I have 70 answers, I’m the “cuvette” of Dien Bien Phu

At 7:20 a.m. on November 20, 1953, two paratrooper commandos under the command of battalion commanders Marcel Bigeard and Jean Bréchignac took off from their base in Hanoi in the north. Operation Custer had just begun. The goal: to drop French soldiers on Dien Bien Phu in northern Vietnam, a vast plain 15 kilometers long and seven kilometers wide. Four months later, it would be the scene of the bloodiest battle since World War II. Caged in secrecy, the goal of the operation was to retake the valley from the Viet Minh, a Vietnamese nationalist and communist movement, and to establish an air and land base there. It also involved protecting Laos, with which France had signed a treaty of independent association a month earlier.

Flooding

On the night of March 13, the battle really began when five Viet Minh divisions under General Vo Nguyen Giap launched an assault into the valley. It was a veritable torrent of artillery fire, and the French General Staff had clearly underestimated the power of Viet Minh artillery, which benefited from large supplies from neighboring communist China. Within two days, the surge had killed 500 French and 2,000 Vietnamese.

The Viet Minh would eventually retake strongholds and hilltops, but only at the cost of fierce French resistance. Between March 13 and May 7, 1954, French soldiers faced an enemy that outnumbered them four to one: 3,300 people died ; 10,300 people were captured and sent to concentration camps for “re-education”, 70% of whom never returned.

READ ALSODien Bien Phu: French positions fall on May 7, 1954

Strategic mistake?

The choice of confrontation at Dien Bien Phu has been recognized by history. Was it a futile sacrifice? The brave French soldiers encountered contradictions and delays in French diplomacy in particular. In fact, at Dien Bien Phu, the Viet Minh troops suffered real bloodshed (20,000 of the 48,000 soldiers were killed).

Travel back to the “hell” of the bloodiest battle since World War II.