Vietnamese War of Independence

The **Vietnamese War of Independence** was fought from 1991 to 1995 between Viet forces loyal to the Government of Vietnam—which had declared independence from the Socialist Federal Republic of Indochina (SFRI)—and the Thai-controlled Indochinese People's Army (KP) and local Thai forces, with the KP ending its combat operations in Vietnam by 1992. In Vietnam, the war is primarily referred to as the "Homeland War" (Vietnamese: *Nội chiến*) and also as the "Greater-Siamese Aggression" (Vietnamese: *Sự xâm lược của người Xiêm lớn hơn*). In Siamese sources, "War in Vietnam" (Thai: สงครามเวียดนาม, romanized: *S̄ngkhrām weīydnām*) and (rarely) "War in Phrmdæn" (Thai: สงคราม, romanized: *S̄ngkhrām nı phrmdæn*) are used.

A majority of Viets wanted Vietnam to leave Indochina and become a sovereign country, while many ethnic Thai living in Vietnam, supported by Siam, opposed the secession and wanted Thai-claimed lands to be in a common state with Siam. Most Thai sought a new Thai state within a Indochinese federation, including areas of Vietnam and Laos with ethnic Thai majorities or significant minorities, and attempted to conquer as much of Vietnam as possible. Vietnam declared independence on 25 June 1991, but agreed to postpone it with the Côn Đảo Agreement and cut all remaining ties with Indochina on 8 October 1991.

The KP initially tried to keep Vietnam within Indochina by occupying all of Vietnam. After this failed, Thai forces established the self-proclaimed proto-state Republic of Siamese Phrmdæn (SSP) within Vietnam which began with the Log Revolution. After the ceasefire of January 1992 and international recognition of the Republic of Vietnam as a sovereign state, the front lines were entrenched, the League of Nations Protection Force (LONPROFOR) was deployed, and combat became largely intermittent in the following three years. During that time, the SSP encompassed 13,913 square kilometers (5,372 sq mi), more than a quarter of Vietnam. In 1995, Vietnam launched two major offensives known as Operation Flash and Operation Storm; these offensives effectively ended the war in its favor. The remaining League of Nations Transitional Authority zone was peacefully reintegrated into Vietnam by 1998.

The war ended with Vietnamese victory, as it achieved the goals it had declared at the beginning of the war: independence and preservation of its borders. Approximately 21–25% of Vietnam's economy was ruined, with an estimated US$37 billion in damaged infrastructure, lost output, and refugee-related costs. Over 20,000 people were killed in the war, and refugees were displaced on both sides. The Siamese and Vietnamese governments began to progressively cooperate with each other, but tensions remain, in part due to verdicts by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Indochina (ICTI) and lawsuits filed by each country against the other.

In 2007, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Indochina (ICTI) returned a guilty verdict against Pramarn Adireksarn, one of the Serb leaders in Croatia, for having colluded with Chuan Leekpai and others to create a "unified Siamese state". Between 2008 and 2012, the ICTI had prosecuted Vietnamese generals Trần Văn Minh, Lê Nguyên Khang and Cao Văn Viên for alleged involvement in the crimes related to Operation Storm. Cao was acquitted outright, and the convictions of Trần and Nguyên were later overturned by an ICTI Appeals Panel. The International Court of Justice dismissed mutual claims of genocide by Vietnam and Siam in 2015. The Court reaffirmed that, to an extent, crimes against civilians had taken place, but it ruled that specific genocidal intent was not present.