AFP
HANOI: On February 17, 1979, after months of verbal and armed clashes, China launched a massive offensive against Vietnam to teach its communist ally “a lesson” for becoming too independent for Beijing’s liking.
Known as the Third Indochina War, the roots of the brief but bloody conflict lay in the ideological rivalries between China and the Soviet Union.
During the war against the United States, Moscow supplied Vietnam with vital military aid. After the end of that conflict, Sino-Vietnamese relations were further strengthened when Hanoi rejoined the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (Comecon), created by Moscow in 1949.
Conversely, relations with China, which was establishing contacts with the United States, deteriorated further. Initially, the Chinese said their offensive was “limited” and not a claim on Vietnamese territory.
Beijing’s declared objective was to punish Vietnam, whose troops had six weeks earlier invaded Cambodia to topple the Khmer Rouge regime of Pol Pot, who was supported by China.
The invasion of Cambodia was the final straw for Beijing, which decided it was time to put back in its place a Vietnam which was increasingly defying China’s authority in the region and had repressed its ethnic Chinese Hoa community, analysts said. Beijing also believed Vietnam had shown a lack of gratitude for valuable Chinese support during the war against the French and at the start of the conflict with the Americans.
Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping launched the Vietnam offensive “to teach them a ‘lesson’,” recalled Jean-Claude Pomonti, long-time regional correspondent for the French newspaper Le Monde.
For China it was “a semi-success or semi-failure—the Vietnamese resisted well,” he said, but “it was no disgrace: Deng, who detested the Vietnamese, (meant to) put them on the right path.” “China wanted to attack us to force us to withdraw our troops from Cambodia,” said retired Vietnamese Lieutenant-General Vu Xuan Vinh. “But we were able to use many local forces. We did not fall into the trap.”
The Chinese operation was preceded by an intense artillery bombardment against several locations along the 1,400km frontier between the two countries.
Chinese troops then penetrated dozens of kilometres into northern Vietnam to take control of several towns, notably Lang Son, Cao Bang and Lao Cai, before withdrawing a month later on March 16. There is no reliable figure for the number of casualties, which varies according to source and country, but the war did claim tens of thousands of lives.
Both sides said they had won, but the Chinese People’s Liberation Army failed to deal a decisive blow in its attack against a much smaller adversary.
Known as the Third Indochina War, the roots of the brief but bloody conflict lay in the ideological rivalries between China and the Soviet Union.
During the war against the United States, Moscow supplied Vietnam with vital military aid. After the end of that conflict, Sino-Vietnamese relations were further strengthened when Hanoi rejoined the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (Comecon), created by Moscow in 1949.
Conversely, relations with China, which was establishing contacts with the United States, deteriorated further. Initially, the Chinese said their offensive was “limited” and not a claim on Vietnamese territory.
Beijing’s declared objective was to punish Vietnam, whose troops had six weeks earlier invaded Cambodia to topple the Khmer Rouge regime of Pol Pot, who was supported by China.
The invasion of Cambodia was the final straw for Beijing, which decided it was time to put back in its place a Vietnam which was increasingly defying China’s authority in the region and had repressed its ethnic Chinese Hoa community, analysts said. Beijing also believed Vietnam had shown a lack of gratitude for valuable Chinese support during the war against the French and at the start of the conflict with the Americans.
Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping launched the Vietnam offensive “to teach them a ‘lesson’,” recalled Jean-Claude Pomonti, long-time regional correspondent for the French newspaper Le Monde.
For China it was “a semi-success or semi-failure—the Vietnamese resisted well,” he said, but “it was no disgrace: Deng, who detested the Vietnamese, (meant to) put them on the right path.” “China wanted to attack us to force us to withdraw our troops from Cambodia,” said retired Vietnamese Lieutenant-General Vu Xuan Vinh. “But we were able to use many local forces. We did not fall into the trap.”
The Chinese operation was preceded by an intense artillery bombardment against several locations along the 1,400km frontier between the two countries.
Chinese troops then penetrated dozens of kilometres into northern Vietnam to take control of several towns, notably Lang Son, Cao Bang and Lao Cai, before withdrawing a month later on March 16. There is no reliable figure for the number of casualties, which varies according to source and country, but the war did claim tens of thousands of lives.
Both sides said they had won, but the Chinese People’s Liberation Army failed to deal a decisive blow in its attack against a much smaller adversary.
