General Vo Nguyen Giap: Legendary general, both literary and martial

General Vo Nguyen Giap visits female signal and medical units that participated in the May 1, 1973 Parade.

General-Commander-in-Chief Vo Nguyen Giap is a rare general in the world, a legendary general of the Vietnamese people, who did not attend any military school but commanded the army to grow from nothing, defeating many famous generals of the colonial invaders, graduating from famous military academies, thereby contributing with the entire Party, the entire army, and the entire people to achieve great victories that changed the flow of national history.

The Vietnamese people and the world know and respect him as a talented and virtuous general, a man of both literary and martial arts, one of the shining celebrities of Vietnamese culture, and the "eldest brother" of the Vietnam People's Army.

Special General

As a loyal revolutionary soldier, an excellent student, close to President Ho Chi Minh, a highly prestigious leader of the Party, State and people, the first General of the Vietnam People's Army, with his talent, courage, and being close to and working alongside President Ho Chi Minh, receiving his close guidance, General Vo Nguyen Giap excellently completed the tasks assigned by the Party and people of Vietnam.

Commander-in-Chief Vo Nguyen Giap is also a special General as he is a military officer with the world's top qualifications but has not undergone any military training; he was promoted to military rank only once, receiving the rank of General on August 25, 1948, when he was only 37 years old.

Throughout his life with more than 80 years of revolutionary activities, the General had many great achievements and made especially outstanding contributions to the revolutionary cause of the Party and the nation. The General's name is closely associated with the birth, fighting and growth of the heroic Vietnam People's Army, with the great victory of the two long resistance wars against French colonialism and American imperialism and the cause of building and defending the Fatherland.

The Dien Bien Phu Campaign Command under the direct command of General Vo Nguyen Giap is discussing the battle plan for each battle. With the method of "fighting firmly, advancing firmly," our army "encircled" the stronghold from the outside in, successively destroying each stronghold cluster, moving towards completely destroying the enemy.

In the Letter to the main force troops, local troops and guerrillas on the occasion of the 5th anniversary of the founding of the Vietnam People's Army (December 22, 1949), President Ho Chi Minh wrote: "Our army is accustomed to calling General Commander-in-Chief Vo Nguyen Giap "Big Brother". This affectionate way of addressing is very true to the spirit and history of our army: because since the founding of the Southern advance team until now, the Party and the Government have assigned comrade Giap and a number of cadres to be in charge of organizing, training and leading our army."

At important and turning points of the resistance war, the General always correctly assessed the situation of the battlefield, wisely made the right decisions; proposed, directed, and implemented the formula of "independent company, concentrated battalion," crushing the large-scale attack of the French colonialists on Viet Bac (1947); wisely and decisively changed the target of attacking Cao Bang to Dong Khe in the Border Campaign (1950); advocated the dispersion of French mobile forces in many directions on the Indochina battlefield to make it difficult for them to rescue the Dien Bien Phu battlefield in the Winter-Spring campaign (1953-1954).

In particular, in the Dien Bien Phu Campaign (1954), the General was extremely careful, comparing the balance of power between the two sides, bold but not arbitrary, determined to win before fighting, so he proposed and decided to change the combat motto from "fight fast, solve quickly" to "fight firmly, advance firmly", bringing the campaign to complete victory.

Immediately after the successful end of the resistance war against French colonialism, the General was one of the first leaders of the Party to affirm: "We must continue the national liberation revolution by fighting against the US, saving the country to liberate the South, and unify the country." Realizing early the importance of providing strategic support for the Southern revolution, the General proposed to the Central Committee and directly directed the construction and protection of the Truong Son strategic transport route, opening the Ho Chi Minh Trail at sea to supply military goods and technical weapons quickly and promptly to the Southern battlefield.

General Vo Nguyen Giap was also a very important factor contributing to the success of major campaigns such as the Route 9-Khe Sanh Campaign, the Tet Offensive and Uprising (1968), and the Central Highlands Campaign (1975).

