April 30, 1975 | Saigon Falls

[niyad]

April 30, 1975 | Saigon Falls

U.S. Navy Vietnamese families in a helicopter on an American aircraft carrier after being evacuated from Saigon on April 29, 1975, one day before the city was overrun by North Vietnamese forces.

On April 30, 1975, Communist North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces captured the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon, forcing South Vietnam to surrender and bringing about an end to the Vietnam War.

An Associated Press article in the May 1 New York Times reported: “Scores of North Vietnamese tanks, armored vehicles and camouflaged Chinese built trucks rolled to the presidential palace. The president of the former non-Communist Government of South Vietnam, Gen. Duong Van Minh, who had gone on radio and television to announce his administration’s surrender, was taken to a microphone later by North Vietnamese soldiers for another announcement. He appealed to all Saigon troops to lay down their arms and was taken by the North Vietnamese soldiers to an undisclosed destination.”

The fall of Saigon came just over two years after the United States, ally of South Vietnam, pulled out of the Vietnam War with the signing of the Paris Peace Accords. The agreement created a cease-fire between North and South Vietnam, but it did not end the conflict. Fighting resumed by the end of 1973 as the Viet Cong, which still had an estimated 150,000 men positioned in South Vietnam, renewed offensives.

Without the support of United States troops and with limited American aid, the South Vietnamese struggled to stop the advance of North Vietnamese forces. In the spring of 1975, President Nguyen Van Thieu of South Vietnam desperately asked President Gerald R. Ford for support, but Mr. Ford could not provide it. Mr. Thieu resigned on April 21 and fled the country.

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http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/30/april-30-1975-saigon-falls/?_r=0

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fall_of_Saigon

https://www.wbur.org/2015/04/27/saigon-evacuation-massachusetts-marines

http://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/apr/21/40-years-on-from-fall-of-saigon-witnessing-end-of-vietnam-war

http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/29/us/vietnam-saigon-evacuation-anniversary/

http://www.pbs.org/battlefieldvietnam/timeline/index4.html