France Colonizes Vietnam

In 1858 a French and Spanish naval expedition attacked the Vietnamese port of Da Nang, and in early 1859 French forces seized Saigon. These actions began the conquest of Vietnam, which over the next few decades became the core of French Indochina. The event matters because it ended centuries of Vietnamese rule under the Nguyen dynasty and set in motion a colonial era whose legacies shaped the wars of the twentieth century. (The event's metadata lists China as the country, but the events took place in Vietnam.)

The background lay in French commercial, strategic, and religious ambitions in Asia. French Catholic missionaries had been active in Vietnam since the seventeenth century, and by the 1800s the court of Emperor Tu Duc viewed them and their converts with suspicion, at times persecuting them as a threat to Confucian order. French leaders, including Napoleon III, cited the persecution of missionaries as justification for intervention. Historians generally agree, however, that the deeper motives were rivalry with Britain, which had gained Hong Kong and opened Chinese ports after the Opium War, and a desire for a French foothold in East Asia and access to markets in southern China.

The expedition under Admiral Charles Rigault de Genouilly bombarded and occupied Da Nang in September 1858, expecting popular support and a quick result. Instead, disease, supply problems, and Vietnamese resistance stalled the force. Turning south, the French captured the Saigon citadel in February 1859. Their forces remained thin for some time, partly because France was also engaged in other conflicts, including the war in Europe in 1859 and operations in China.

Fighting continued until the Treaty of Saigon in 1862, in which Tu Duc ceded three southern provinces and opened ports to French trade. The French expanded further, taking more of the south by 1867 to form the colony of Cochinchina. In 1883 and 1884 treaties after further military pressure made central Vietnam (Annam) and the north (Tonkin) protectorates. In 1887 these territories were joined with Cambodia into the Indochinese Union, with Laos added in 1893.

French rule brought railways, ports, plantations, and a colonial administration, but it relied on taxes, monopolies, and often harsh labor conditions. It also altered Vietnamese society, spreading the romanized script quoc ngu and stimulating new educated classes. Resistance never ended, from early scholar-led movements to the nationalist and communist organizations of the twentieth century. The struggle for independence led to the First Indochina War, French defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, and the division of the country, which paved the way for the later Vietnam War.