, pushing the enemy into defeated situation.

Fifthly, promoting combined armed warfare strength and focusing on artillery advance, fiercely attacking each key fight.

Dien Bien Phu campaign was the first combined armed warfare on a large scale of Vietnamese People’s Army. Our forces taking part in the campaign included infantry brigades (9 regiments), an infantry-artillery brigade (351) and an antiaircraft gun regiment (367). Our forces were equal to those of the enemy; but they had a strong advantage of war planes and tanks. However, the most important thing in the fight was the use of forces and proper fighting methods.

According to the motto “firmly attack, firmly succeed”, our troops promoted the combined warfare strength, mainly between infantry, artillery and antiaircraft. In the first stage of the campaign (March 13-17, 1954), we focused on the gun fire advantage and wiped out three entrenched fortifications in the northern direction. The ratios of military power of French forces and our troops in Him Lam battle was 1/3, in Doc Lap hill battle was 1/4.5, and in Ban Keo battle was 1/3. In Him Lim flight, our mortar power was 10-fold higher than that of the enemy. In comparison, we were 2.6 times higher than French forces.

Our victory in the first stage pointed out the need of tight cooperation in fights, which created more advantages wiping out each entrenched fortification. We gathered the experience after each fight to improve and prepare for the following fights. That was a step of developing operation art in large-scale attack for our armed forces in the resistance war against French colonialism. The most important task was to determine the campaign motto “firmly attack, firmly succeed” [9].

However, in the second stage (March 30 - April 30, 1954), we failed to implement principles and experience on combined infantry-fire power when attacking the entrenched fortification in the west. This meant our troop met many difficulties and suffered heavy losses. In A1 hill battle, we used regiment 174 to attack posts without concentrated fighting operation. This brought in the failure to occupy entrenched fortification in three consecutive days and nights.

This meant that application of the tightened warfare cooperation and infantry-firepower combination were to gain the victory in this long-term campaign, annihilating vital forces of the enemy.

    Finally, creatively applying campaign operation method; combining enclosure with breaking-through; attacking intensively on the enemy front and defense; splitting enemy forces; and implementing general offensive campaign to obtain the final victory.

Carrying out intensive attack, promoting the supremacy of firearm, limiting strength and breaking the enemies weakest points were the development steps in the second stage. We used small forces to operate widely under different forms and deployed snipers to reduce the enemy’s forces, causing a desperating spirit in the French side.

In addition, we occupied airports, consolidated the blockage, narrowing airspace, destroying the airway logistics line (only way) to attack “stomach” of the enemy.  

We carried out the new operation plan, in the middle of April, which gradually changed the battlefield situation. With the method of intensive attack combined with our combat trench systems, we forced the French troops into difficult situation and broke out their fighting spirit.

In late April, we formed an active battle-array in Muong Thanh centre area and prepared fully to move to the final attack.

Based on the success of the previous stages, we moved on the third stage (from 1st to 7th May 1954), continued fighting the French enemy’s final entrenched fortification in the East. We immediately conducted the general offensive on Dien Bien Phu entrenched fortification in the afternoon of May 7. The impressive development point of this operation in the third stage was the approciate time for the final decisive attack. At the time when the enemy decided to flee [10], we immediately rushed into the enemy’s Headquarters, capturing the chief commander and the General Staff of the entrenched fortification.

After fighting for 56 days and nights, our army and people gained complete victory in Dien Bien Phu strategic fight.

In winter-spring victory (1953-1954) with the peak of the Dien Bien Phu campaign completely destroyed Navarre’s plan, it opened a new stage for our army and people to victoriously finish the resistance war against French colonialism.

For French colonialists, the failure in Dien Bien Phu was an indispensable consequence of wrong strategic calculations. They overlooked the strength of a nation which was to fight for the protection of independence and freedom. They failed to accurately evaluate the strength of Vietnamese People’s war with the guideline of a pioneer Party and talented leader Ho Chi Minh.

It could be confirmed that the glorious victory of Dien Bien Phu campaign marked the peak of developing Vietnam’s military operation art in the resistance war against French colonialism. Dien Bien Phu was a victory of the policy “resistance war, country restoration”, and of the People’s war strategy. This vitory created a strong will in the Vietnamese army and people that helped them to deal with any difficulties and defeat the policies, plans and armed forces of French colonialism.

Major General, Associate Professor, Doctor Vu Quang Dao - Head of the Vietnam Institute of Military History