France’s military involvement in Vietnam began when it sent warships in 1847, ostensibly to protect Christians from the ruling emperor Gia Long. Before the 1880s, the French controlled Vietnam. In the early 20th century, Vietnamese nationalism began to rise, clashing with the French colonial rulers. By the time of World War II, a number of groups sought Vietnamese independence but as Vo Nguyen Giap—who would build Vietnam’s post–WWII army—expressed it, the communists were the best organized and most action-oriented of these groups. During the Second World War, Vichy France could do little to protect its colony from Japanese occupation. Post-war, the French tried to re-establish control but faced organized opposition from the Viet Minh (short for Viet Nam Doc Lap Dong Minh Hoi, or League for the Independence of Vietnam), led by Ho Chi Minh and Giap. The French suffered a major defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, leading to negotiations that ended with the Geneva Agreements, July 21, 1954. Under those agreements, Cambodia and Laos—which had been part of the French colony—received their independence. Vietnam, however, was divided at the 17th parallel. Ho Chi Minh led a communist government in the north (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) with its capital at Hanoi, and a new Republic of South Vietnam was established under President Ngo Dinh Diem, with its capital at Saigon.

The division was supposed to be temporary: elections were to be held in both sections in 1956 to determine the country’s future. When the time came, however, Diem resisted the elections; the more populous north would certainly win. Hanoi re-activated the Viet Minh to conduct guerilla operations in the south, with the intent of destabilizing President Diem’s government. In July 1959, North Vietnam’s leaders passed an ordinance called for continued socialist revolution in the north and a simultaneous revolution in South Vietnam. Some 80,000 Vietnamese from the south had moved to the north after the Geneva Agreements were signed. (Ten times as many Vietnamese had fled the north, where the Communist Party was killing off its rivals, seizing property, and oppressing the large Catholic population.) A cadre was drawn from those who went north; they were trained, equipped and sent back to the south to aid in organizing and guiding the insurgency. (Some in the North Vietnamese government thought the course of war in the south was unwise, but they were overruled.) Although publicly the war in the south was described as a civil war within South Vietnam, it was guided, equipped and reinforced by the communist leadership in Hanoi. The insurgency was called the National Liberation Front (PLF); however, its soldiers and operatives became more commonly known by their opponents as the Viet Cong (VC), short for Vietnamese Communists. The VC were often supplemented by units of the People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN), more often called simply the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) by those fighting against it. Following the Tet Offensive of 1968, the NVA had to assume the major combat role because the VC was decimated during the offensive. A different feeling prevailed among many within the U.S. government. The communist takeover of China and subsequent war in Korea (1950-53) against North Korean and Chinese troops had focused a great deal of attention on Southeast Asia as a place to take a strong stand against the spread of communism. During President Dwight Eisenhower‘s administration (1953–1961), financial aid was given to pay South Vietnam’s military forces and American advisors were sent to help train them. The first American fatality was Air Force Technical Sergeant Richard B. Fitzgibbon, Jr., killed June 8, 1956. (His son, Marine Corps lance corporal Richard Fitzgibbon III would be killed in action in Vietnam September 7, 1965. They were the only father-son pair to die in Vietnam.) In July 1959 Major Dale Buis and Master Sergeant Chester Ovnand were off duty when they were killed during an attack at Bien Hoa.

Ho Chi Minh had been educated in Paris. There is considerable debate over whether he was primarily nationalist or communist, but he was not especially anti-Western. (An American medic treated him during World War II, probably saving his life.) Ho attempted to contact Eisenhower to discuss Vietnam but received no answer. “Ike” may not have seen the message, but at any rate he was focused on establishing NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) as a wall against additional communist advances in Europe and was intent on securing France’s participation in NATO. That would have made any negotiation with Ho politically ticklish. A lingering question of the war is what might have happened if Eisenhower and Ho had arranged a meeting; possibly, an accord could have been reached, or possibly Ho was simply seeking to limit American involvement, in order to more easily depose the Diem government.

Water, it appeared, was a very good torturing method. People were held upside down in water, put in boiling hot water, were splashed with boiling hot water, and so forth.

Another way to torture a person was to put a spike in a boot, in the heel with the pointy part up, and have the person put their foot in it. This effectively crippled the person, as well as giving excruciating pain.

A popular torturing method was also a popular medical cure 2,500 years ago. Leeches. Leeches would be placed on the victim's exposed skin and the victim would feel the bite of many leeches sucking the blood out of him. 

There was also the classic: baby bashing. In a way to cultivate the growth of Cambodia and also to cow the people into obedience, soldiers would literally bash babies against trees, which naturally would kill them. Mothers wept, fathers swore vengeance, but they couldn't do anything. All they could do was try to protect their other children.