Ho chi Minh was leader of north Vietnam during the French colonisation of Vietnam and the American Vietnam war. He was actually able to kick out the French and the Americans from his country. I always thought Minh was a wicked communist. But today actually in hisotry class (we study from French government books) there was a small text about Minh talking about how vietnamese women were treated like animals by the French and they got raped by them and that he was fighting for justice. My teacher, he's actually French, (not my french teacher that I always talk about this is a Male one and he's from France) before we read the text he said:"this isn't a joke, this could have happened to your grandmother (cuz Egypt was a British colony) and we went on ready, he then said:"well... Minh hated the French for what a few did, so he hated the whole country just for what a few did"
I just can't stand communism, but I still can't determine of Ho chi Minh is really "a son of b****" like how he's described in Vietnam war movies or a freedom fighter.
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i think a bit of both. he instilled in the vietnamese a sense of pride that they should be able to be an independent nation rather than under the imperialistic thumb. any independent nation should see the value in this sense of patriotism
but he also allowed for internment and programming camps, torture, and allowed etc, etc. and ultimately let Le Duan massively overhaul any utopian vision of communism in favor of a more traditional authoritarian type of rule
To most Vietnamese from/in the Cộng hòa xã hội chủ nghĩa Việt Nam (「Socialist Republic of Vietnam」), 胡志明 ("Hồ Chí Minh") is generally considered a hero.
To Vietnamese who lost the nation to Communist forces & live in exile elsewhere (like the U. S.), he's a villain & not even Vietnamese at all! Apparently, they see him as Beijing's evil spy who took down their free, democratic fatherland of Việt Nam Cộng Hòa (「Republic of Vietnam」). They've even formed a de-facto parallel government-in-exile Chính Phủ Quốc Gia Việt Nam Lâm Thời - Đệ Tam Việt Nam Cộng Hòa (「Provisional National Government Of Vietnam」; also called the「Third Republic of Vietnam」) headquartered in California, while several members of the (rival/partner?) government-in-exile Chính Phủ Lâm Thời Việt Nam Tự Do (「Government of Free Vietnam」) headquartered in Texas were captured in Cambodia and extradited to Vietnam in 1999 and the group dissolved in 2013.
Hanoi offers dual-citizenship to reconcile & re-claim hold of the exile-communities, but the Vietnamese I've met here in the U. S. refuse the offer (and probably have citizenship with the currently-unrecognized government-in-exile). They would rather visit their ('former') fatherland with a foreign passport than partake in the 'Chinese spy''s 'illegitimate' government.
History is just yesterday's news. Today, people will see as heroes/villains such people as Pres. Trump, Pres. Putin, Pres. Duterte, etc. The same thing happened in the past & in other countries.
History & current events have objective facts (ex. 'A human named "Hồ Chí Minh" existed…') & subjective ('… and he was a hero/villain.') perspective to make sense of it all.
The same goes with the Philippines' Emilio Aguinaldo. Manila's Department of Education teaches us he's our truly historic 1st President of the 1st Philippine Republic (founded 1898), which is the 1st REPUBLIC in ALL of ASIA. His last war as President was the Philippine-American War. Washington (which did NOT recognize us and bought us from Madrid) just called him 'Emilio Aguinaldo, Esq.' at most and considered him a leader of an illegitimate rebellion in the Philippine Insurrection (or 'War of Philippine Insurrection' as I saw in a U. S. history book). Most U. S. textbooks don't even mention this war and consider it a campaign in the larger Spanish-American War. Both Beijing & Taipei object to Manila's claim of '1st Republic' due to the 1912 founding of the 中華民國 ("ZhongHua MinGuo";「Republic of China」), which WAS (yes, 'later' BUT) GLOBALLY RECOGNIZED. Anyone can declare independence, right? REAL nations/republics are recognized.
But if we were to disagree and say ANY republic founded earliest counts, Japan's 蝦夷共和国 ("Ezo Kyōwakoku"; 「Republic of Ezo」) wins, since it was founded in 1869. But, Manila discounts this, since the 'Republic of the Philippines' today is a globally-recognized nation, while 'Ezo' today is just a part of Japan: 北海道 ("Hokkaido"; 「North Sea Circuit」) Prefecture.
So, who's right? What is Asia's 1st republic? Like 'Is Hồ Chí Minh a hero or villain?', it depends.
Well most Vietnam war films are made by Americans and Ho Chi Minh was communist so they'd naturally want him to be portrayed badly. On top of that, he successfully defeating the US with roughly half the number of soldiers so he made a mockery of the US. Thats why he's portrayed badly in US media.
But my dad has been to Vietnam, stayed there for around 3 months, and in Vietnam he's seen as a hero who fought off both French colonialists and US invaders. Almost everyone he met only had bad things to say about the Americans, especially when you consider a lot of Vietnamese farm land is still unusable due to Agent Orange and Napalm, not to mention the massive health impact they both put on civilians both at the time and now.
Vietnamese point of view: Hero American point of view: Villain
Because during the Vietnam war when the country was split into Communists and the people who supported the French and the colonization. Ho Chi Minh supported the Communists and wanted Vietnam to have their freedom. So to many he is seen as a Hero instead as a villain towards like Westerners.
Plus communism isn't so bad, it depends on how the leaders of a country use that power. I don't know if it made sense but yeah.
He was certainly no hero, but there is a lot more to his story than what is generally told. He actually spend time in America when he was younger and really respected America initially. He reached out to Harry S. Truman to help him deal with the French, and all his letters were ignored by Truman. SO eventually, he turned to the Soviets and to China to help. Certainly getting into a war with France would not have been wise but Truman could have at least attempted a diplomatic solution.
Well if that be the case it's like batman: dawn of justice. Either you die a hero or you live long enough to become the villain. I guess Minh shoulda died sooner.
He wasn't a villain. We Americans were stupid. Study the origins of the Vietnam War, and that becomes obvious that it was a war that didn't need to happen at all.
In trying to conquer the sovereign nation of South Vietnam, he was an imperialist villain.
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Anonymous
(18-24)
+1 y
Vietnamese communists were more nationalist. Under Ho chi Minh the Vietnamese fought the Japanese, French, the US& allies, Cambodians as well as the Chinese and won. The US made a major mistake in supporting the South Vietnamese government.
I'm not educated enough on the finer details of the conflict to have a concrete opinion.
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Anonymous
(18-24)
1 y
Remember the Vietnamcong were trained by the US army. Ho chi ming worked in America. He worked to get the French, Japanese and Americans out of Vietnam and beat them all.
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Opinion Owner
1 y
Little known fact that after ww2 when ho chi ming declared Vietnamese independence he quoted Thomas Jefferson and the US constitution
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