70 years ago, with its important strategic position, Dien Bien Phu was built by the French army into a powerful group of strongholds that the French called an impregnable fortress. Each stronghold had winding trenches and communication trenches connecting the strongholds together, along with many layers of barbed wire fences surrounding it.
Faced with that situation, our Campaign Command decided to change the combat method from “fight fast, win fast” to “fight steady, advance steadily”. Along with that, the direct assault fighting style was changed to encirclement and encroachment, digging trenches close to the enemy’s stronghold. Instead of an attack on the entire stronghold, we built a siege battlefield, divided the enemy with trenches, moved artillery into safe positions, placed strongholds within firing range, controlled the airport, destroyed each resistance center, and proceeded to strangle the “steel porcupine” in Dien Bien Phu.
To ensure the requirements of artillery mobility, transporting wounded, mobilizing large troops and approaching enemy combat positions, our troops dug two types of trenches. One was the main trench surrounding the entire enemy position in the central sector. The other was the infantry trench from the positions of the units in the forest, cutting across the main trench, advancing into the positions that our troops intended to destroy. The trenches were about 1.7m deep; the main main trench was about 1.2m wide, and the infantry trench was about 0.5m wide to ensure safety from enemy bombs and bullets and to keep the troops secret when moving. After each main trench section, there were branch trenches and frog-shaped trenches to avoid bullets and take shelter.
Dien Bien soldier Nguyen Van Ky of Regiment 176, Division 316 (currently living in Thanh Xuong commune, Dien Bien district) shared: “To ensure secrecy, the digging of trenches was done at night. The tools were only hoes and shovels. Each meter of trench dug was the sweat, tears, and efforts of many people, and one mistake could cost lives. When encountering muddy fields or rainy nights, our soldiers had to dive in the water, using steel helmets to hold the mud and pour away the water, which was extremely hard and arduous. As far as they dug, they had to reinforce and camouflage it. Day after day, month after month, the soldiers would lie down and dig, then sit and dig all day and night. They dug until the hoes and shovels were more than half worn out. Many officers and soldiers were injured and sacrificed while digging trenches while holding hoes and shovels.”
Hill A1 was a stronghold equipped with a system of trenches and modern enemy weapons. The battles here were extremely fierce. We and the enemy fought for every inch of land. Therefore, the Campaign Command decided to dig an underground tunnel from our position to the foot of the enemy bunker, then place explosives to destroy the bunker. The task of digging the tunnel was assigned to Captain Nguyen Phu Xuyen Khung, commanding the M83 Engineer Company and an infantry squad of Battalion 255, Regiment 174, Division 316, who dug from April 20 to May 4, 1954 to place 960kg of explosives.
The soil on Hill A1 was extremely hard, the M83 engineers encountered many difficulties, especially opening the tunnel door. It took 3 nights to open an area large enough for a person to be temporarily safe, lying down and digging to continue digging into the hill. Meanwhile, the French army kept shooting and throwing grenades. The following days, productivity was better, but the deeper we went, the less oxygen there was, so only one person was assigned to dig, while another person next to them fanned, and outside, 2-3 people took turns using bamboo fans to fan the air in. Each team could only dig for half an hour before having to change shifts. Despite the difficulties, no one was discouraged.
Under the command of Captain Nguyen Phu Xuyen Khung, in just 15 days, an underground tunnel with a total length of 47m was formed. At exactly 8:30 p.m. on May 6, the explosive block was detonated. That explosion was also the signal for our army to launch a general attack. On May 7, 1954, our army captured Hill A1 and our troops completely destroyed the Dien Bien Phu stronghold.
With the extraordinary efforts of the Dien Bien soldiers, a dense system of tunnels and trenches was formed, creating conditions for our units and firepower to encircle, encroach, attack and destroy the enemy. According to estimates, the length of our tunnel system on the map was initially about 100km, but during the campaign, our troops dug it twice as long, more than 200km. Our trench battlefield included large, small, and complex systems of tunnels and trenches, both offensive and defensive; ensuring both combat and daily living conditions for the troops. The trenches were also the roads for us to transport wounded soldiers. With the encroachment method, we gradually tightened the siege and then suddenly broke through to destroy the enemy. Later, the encirclement method in the Dien Bien Phu Campaign was compared by some military experts in the world to the noose around the necks of the French army at the Dien Bien Phu stronghold.
Our trench system in the Dien Bien Phu Campaign not only contributed to the great victory but also served as a place to treat wounded and sick soldiers. Right in the trenches, under the rain of bombs and bullets, the medical soldiers overcame all difficulties and shortages of materials, light, and medicine, turning trenches and bunkers into operating rooms and field treatment areas, promptly treating tens of thousands of wounded soldiers. Thanks to the trench system, in the Dien Bien Phu Campaign, the medical force treated more than 10,000 wounded soldiers and nearly 4,500 sick soldiers (not including enemy troops), making an important contribution to restoring the fighting strength of units on the entire front.
Mr. Ha Minh Hien, born in 1939, in Bao Dap commune, Tran Yen district (Yen Bai province), currently living in Dong Tam residential group, Tua Chua town, Tua Chua district, was a military doctor in the Dien Bien Phu Campaign.
Mr. Hien said: “The medical work in the Dien Bien Phu Campaign was very different from previous campaigns. This was the first time we performed treatment in tunnels and trenches. The route for transporting wounded soldiers was identified as the trench system. At that time, the ambulance team had only a few people. Each person had to bring bandages, medicine and first aid equipment. Especially at the end of April 1954, on days of heavy rain, water seeped into the tunnels, making first aid work difficult.”
The trench system in the Dien Bien Phu Campaign was a unique and creative military tactic of our army to defeat the enemy, which was considered the strongest in the world at that time. At the seminar on Military Art of the Dien Bien Phu Campaign - Practical Lessons in Current Combat organized by the 12th Corps Command on April 4, 2024, Colonel Tran Ngoc Long, former Deputy Director of the Institute of Military History, analyzed: The development of the system of offensive and siege battlefields helped the troops to stand firm throughout 56 days and nights of war. The traffic trenches with tens of thousands of first aid bunkers and weapons bunkers minimized the losses of Vietnamese troops against French firepower. The troops even built fake battlefields to deceive thanks to the trench system.
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