Ho Chi Minh Thought

Ho Chi Minh Thought is an Authoritarian Left ideology which applies the characteristics of  Marxism–Leninism to  (North) Vietnam. Although named after him, Ho Chi Minh Thought is not based exclusively on Ho Chi Minh's ideas, as it is also based on the ideas of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV), and may include ideas espoused by the CPV, even if they differ from, or build upon Ho Chi Minh's own ideas. Similarly to Maoism, Ho Chi Minh Thought emphasizes the peasantry as the most important revolutionary class, rather than the industrial proletariat. It is centered around values such as a national liberation, class liberation, independence, and a revolutionary attitude.

Beliefs
WIP

[[File:Hochi.png]] Origins
Ho Chi Minh (born Nguyễn Sinh Cung) was a Vietnamese revolutionary and statesman. He served as Prime Minister of North Vietnam from 1945 to 1955 and President from 1945 until his death in 1969.

Nguyễn Sinh Cung was born during the 1890s (The exact year is disputed) in the village of Hoàng Trù, Central Vietnam under French colonial rule. His father Nguyễn Sinh Sắc was a Confucian scholar and teacher, and in accordance with confucian tradition gave his son a new name at the age of 10: Nguyễn Tất Thành meaning "Nguyễn the Accomplished".

Thanh (Ho) traveled the world throughout his youth and lived and worked in both France,  the UK,  the US,  the Soviet Union, and   China (ROC) constantly changing his identity and backstory whenever it suited his interests. Ho's early life is full of contradictions and is heavily disputed by scholars.

In 1941, Hồ Chí Minh returned to Vietnam to lead the Việt Minh independence movement against the Japanese and  French Fascist Imperial Forces. The Vietnamese anti-colonial resistance during the Pacific War was heavily by the US through the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the predecessor to CIA.

Following the August Revolution (1945) organized by the Việt Minh, Hồ Chí Minh became Chairman of the Provisional Government (Premier of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and issued a Proclamation of Independence of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Although he convinced Emperor Bảo Đại to abdicate, his government was not recognized by any country. US President Harry S. Truman was much less interested in the decolonization of Asia than his predecessor  Franklin D. Roosevelt was and turned against the Vietnamese cause for independence from France.

Following the Declaration of Independence of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, the Viet Minh brutally suppressed and imprisoned thousands of non-communist Vietnamese nationalists and Trotskyists thus securing the dominance of  the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV).

[[File:Cball-France.png]] First Indochina War [[File:Hochi.png]]
The First Indochina War was between the French Colonial Forces and the Viet Minh anti-colonial resistance from 1946 to 1954.

On 23 September 1945, with the knowledge of the British commander in Saigon, French forces overthrew the local DRV government and declared French authority restored in Southern Vietnam, and began to gradually retake control of the entire country forcing Ho Chi Minh and his comrades underground. The French tried to stabilize Indochina by reorganizing it as a Federation of Associated States. In 1949, they put former Emperor Bảo Đại back in power, as the ruler of a newly established State of Vietnam.

The first few years of the war involved a low-level rural insurgency against the French. In 1949 the conflict turned into a conventional war between two armies equipped with modern weapons from other countries. The French were supported by the US and  the ROC, with an army consisting of troops from their colonial empire which included both Africans, Arabs, Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian collaborators. The Viet Minh was supported by Communist China  and  the Soviet Union.

The First Indochina War came to an end following the International Geneva Conference on July 21, 1954, when the new socialist French government and the Việt Minh made an agreement that gave the Việt Minh control of North Vietnam above the 17th parallel. The south continued under Bảo Đại. A year later, Bảo Đại would be deposed by his Prime Minister, Ngô Đình Diệm, creating  the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam).

Land Reform
Between 1953 and 1956, the North Vietnamese government instituted various agrarian reforms, including "rent reduction" and "land reform", similar to what their Chinese counterparts under Mao did at the same time, which resulted in significant political oppression with executions which ranged from between 10 000 - 50 000 people. In 1956, leaders in Hanoi admitted to "excesses" in implementing this program and restored a large amount of the land to the original owners.

=== Vietnam War  ===

The Vietnam War was one of the deadliest wars and major conflicts of the Cold War that took place in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975.

North Vietnam was supported by the Soviet Union, China, and North Korea. South Vietnam was supported by the US and other anti-communist allies such as South Korea,  The Philippines,  Thailand,  Australia,  New Zealand, and many other countries.

