From underground D67 to spring of victory

The memoir "The General Headquarters in the Spring of Victory" by General Vo Nguyen Giap (performed by Pham Chi Nhan) was drafted and prepared for many years.

When he started writing his memoirs, General Vo Nguyen Giap had turned 90 years old.

The book is 370 pages thick, first printed in 2000 by the National Political Publishing House. With rich sources of information, the author recounts a heroic and glorious period of history of the whole nation.

Through the book, the headquarters' working location is made public. It is the one-story D67 building, located at 9 Hoang Dieu Street (Hanoi). It has a system of underground tunnels 9 meters deep. This is where 1,000 meetings of the Politburo and the Central Military Commission took place to make strategic decisions during the anti-American period. This place experienced tense days but still ensured normal operations from the commander-in-chief to generals, officers and dozens of soldiers.

Headquarters always keeps up with the times . After the Paris Agreement was signed, we immediately seized and accelerated the opportunity. Through reconnaissance battles in Thuong Duc (October 1974), Phuoc Long (January 1975), we showed that our "position" had grown dramatically.

Realizing that the US was no longer capable of re-intervening, after much deliberation, at the end of 1974 the Politburo concluded that the strategic opening battle would be Buon Ma Thuot. The diversion and troop concealment had to be kept absolutely secret. This was a skillful and artistic combination.

The encirclement and division were completed, and the General Headquarters decided to open fire at 6:30 a.m. on March 10. From then on, the entire system was shaken. In the book we see that "time" goes with "situation", our situation always maintains the initiative, accompanied by force and then by strategy . In addition to the strength of weapons, there is also the strength of the warrior spirit, the strength of the people's hearts. We maximize the strength of military mobilization, of attacks from the outside and combine with uprisings from the inside...

Reading the General's memoirs, we see the particularly important role of the Supreme Command and the strategic staff agencies of the General Headquarters throughout the fierce and long-term battle of wits and strength between us and the enemy. The General recounted: “In the spring of 1975, the Supreme Command demonstrated its strategic talent, understanding the enemy and itself, and comprehensively managed the war on a national scale, urgently, flexibly, cautiously, and with certainty of victory, achieving total victory in the extremely complicated international situation in the mid-1970s. The campaigns all took place according to a unified plan of the General Command, with coordination in both the plan and the campaign situation, creating premises for each other and together creating conditions for the formation of the final strategic decisive blow.”

Through the memoirs of General Vo Nguyen Giap, we clearly see the Vietnamese spirit and intelligence at decisive historical moments: sharp, creative, decisive, seizing opportunities and creating great opportunities, making great efforts to wipe out the enemy.

These fascinating and informative pages clearly depict the intelligence of a talented group of the first guard who shone brightly at a decisive historical moment leading our nation to glory.

With a calm and kind nature, he talked about the leaders, generals, and officers from the General Headquarters to the leaders of the battlefields - his comrades and teammates - in a friendly, sincere, and extremely respectful manner.

This is a book about military affairs but it is also a blend of political elements that shows a sharp analytical perspective of the times, showing that in an era where every development in a country cannot help but consider regional and global connections.

The book has pages written in a memoir style through which readers can feel in a very unique way the General's working style and humane behavior. Upon hearing the news that the first B52 plane had crashed in the sky of Hanoi, the General could not contain his emotions when he saw that the B52 was no longer an inviolable monster : ''I stepped out of the command post. It was cold and drizzling. But my heart was unusually warm,...(*)

In the final chapter, the author summarizes a historical period that is meaningful for protecting and building the country, in which the most important issue is still the issue of the united front of the people, having to absorb the art of fighting from our ancestors, in which we understand ourselves and others thoroughly and always for the benefit of the people and the nation.

Although the world and regional situation is complicated, those valuable lessons still retain their value in the cause of protecting and building the Fatherland.

NGUYEN VIET THANH

Source: https://baohaiduong.vn/tu-long-dat-d67-den-mua-xuan-toan-thang-409029.html