Nearly 21,000 modified bicycles, each carrying 200-300 kg, contributed to solving the problem of transporting military provisions and weapons for the Dien Bien Phu campaign.
On December 6, 1953, the Politburo decided to launch a general offensive campaign against the "impregnable fortress" of the French army in Dien Bien Phu. According to calculations by the General Staff of the Vietnam People's Army and the General Department of Supply, to serve more than 87,000 people on the front line (54,000 soldiers and 33,000 laborers), it was necessary to mobilize at least 16,000 tons of rice (not including rice for laborers), 100 tons of meat, 100 tons of vegetables, 80 tons of salt and about 12 tons of sugar...
Food supplies for the battlefield were mainly mobilized from the Viet Bac region (Cao Bang, Bac Kan, Lang Son, Ha Giang, Tuyen Quang, Thai Nguyen), Inter-zone 3 (Hai Phong, Kien An, Thai Binh, Hung Yen, Hai Duong) and Inter-zone 4 (Thanh Hoa, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Quang Tri, Thua Thien Hue). Most of them had to be transported over a distance of 500-600 km, mostly through steep and dangerous passes, and were frequently bombed by French aircraft.
On July 27, 1953, the Prime Minister decided to establish the Central Front Supply Council chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Pham Van Dong. Its mission was to direct all central and local levels to mobilize maximum human and material resources to serve the battlefield. In addition to more than 530 trucks, one of the main forces serving the logistics of the Dien Bien Phu campaign was the pack-cart.
Bicycle packers on their way to the campaign. Photo: VNA
Bicycles were very rare at that time, the most popular were Peugeot or Lincoln made in France and only wealthy families could afford them. Each Peugeot was worth a fortune, but in response to the call of the local Front Supply Council, many families did not hesitate to support.
According to statistics, during the Dien Bien Phu campaign, Viet Bac provinces mobilized more than 8,000 bicycles, Inter-zone 3 more than 1,700 vehicles, Inter-zone 4 more than 12,000 vehicles.
Bicycle improvement initiative
According to the documents of the Vietnam Military History Museum, one of the first people to make improvements to help bicycles carry more goods was Mr. Ma Van Thang, from Thanh Ba, Phu Tho province. While he was the Chairman of the Administrative Resistance Committee of Thanh Minh commune, Thanh Ba district, in early 1954, Mr. Thang joined a group of porters and was assigned to be the leader of the bicycle pack group of Phu Tho province.
The group of 100 people, codenamed T20, had the main task of transporting goods from Au Lac warehouse, Yen Bai province, to the foot of Pha Din pass, Son La province, a distance of more than 200 km through many dangerous steep passes. Mr. Thang was assigned the Lincon, at first each trip could only carry an average of 80-100 kg of rice.
While climbing the steep pass, Mr. Thang and his teammates came up with the idea of tying a small piece of bamboo to the handlebars. The bamboo piece, nearly a meter long, made it easier to control because the bicycle was very bulky because of the rice sacks. Another piece of bamboo was tied to the longitudinal axis of the saddle, about 50 cm higher, to help maintain balance and make it easier to push the bike with the shoulder.
The workers also reinforced the frame and the luggage rack with iron and tied wood to increase the rigidity when loading goods. They also used cloth, old clothes or small pieces of inner tubes to line the inside to increase the durability of the tires.
Two three-legged wooden stools were also added, one to lean on while resting, the other to block the bike when going down steep mountain passes. With this creative approach, Mr. Thang and the T20 pack-bike team have gradually increased the carrying capacity to 200-300 kg per trip.
Mr. Ma Van Thang's bicycle is on display at the Dien Bien Phu Victory Museum. Photo: Hoang Phuong
The improved cart can carry more than 10 times more than a porter on foot, minimizing the consumption of rice along the way for the transport groups. In addition, the cart can also operate well on narrow, rough or muddy roads that cars or other means of transport cannot use.
Mr. Thang's initiative was later learned by many people, but there were also skeptics. Once, while transporting goods to Nghia Lo intersection, Yen Bai province, his vehicle was suddenly inspected, at this time the weight of goods on the vehicle was up to 352 kg. This number was considered a record for a single trip, confirmed by the Campaign Support Committee, and praised on the entire front.
At the end of the campaign, the T20 Phu Tho bicycle packers transported about 85 tons of goods, exceeding the target by 15%, and were awarded the emulation flag. During the entire campaign, Mr. Thang alone transported 3,700 kg of goods over a total length of 2,100 km. The bike he used was recognized as the bike with the highest productivity in the Dien Bien Phu campaign.
Bicycle carrying record 345.5 kg
The improved bicycle was then widely popularized throughout the Viet Bac, Lien khu 3, and Lien khu 4 regions. During the Dien Bien Phu campaign, Thanh Hoa was the locality that mobilized the most of this vehicle with about 3,500 units.
According to the historical documents of Thanh Hoa Provincial Party Committee, the Thanh Hoa town resistance porter caravan was the earliest to be established with nearly 100 people and vehicles. Next were the porter caravans of Quang Xuong, Hoang Hoa, Dong Son, Thach Thanh, Ha Trung, Nong Cong districts...
Mr. Trinh Quang Them, Captain of the Fire Brigade of Hop Ly Commune, Trieu Son District, who participated in the bicycle pack team serving the Dien Bien Phu campaign, said that around the end of 1953, "everywhere in Thanh Hoa was seething with the spirit of going to battle". That same year, Mr. Them volunteered to join the local bicycle pack team.