At the 1954 Geneva peace conference, Under the terms of the Geneva Accords, civilians were allowed to move freely between the two provisional states for a 300-day period. Elections throughout the country were to be held in 1956 to establish a unified government. Around one million northerners, mainly minority Catholics, fled south, seeking a life free from communism. The exodus was coordinated by a U.S.-funded $93 million relocation program, which included the use of the Seventh Fleet to ferry refugees.

Following Geneva Accord of 1955, 90,000 Viet Minh were evacuated to the North while 5,000 to 10,000 cadre remained in the South, with orders to refocus on political activity and agitation against the South Vietnamese government then led by President Ngô Đình Diệm.

Said communist infiltrators located in the South recruited local dissidents to Diệm's regime and formed the Viet Cong, an armed communist revolutionary organization that fought under the direction of North Vietnam, as an extension of the People's Army of Vietnam (VPA) against the South Vietnamese government.

The Buddhist Crisis caused by President Ngô Đình Diệm's preferential treatment of Catholics at expense of South Vietnam's Buddhist majority proved useful for the communists' cause for reunification.

The Communist Party of Vietnam approved a "people's war" on the South in 1959. As the level of guerilla attacks against South Vietnamese government officials and civilians by the Viet Cong intensified, U.S. President John F. Kennedy decided in November 1961 to substantially increase American military aid to South Vietnam. By 1962, there were 12,000 U.S. military advisors in Vietnam.

Following JFK's assassination in 1963, US Military involvement in Vietnam increased massively under President Lyndon B. Johnson. After the Gulf of Tonkin incident, LBJ began to send ground troops to Vietnam. As US forces kept bombing Vietnamese cities and villages killing thousands of civilians in the process, and American lives were sacrificed, opposition to US involvement in Vietnam began to mount at home, particularly in the form of the Hippie Movement. It wasn't just hippies and civil rights activists who opposed the war but also many prominent US politicians and military strategists such as George F. Kennan and perhaps surprisingly Henry Kissinger, who saw the war as a lost cause and that there were more cost-effective ways to counter the spread of communism rather than sacrificing thousands of American lives on the other side of the globe.

The Phoenix Program was initiated in 1967 and coordinated by the CIA, involving the American, Australian, and South Vietnamese militaries with the purpose of identifying and destroying the Viet Cong via infiltration, torture, capture, counter-terrorism, interrogation, and assassination. The Phoenix Program "neutralized" 81,740 people suspected of VC membership, of whom 26,369 were killed and the rest surrendered or were captured.

In January 1968 the Viet Cong (VC) and North Vietnamese People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) launched the infamous Tet Offensive, a campaign of surprise attacks against military and civilian command and control centers throughout South Vietnam. Over 14 000 South Vietnamese civilians were killed during the Tet Offensive. A large part of that number is attributed to the Massacre at Huế that caused between 2000-6000 civilian casualties during the communist's capture, military occupation, and later withdrawal from the city of Huế.

On 10 May 1968, peace talks began between the United States and North Vietnam in Paris at the time fighting between US and Vietnamese kept going on the ground. The Vietnam War made LBJ deeply unpopular at home and caused him to decline seeking re-election. Vietnam was a major political issue during the United States presidential election in 1968. The election was won by Republican party candidate Richard Nixon who had campaigned on ending the war without letting South Vietnam fall to the communists. Nixon and Kissinger began a process of "Vietnamization" to train ARVN troops so that they could defend themselves from the communists while US troops withdrew from Vietnam.

After death, the death of Ho Chi Minh in 1969, General Secretary of the CPV Lê Duẩn became the de-facto most powerful leader of North Vietnam. Lê Duẩn was overly optimistic about re-taking the South and would not make any concessions to the US.

The war was central to the 1972 U.S. presidential election as Nixon's opponent, George McGovern, campaigned on immediate withdrawal. Henry Kissinger had continued secret negotiations with North Vietnam's representative Lê Đức Thọ and in October 1972 reached an agreement. On 15 January 1973, all U.S. combat activities were suspended. Lê Đức Thọ and Henry Kissinger, along with the PRG Foreign Minister Nguyễn Thị Bình and a reluctant President Thiệu of South Vietnam, signed the Paris Peace Accords on 27 January 1973 which officially ended US involvement in the Vietnam War.

