Nghệ thuật quân sự

“Our military strategy is to use spiritual factors to overcome matetial factors, the weakness to overcome the strength, the rudiment to overcome the modernity. With Vietnamese patriotism and revolutionary heroism, we have defeated the powerful countries with modern weapons”.
(General Võ Nguyên Giáp)

“You, Commander-in-Chief will take the field. I give you full authority... This battle is very important, so we must win. If you are sure of a victory, you should act; otherwise, shouldn’t”.
(President Hồ Chí Minh)

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On January 26, 1954, before launching an attack on Điện Biên Phủ, General Võ Nguyên Giáp called a meeting of the Party Committee of the Front. That day, he made “the hardest decision of his life as a Commander-in-chief”: “The situation is urgent. We need to make a decision soon. No matter what the situation is, we still have to stick to the key principle, which is 'complete victory'… and to guarantee a complete victory, we have to change the guideline from 'Strike fast, win fast” to “Slowly but surely”. Now, we will put off the fighting. I order the soldiers on the whole line retreat to the assembly point, and move out all of the cannon. the Obeying of the order must be carried out as seriously as the obeying of combat order”.
(General Võ Nguyên Giáp’s memoirs)

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Be more and more active…

“Be more and more active… Try to get to the front in a shortest time and liberate the South. Be determined to fight for a complete victory”.
Along with the political and military interventions of the United States in the South which went against the Geneve Convention, the policy of Denouncing and Exterminating Vietnamese Communists of the Republic of Vietnam government caused heavy losses for the southern revolution. Under the leadership of the Party, especially under the direct leadership of President Hồ Chí Minh - Secretary of the Central Military Commission, General Võ Nguyên Giáp decided to establish the Corps 559 in by-land support of Trường Sơn strategy, and the Corps 759 in by-sea support of the South.

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"We are waging a people's war, à la manière vietnamienne (in a Vietnamese way)"

“We are waging a people's war, à la manière vietnamienne (in a Vietnamese way) - an all-out war in which every man, woman, unit, old and young alike, are always ready because they are all motivated. This is why modern American weapons or electronic devices and things like that become useless. Although America's military is powerful, Americans have made mistakes in calculation because they did not see their own weaknesses. In a war, there are only two elements: people and weapons. In the end, people are still the deciding factor though. It’s people!”
(General Võ Nguyên Giáp)

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