Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam and Domino Thoery

Ho Chi Minh
and
the Vietnam War
(1890 – 1969)

He was a sailor, a school teacher and he studied French. He moved to Paris, read books about Karl Marx and later he became a communist and helped found the French Communist Party on 1920. He believed that all communists should go back to their countries to guide and lead the people so they could fight for their freedom and independence. He could not return to Vietnam because he was in danger of being arrested by the French autorithies that controlled Vietnam, so he moved to China near the border of Vietnam. When the French surrendered to the Japanese, Ho and other exiled members saw this as an opportunity and formed an organization called the Vietminh and began a guerilla campaign against the Japanese. They received supplies (weapons, etc. ) from the Soviet Union and after Pearl Harbor, they also received from the USA.
After World War II ended they took ever the control of Vietnam. In 1945, Ho Chi Minh announced the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. While this happened, F. D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill and J. Stalin decided that Vietnam would be divided in two: the northern half under Chinese control and the southern half under British control.
France refused to recognize the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and tried to re-establish control. In 1946, Britain agreed to remove its troops and China also agreed in exchange that France would give up its rights to territory in China. Mao Zedong helped to defeat Chaing Kai-Shek, giving the Vietminh a base so they could have a better chance against the French forces. France tried to ease the situation and offered to help set up a national government and promised to give Vietnam its independence. Ho Chi Minh with other leaders did not believe this and continued the war.

In 1954, Vietnam was divided and Ho Chi Minh led the North. Communist with capital in Hanoi. South with Ngo Dinh Diem as the "puppet" western leader with Saigon as capital. The South refused in 1955 to hold elections so they could reunify Vietnam as it was established in the Berlin Conference the year before. The Communist government declared that they wanted to unify Vietnam and control it. The communists made guerillas against Diem government and created the National Liberation Front. The Diem government had american support with the Friendship and cooperation treaty as agreed with president Kennedy. In 1963, Coupe d'etat, they were able to defeat Diem government, so communism advanced. A year later, Lyndon B. Johnson decided to bomb North Vietnam and sent troops to the south.
This war went for a long time killing thousands, leaving great impacts in society and giving great damage to American politics. After a lot of civil protests, global opinions that were against it and the Nixon Doctrine, in 1973 they were peace talks but it was not until 1975 that the National Liberation Front was declared as victorious ending the war.

The Domino Theory



It was an american theory that believed that if one country was communist that all the other countries would become communist too. IT was reffered to as domino due to the effect there is when a domino piece falls down and it brings down all the other domino pieces aligned after it.

Berlin History

Berlin History

In 1945, after the end of World War II, Germany was divided in sections which were being controlled by different foreign governments. There were 4 sections: British, American, French in the West and Soviet in the East. They started to put restrictions on passing through the sections like the Interzonenpass which people had to carry and show to travel between sections.
Then, many other limitations happened like the Berlin blockade which only lasted a year and then on 1949, the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) was founded. Months later, the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) was founded; this brought the two sections even farther apart and was one of the many causes to the Berlin Wall.
On 1952, the border between East and West Germany was closes, only the borders between East and West Berlin were still open. By 1957, things were very controlled and leaving one part without permission could even lead up to prison. In 1961, the Brandenburg Gate and the sectorial border between East and West Berlin were closed; barriers were built between East and West.
Ten years later on 1971 due to the Four Power’s Agreement over Berlin became visiting easier for West Berlin. In 2 different years, two U.S. presidents tried to end this situation but they were unsuccessful.
Finally on 1989 the Berlin Wall was opened and later in the same year, the Brandenburg Gate was also opened. By 1990, Germany was reunited.

http://www.dailysoft.com/berlinwall/history/berlinwall-timeline.htm

Stalin

Joseph Stalin

(1879 - 1953)

Born on Dec. 21, 1879 on Gori, Georgia, Russian Empire, he was a Soviet politician and dictator. He joined an underground revolutionary group and sided with the Bolshevik fraction of the Russian Social-Democratic Workers' Party in 1903. He was a disciple of Vladimir Lenin, he served in minor party posts and was appointed to the first Bolshevik Central Committee in 1912. He remained active behind the scenes and in exile which lasted from 1913 to 1917, until the Russian Revolution of 1917 brought the Bolsheviks to power. He adopted the name Stalin from Russian stal, “steel”. He served as commissar for state control in the Bolshevik government.

He was a member of the Politburo, and then he became secretary-general of the party's Central Committee. After Lenin's death in 1924, Stalin overcame his rivals, Leon Trotsky, Grigory Zinovyev, Lev Kamenev, Nikolay Bukharin, and Aleksey Rykov, and took control of Soviet politics. In 1928 he inaugurated the Five-Year Plans that radically altered Soviet economic and social structures and resulted in the deaths of many millions. Later, he fixed to eliminate threats to his power through the purge trials and through widespread secret executions and persecution. In World War II he signed the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact, attacked Finland in the Russo-Finnish War, and annexed parts of Eastern Europe to strengthen his western frontiers. In 1941 when Germany invaded Russia, Stalin allied Russia with Britain and the U.S. After the war he consolidated Soviet power in Eastern Europe and built up the Soviet Union as a world military power. He was preparing to build up another purge after the so-called Doctors' Plot when he died on March 5, 1953 in Moscow, Russia, U.S.S.R.. Stalin is remembered for having left a legacy of repression and fear as well as industrial and military power.

http://www.biography.com/articles/Joseph-Stalin-9491723

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