The North Vietnamese communists continued their assault on South Vietnamese cities and due to the lack of outside support, the South Vietnamese elite was left unmotivated to defend their country, and many fled Vietnam for the US. On 27 April, 100,000 PAVN troops encircled Saigon. Chaos, unrest, and panic broke out as hysterical South Vietnamese officials and civilians scrambled to leave Saigon. Martial law was declared. Operation Frequent Wind, the largest helicopter evacuation in history was initiated. More than 7,000 people were evacuated by helicopter from various points in Saigon and taken to ships set for the US.

On 30 April 1975, PAVN troops entered the city of Saigon and quickly overcame all resistance, capturing key buildings and installations. Two tanks from the 203rd Tank Brigade of the 2nd Corps crashed through the gates of the Independence Palace and the Viet Cong flag was raised above it at 11:30 am local time.

The Fall of Saigon meant that at last Vietnam was reunified under one communist government. The communists renamed the city after Ho Chi Minh, former President of North Vietnam, although the name "Saigon" continued to be used by many residents and others. All remnants of South Vietnam were destroyed, all businesses were nationalized, capitalism was abolished, and hundreds of thousands were either killed or taken to re-education camps.

The 20-year-long war had devastated the country and left it without an industrial base for self-sufficiency which proved fatal as the communist government of Vietnam was left without any allies to help re-build the country. Over a million Vietnamese citizens were forced to flee the country in search of a new life. Most refugees fled by boats by sea, leading to the harrowing images of " Vietnamese boat people." The number of boat people leaving Vietnam and arriving safely in another country totaled almost 800,000 between 1975 and 1995. Several tens of thousands of refugees eventually returned to Vietnam, either voluntarily or involuntarily.

[[File:Cball-Laos.png]] Laotian Civil War
WIP

=== Third Indochina War === WIP

[[File:Đổi Mới.png]] Đổi Mới
Đổi Mới - Đổi Mới which means "renovation" or "innovation" in Vietnamese is the name given to the economic reforms initiated by the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) during the late 1980s with the supposed goal of creating a "socialist-oriented market economy". In the early 1990s, Vietnam accepted World Bank reform advice for market liberalization and the number of private enterprises increased, and investment from foreign corporations was encouraged thus moving Vietnam further and further away from Ho Chi Minh's vision of a communist society. As a result of vast privatization and economic reforms, Vietnam underwent a miraculous economic transformation in the 1990s. However, income inequality, negative environmental effects, exploitation by both domestic and foreign corporations, and high levels of corruption and nepotism still plague Vietnam to this day.


 * [[File:Marketsoc.png]] Nguyễn Văn Linh - WIP


 * [[File:Reform.png]] Võ Văn Kiệt - One of the most important advocates for Đổi Mới was Võ Văn Kiệt who served as Prime Minister of Vietnam from 1991 to 1997. Võ Văn Kiệt can be seen as Vietnam's equivalent of Deng Xiaoping as he oversaw his nation's return to the world arena after decades of war and isolation and normalized relations with the US, ending 20 years of formal mutual enmity and American embargo after the fall of Saigon. Võ Văn Kiệt's advocacy for privatization and deregulation of the economy was met with much criticism from more conservative Party members and the CPV just like its Chinese counterpart became plagued by power struggles and factionalism between reformists and conservative members.


 * [[File:Authcap.png]] Nguyễn Tấn Dũng - WIP


 * [[File:Consocf.png]] Nguyễn Phú Trọng - WIP

[[File:Cball-Laos.png]] Laos
Kaysone Phomvihane Thought builds upon  Marxism-Leninism and  Ho Chi Minh Thought developed by Kaysone Phomvihane, the first leader of the  Lao People's Revolutionary Party and is a variant of Marxism-Leninism adapted to circumstances and special time peiods of  Laos. It includes views on the issues of basic principles of the Laotian Revolution, specifically the application and development of Marxism-Leninism to the material conditions of Laos.

How to Draw
Ho_flag.svg The flag of Ho Chi Minh thought is basically the Vietnamese flag.
 * 1) Draw a ball,
 * 2) Colour the ball red,
 * 3) In the centre, draw a yellow star,
 * 4) Add the eyes and you're done!