After a short training period in the district, he went to Pho Cong, Ngoc Lac district to receive a truck to transport goods to Lai Chau, Son La. The road was over 500 km of steep passes, but every trip, his and his teammates' trucks were loaded with food. "Every day we rested and then marched at night to avoid bombing planes," Mr. Them said.
The steep mountain pass to the Northwest was already arduous, and marching at night made it even more difficult. On average, Mr. Them's packcart convoy traveled 15-20 km per day. Rain or shine, they traveled without stopping.
At that time, most poor farmers like Mr. Them did not own bicycles and did not know how to ride them. When assigned to transport food, everyone was given a brief training on how to drive a bicycle, but they only practiced pushing and carrying, not learning how to ride. "Many people are very good at carrying food but do not know how to ride a bicycle," Mr. Them said.
More than 11,000 porters from Thanh Hoa province gathered at food warehouses in Cam Thuy district and Hoi Xuan town of Quan Hoa district (more than 120 km from Thanh Hoa city) to organize and reorganize the team. Strong people and good vehicles were assigned to the front line, average people to the midline, and women and the elderly to the rear.
People of towns in Thanh Hoa saw off a group of porters on bicycles to serve the front line in 1954. Photo courtesy
The truck teams are organized by district, each district has a company or also called a C. Below the company is the platoon with each unit having about 30-40 people and vehicles. The platoon is divided into squads of about 15 people forming tam tam groups (three people in one). When going downhill, one person holds the steering wheel, two people pull the truck to keep it from rolling. When going uphill, one person goes in front to tie a rope around the neck of the truck and pull it up, the person behind uses force to push.
Each bike pack team also has a vehicle to carry tools, spare parts, and a charcoal stove to patch nine inner tubes for damaged bikes. This "mobile repair shop" is ready to change tires, tighten rims, and weld frames to ensure the entire team marches to support on time.
The movement of "carrying a lot, going fast" became more and more widespread, encouraging porters to increase the weight of goods they carried. At first, each vehicle only carried 100-200 kg per trip, later increasing to 300 kg and more. Among the porters in Thanh Hoa at that time, the most prominent was "porter-carrier champion" Cao Van Ty, who always carried 315 kg.
Mr. Bui Tin - who was twice honored with the Ho Chi Minh Badge and the Third Class Military Exploit Medal, carried 320 kg during the campaign. In particular, the "Thanh Hoa motorbike taxi champion" Trinh Ngoc with the record of transporting 345.5 kg in one trip, is considered a legend on the steep, dangerous mountain passes when transporting goods from Thanh Hoa to Dien Bien Phu.
"Our spirit at that time was very determined. Because of the assigned mission, no matter how difficult it was, we had to overcome it, no matter how hard it was, we had to go. Bringing a kilogram of food to Dien Bien was extremely difficult, it was blood and bones, not normal," said former frontline laborer Trinh Quang Them.
Mr. Them said that even when thinking back on that road, he still couldn't imagine how he could get through it, "like a legendary story". The invention of the bicycle was truly a "miracle", because if he had to carry 20 kg each time, he wouldn't know when he would have had enough provisions for the campaign.
Mr. Trinh Ngoc's bicycle, which carried more than 345 kg of food during the Dien Bien Phu campaign. Photo: Le Hoang
Thanh Hoa transported 56% of food and 40% of provisions for the campaign.
During the Dien Bien Phu campaign, Thanh Hoa was a major rear base, mobilizing more than 180,000 porters on foot and 11,000 porters on bicycles. The entire province had more than one million people (with about 27 million workdays) participating in the campaign, equal to half of the province's population at that time.
Along with cars, boats, ox carts, horse carts..., Thanh Hoa's convoy of more than 3,500 bicycles carried out nearly 16,000 trips transporting food, medicine, and ammunition to the front. The province transported to the battlefield more than 9,000 tons of rice, accounting for 56% of the total amount of rice for the front line; 450 tons of dried fish, 2,000 pigs, 1,300 cows, 250,000 eggs, 150 tons of beans, 20,000 bottles of fish sauce and hundreds of tons of vegetables, accounting for 40% of the food used during the entire campaign.
Nationwide, during the entire Dien Bien Phu campaign, the Viet Minh mobilized nearly 21,000 bicycles of all kinds. Together with 11,800 rafts, more than 7,000 wheelbarrows, more than 2,000 buffalo carts, horse carts... they transported more than 25,000 tons of food, 266 tons of salt, 62 tons of sugar, 577 tons of meat, 565 tons of dry food, 1,200 tons of ammunition, more than 1,700 tons of gasoline and 177 tons of other materials.
French journalist Giuyn Roa in his book La Bataille de dien Bien phu said that "It was not Chinese aid that defeated General Navarre (Commander-in-Chief of the expeditionary army in Indochina), but Peugeot bicycles carrying 200-300 kg of goods, pushed by human power - people who were not full and slept on the ground with nylon sheets. General Navarre was defeated not by the means but by the intelligence and determination to win of the opponent".
When summarizing the Dien Bien Phu campaign, General Vo Nguyen Giap wrote in his memoir Dien Bien - Historical Rendezvous: "The pack-bike transport has become the second most important transport arm, after motor vehicles."
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