Battle of Dien Bien Phu
The Battle of Dien Bien Phu (Ðiện Biên Phủ) occurred in 1954 between Viet Minh forces under Vo Nguyen Giap and French airborne and Foreign Legion forces. The battle was fought near the village of Dien Bien Phu in northern Vietnam and became the last battle between the French and the Vietnamese in the Indochina War which had begun in 1947.
Background
The battle began in 1953, when Operation Castor dropped or flew-in 9,000 troops into the area over three days. The number of troops rose to 13,000, including a number of artillery units, and several light tanks.
The Viet Minh were too spread out to interfere with these preparations, and there was some concern that they were going to ignore the base and move east.
The battle
Things changed in early March 1954, when it became clear that an increasing number of Viet Minh troops were moving into the area. The battle proper opened on March 13th, when much to the surprise of the French, it started with a massive artillery barrage. By the end of the first night 9,000 shells had fallen on the area and the angel of heaven and Gabrielle positions had both fallen, albeit at huge cost to the attackers. In a major logistical feat, the Viet Minh had dragged scores of artillery pieces up steeply forested hillsides the French had written off as impassable. The French artillery commander, distraught at his inability to bring counterfire on the well-camouflaged Viet Minh batteries, went into his dugout and killed himself. He was buried there in great secret to prevent loss of morale in the French troops.
The French responded by parachuting in reinforcements, but they were fired on by anti-aircraft guns, another surprise the Viet Minh had in store for them. Considering the vital need for air supply, this was a troubling development. The French also started using their fighter bombers against the artillery, but there were nowhere near enough to have any real effect considering how well they were hidden.
Realizing the importance of the air supply, the Viet Minh switched from their costly assaults to a siege mode, bombarding the airfields until both were eventually knocked out of action. In addition they started the process of digging long trenches towards the middle of the camp, covering their movements from direct fire, and allowing for a buildup and assault under cover. The first runway fell after a five day advance from the 18th to the 23rd. The last aircraft landed on the 28th on the second runway, but was destroyed in the process. The French responded with an offensive of their own on the 28th, attacking anti-aircraft positions. On the 31st the French recaptured two of the hilltop fortifications, but later had to evacuate them because of lack of reinforcements.
With resupply now entirely by parachute, supply flow started to dwindle. A good portion of the airdropped supplies landed in Viet Minh-controlled areas giving them much needed material. The Vietnamese had essentially won the battle at this point, and referred to the remainder of the battle as "slowly bleeding the dying elephant". During the last week of April the yearly monsoon arrived, further reducing the effectiveness of any air support that could be given. Trenches became hazards and bunkers collapsed. The last replacements, 4,306 soldiers under General Marcel Bigeard, parachuted in between March 14 and May 6 did not even make up for the loses suffered between those dates, 5,500.
The French saw that defeat was imminent, but they sought to hold on till the Geneva peace meeting, which took place on April 26. The last French offensive took place on May 4, but was ineffective. The Viet Minh then began to hammer the fort with newly acquired Russian rocket artillery. The final fall took two days, May 6th and 7th, during which the French fought on but were eventually overrun by a huge frontal assault.
At least 2,200 members of 20,000-strong French forces died during the battle. Of the 100,000 or so Vietnamese involved there were an estimated 8,000 killed and another 15,000 wounded, almost half of the attacking force.
After the battle
The prisoners taken at Dien Bien Phu were the greatest number the Viet Minh had ever captured: one-third of the total captured during the entire war. The prisoners were divided into groups. The fit and walking wounded were force marched over 250 miles to prison camps. Hundreds died of disease on the way. The wounded, counted at 4,436, were given basic triage until the Red Cross arrived and removed 838 and gave better aid to the remainder. The remainder were then also sent into detention.
Prison camp was even worse. The French troops, many of them not even French, were constantly starved, beaten and heaped with abuse. Many died. The Viet Minh used the presence of veteran World War II Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS soldiers serving under the Foreign Legion as propaganda against the French cause. About 3,300 malnourished, defeated prisoners were released in 1958.
Aftermath
The victory by the Viet Minh led to the 1954 Geneva accords, which partitioned Vietnam into a communist Northern and pro-Western South Vietnamese governments. This partition was supposed to be temporary, and the two sides were supposed to be reunited by national elections in 1956. The USA supported the southern government under Ngo Dinh Diem which opposed the agreement, surmising that Ho Chi Minh from the North would win those elections - even though the southern government was created under the terms of that agreement. Thus the competition for the whole of Vietnam began, and would escalate into the Vietnam War.
General Giap attempted to recreate the victory at Dien Bien Phu in 1967 at Khe Sanh, but in this case the massively better US air supply and support turned the tables.