Friends

 * [[File: ML.png]] Marxism–Leninism - My influence.
 * [[File: Castro.png]] Castroism - My fellow communist friend, and closest ally, dedicated to crushing imperialism, bringing progress and liberation for the masses.
 * [[File: Agsoc.png]] Agrarian Socialism - Welcome to the rice fields!
 * [[File:Parti.png]] Particracy - The CPV is the sole legal party of Vietnam and the protector of the socialist revolution.
 * [[File: Modnat.png]] Patriotism - Based!
 * [[File:Orthlen.png]] Leninism - Based!
 * [[File:Leftnat.png]] Left-Wing Nationalism - Literally me!
 * [[File:Khrusch.png]] Khrushchevism - Thanks for your support during the war.

Frenemies

 * [[File: Stalin.png]] Stalinism - Thanks for recognizing me but why did you refuse to my invasion of South Vietnam?
 * [[File:3princ.png]] Tridemism - One of my main inspirations but I turned on you later as I banned all other political parties in Vietnam.
 * [[File: Mao.png]] Maoism - True Chinese comrade! He inspired me, but later betrayed me.
 * [[File: AnAg.png]] Agrarian Anarchism - I love seeing fellow agrarians, but please get organized, comrades.
 * [[File: Farm.png]] Agrarianism - Another fellow agrarian but he is skeptic about the economics of socialism.
 * [[File: Sorelia.png]] National Syndicalism - Comrade who wants to return to simpler times, but why isn't he communist!
 * [[File:Tito.png]] Titoism - We became more similar with time.
 * [[File:Authcap.png]] Authoritarian Capitalism - My current self due to actions of rightists like Võ Văn Kiệt and Nguyễn Tấn Dũng. However, General Secretary of Communist Party of Vietnam, Nguyễn Phú Trọng does not seem to happy about it.
 * [[File:Klep.png]] Kleptocracy - Corruption is a big problem in Modern Vietnam. However, actions have been taken to reduce it.
 * [[File: Necon.png]] Neoconservatism - I remember when I absolutely wrecked you in the 1970s using the forest and gave you flashbacks, but after Doi Moi reforms we became friends because we both oppose China.
 * [[File: Dengf.png]] Dengism - Once we were mortal enemies but now I kinda admit that we followed the same path since I initiated the Doi Moi reforms. China is also one of Vietnam's largest trade partners which has received much domestic backlash.

Enemies

 * [[File: Trot.png]] Trotskyism - ...Red Imperialism?
 * [[File:Persondignity.png]] Person Dignity Theory - Fuck you Diem! Neocolonial puppet.
 * [[File: Polpot.png]] Pol Potism - CAN YOU PLEASE NOT GENOCIDE VIETNAMESE PEOPLE FFS!
 * [[File: Monarch.png]] Monarchism - Haha Monarchy go bye bye!
 * [[File: Imp.png]] Imperialism - Well, France, if only if you could take your own advice in exclaiming vive la révolution!
 * [[File:Native.png]] Montagnard Nationalists - GOD DAMNIT! STOP TRYING TO SUCCEED FROM US!
 * [[File: Thaifash.png]] Thai Fascism - F*ck you Plaek Phibunsongkhram and Thanom Kittikachorn, imperialist collaborators!
 * [[File:Ilminism.png]] Ilminism - You support [[File:Cball-SouthVietnam.png]] South Vietnam?! THEN I'LL SUPPORT [[File:Cball-North_Korea.png]] NORTH KOREA!
 * [[File:Woodrow.png]] Wilsonianism- I ASKED FOR YOUR HELP AND YOU IGNORED ME YOU RACIST IMPERIALIST PIG!
 * [[File:Showa-kanmuri.png]] Showa Statism - Japanese go home!
 * [[File:AnEn.png]] Anti-Environmentalism - NOOOOO!!! I NEED THOSE TREES TO HIDE IN!!!

Literature

 * Ho Chi Minh on Revolution - Selected Writings

Wikipedia

 * Ho Chi Minh Thought
 * Ho Chi Minh
 * Communist Party of Vietnam
 * Viet Cong
 * Viet Minh

Articles

 * Undeniable values of Ho Chi Minh Thought
 * Values of Ho Chi Minh Thought confirmed in new era

Videos

 * The Vietnam War Explained In 25 Minutes | Vietnam War Documentary by The Life Guide

Gallery
Hồ Chí Minhizm 胡志明思想