fco_853476 - FRENCH UNION - FRENCH INDOCHINA 50 Centimes nickel 1946 Paris

FRENCH UNION - FRENCH INDOCHINA

(1946-1954)

Indochina had been occupied by Japan at the end of World War II. After a period of hesitation in 1945, the bombardment of Haiphong and the massacres of Hanoi, the war in Indochina began in 1946, initiated by the communist Ho Chi Minh (1890-1969) who used the very lively Vietnamese national feeling , to proclaim himself President of the Republic with Giap as Minister of Defense and the former Emperor Bao Dai as adviser. The Viet Minh seizes Hanoi by treachery. The conflict will last eight years and erase eighty years of French presence in Southeast Asia.