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Ho Chi Minh's Life

  
 
 
 Ho Chi Minh was born Nguyen Sinh Cung on May 19, 1890 in Hoang Tru, Vietnam. Ho traveled to many places searching for knowledge about communism. During his early life, Ho worked on an ocean liner as an assistant pastry chef. He later moved to Paris, talking to Vietnamese about independence saying, “The budding revolutionary couldn't have found a better place to feed his nationalist appetite." World War I arose , and Bolsheviks in Russia rose to power, which ended colonialism. 
 
   The French Communist Party and the Intercolonial Union were founded with the help of Ho Chi Minh. He was put under surveillance by the French police because he was apart of so many Pro-communist organizations.  
 
   Ho changed his name  from Nguyen Tat Thanh, Nguyen Ai Quoc, and then to Ho Chi Minh. The British put Ho behind bars in The Victoria Prison in Hong Kong. However, Ho talked to an infirmary employee to report him dead. In 1933 he escaped on a ship heading to Shanghai. Later, he traveled to Moscow educating himself, to free Vietnam. He attended the University of Oriental Workers and learned  strategies. Ho was sent to Canton, China to help the Russian advisor with the new revolutionary Chinese government. He taught Marxist theory and how to attract converts to communism. He made the trip back to Moscow safely, escaping China when Chiang Kai- Shek (president of Republic of China) turned on his many allies.
 

    After many years away,  Ho Chi Minh traveled back to Vietnam. He founded a group known as the Vietminh (Vietcong); the Vietminh was a fighting force for North Vietnam to keep the Japanese and French out of Vietnam. The Japanese invaded the North and controlled Vietnam the way the French had. However, they gave orders to the emperor, by force, from behind the scenes. The French regained control of Indochina and unsucessfully attempted to fight back against the Japanese. The Japanese finally surrendered and granted the Vietnamese their independence.

    In August, Bo Dai abdicated his place as emperor. Later, Ho Chi Minh became the President of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

   A peace treaty was signed by Vietnam and France that allowed 25,000 French troops to re-enter northern Vietnam for 5 years. The Vietminh were still on guard in the event that the French attempted to break the agreement.  A fight broke out in Haiphong, the French attacked  after the Vietminh ignored their order to evacuate their people from Haiphong. 

    The war between North and South Vietnam erupted because Ho Chi Minh wanted to unite the country.  The South Vietnamese were afraid that Ho would unite Vietnam under a communist rule so their ruler, Diem, government fought back at the Vietminh.

   He died from heart failure.  His wish that Vietnam was united was granted after his death, when the rest of the Vietminh defeated the south forces. In Ho Chi Minh's honor, Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City.

                            

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Photograph of Ho Chi Minh

 
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