In particular, the General firmly grasped the strategic opportunity, proposed to liberate the South earlier (1975) than the original plan; directed the liberation of Hue and Da Nang; liberated the Truong Sa archipelago; established the Eastern Saigon army wing to coordinate with four other army wings and gave the order: "Faster, faster, bolder, bolder...," promptly rushed to encircle and attack to destroy the enemy's last lair in Saigon, bringing the nation's resistance war against the US to save the country to complete victory.

Assessing the strategic talent of General Vo Nguyen Giap, French History Professor Georges Boudarel wrote: "GIAP is an outstanding military man, a talented general, a prominent figure in modern Vietnamese and world history in the 20th century and one of the greatest military geniuses of all time."

General Chansamone Chanyalath, Politburo member, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of National Defense of Laos, said that although General Vo Nguyen Giap was not trained in military schools, with his outstanding talent, the General commanded the Vietnam People's Army to defeat two invading enemies, the French colonialists and the American imperialists - the two most powerful empires of the 20th century, using the power of people's war, using a small force with rudimentary equipment to defeat a powerful force with modern equipment. This is considered the quintessential tactic of the famous "people's war" military strategy.

Not only was he the Elder Brother of the Vietnam People's Army, General Vo Nguyen Giap also made great contributions to the revolution of the three Indochinese countries in general and the Lao revolution in particular.

"Commander of Commanders"

During the process of organizing, directing and operating the army, General Vo Nguyen Giap not only excellently fulfilled his duties and tasks as Commander-in-Chief, Commander-in-Chief, but also excellently fulfilled his duties as Secretary of the Central Military Commission, Secretary of the Party Committee of many campaigns. During the process of leading and commanding the army, he always closely followed the Party's political guidelines and directions; firmly maintained the principles of leadership and command, proposed many appropriate and scientific policies and measures, suitable to the requirements of the national liberation struggle, the capabilities of the armed forces and the situation of the country.

The General always attached great importance to the work of building a clean and strong Party organization, taking care of educating revolutionary qualities, political mettle, combat mettle, military tactics, and combat capabilities for cadres and soldiers; closely and skillfully combining political struggle with armed struggle, diplomacy, ideology, soldiers, and enemy agitation; between national defense and economy, security... to achieve comprehensive results in both the tasks of resistance and nation building.

On the occasion of the New Year (January 1973), General Vo Nguyen Giap visited and talked with the self-defense soldiers of Hanoi's K and T neighborhoods, the unit that bravely and intelligently shot down the American E.111 aircraft on the night of December 22, 1972.

During "the two resistance wars of more than 30 years, the Politburo never rejected any strategic proposal of the Secretary of the Central Military Commission and Commander-in-Chief Vo Nguyen Giap or of the Central Military Commission and the General Command" (According to "Vo Nguyen Giap in the Long March of the Century," author Tran Thai Binh).

With the responsibility of Secretary of the Central Military Commission, Minister of National Defense, and Commander-in-Chief of the Vietnam People's Army during the nation's two long resistance wars, the General advised and proposed to the Party and State many important issues related to the destiny of the nation, in which building a national defense for all people is one of the key contents.

General Vo Nguyen Giap believed that this was a huge task that must be properly perceived and carefully prepared in peacetime in order to successfully deal with both external and internal enemies. The General's views on building a national defense not only contributed significantly to the Party's military and defense policies but were also realized in practice, leaving behind valuable experiences for the cause of defending the Fatherland and building socialism in the current revolutionary period.

Building a national defense must rely on the people, promote the strength of the entire people; must properly resolve the relationship between the economy and national defense, build an independent, self-reliant, increasingly modern national defense, closely linked to the development of culture, education, science and technology, health care, sports...

The merits and outstanding contributions of General Vo Nguyen Giap to the revolution and the country have become the pride of the nation before the world. The legacy the General left for our people and army has profound theoretical value and great practical significance in many fields.

With the full convergence of criteria: army organizer and builder; good fighter; excellent military theorist; talented and exemplary leader and politician..., General Vo Nguyen Giap is wholeheartedly respected by the people, honored as "General of the people"; admired by army officers and soldiers, worthy of being "Commander of commanders, general of generals".

According to VNA