Vietnam’s Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh led a delegation of high-ranking Vietnamese officials to pay tribute to late General Vo Nguyen Giap on the occasion of his 110th birth anniversary. 

National ceremony to commemorate General Vo Nguyen Giap's 110th birth anniversary. Photos: VNA

The delegation laid a wreath, offered incense, and attended a ceremony to commemorate the general’s birthday in his hometown, the central province of Quang Binh.

The national ceremony held today [December 22] in Quang Binh, with the participation of top leaders and leading military officers, was also to commemorate the 77th anniversary of the Vietnamese People’s Army.

The participants expressed their gratitude to the late general who devoted his whole life to the revolutionary cause of the Party and nation.

In his speech, PM Chinh stated that General Vo Nguyen Giap is a military commander with outstanding strategic talent, a master of strategy and military art, especially the people’s war.

Vietnam's Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh at the ceremony on Dec 22.

General Vo Nguyen Giap, real name Vo Giap, was born in Loc Thuy Commune, Le Thuy District, Quang Binh in 1911 and passed away in Hanoi in 2013 at the age of 103.

He was promoted to General at age of 37, being the first general in Vietnam.

The legendary general was Minister of National Defence and Commander-in-Chief of the Vietnamese People’s Army, whose campaigns drove both France and the US out of Vietnam.

He earned a degree in law at the University of Hanoi and began teaching history.  A self-taught soldier, he became one of the foremost military commanders of the 20th century.

When being asked about the military tactics, Giap said “We fought our wars in a Vietnamese way. My only influencers were the great strategists of Vietnamese history.”

He used his charisma and tactical skills to transform a tiny band of Vietnamese guerrillas into an army. In May 1954, he commanded the Dien Bien Phu battle which ended with the surrender of French forces, leading to the termination of colonialism in Indochina.

With no formal military training, Giap joined revolutionary forces in the 1940s and built it into a highly disciplined force that ended an empire and united a nation, The New York Times reported.

It described the general as charming and volatile, an erudite military historian and an intense nationalist who used his personal magnetism to motivate his troops and fire their devotion to their country.

“For each day I live, I live fully for the nation,” Giap said when alive.  

Top leaders attend the ceremony.