HT This Day: May 1, 1975 -- Peace at last in Vietnam: NLF forces take control in Saigon
Many Government soldiers turned in their arms and tried to lose themselves amid the civilian population. But there were periodic outbursts of gunfire-some from scattered pockets of resistance and others from celebrating PRG and North Vietnamese firing into the air.
The blue and red flag with a yellow star of the Provisional Government was hoisted over the presidential palace in Saigon.
General Duong Van Minh, who took over the presidency only two days ago, watched resignedly as three NLF front tanks broke through the big main gate of the palace and soldiers leapt out of a lorry to hoist the flag.
A Reuter correspondent was in the palace grounds when dozens of NLF tanks came rumbling at noon, prompting soldiers of the Saigon regime to raise their hands in surrender. Just minutes before, President Minh told the correspondent he was still awaiting word from the PRG, whose grinning green-uniformed troops waved to hundreds of Saigon residents cheering them as their convoys moved through a capital festooned with white flags of surrender.
PRG flags fluttered atop many buildings.
After 120 years of French colonialism, Japanese occupation during World War II and American military intervention, the Indo-China peninsula was free of foreign domination.
Conciliation
President Duong Van Minh announced his Government's unconditional surrender in a broadcast this morning and ordered the South Vietnamese soldiers to turn in their arms.
'All soldiers, be calm,' said the President in a 60-second radio address. 'I also call on soldiers not to open fire so that together we can discuss ways to hand-over the rems of Government without bloodshed.'
'In the interest of peace, national conciliation and concord of the people, to save the lives of the people, I believe deeply in conciliation among the Vietnamese people,' Minh said. 'Therefore, I call on all the soldiers of the Republic of Vietnam to stay where you are.'
'We also call on the soldiers at the Provisional Revolutionary Government (PRG) not to open fire because we are here waiting to meet with the Government of the PRG to discuss the turnover of the administration, both civilian and military, without causing senseless bloodshed of the people.'
Four hours later, a jeepload of North Vietnamese soldiers brought the 51-year-old President to the microphone, and he again appealed to the Government forces to give up.
PRG Foreign Minister Nguyen Thi Binh said in an interview in Da Nang yesterday that Gen. Minh might 'still have some role to play in the future of Vietnam.'
The 51-year-old retired General was taken into custody, one report said.
Saigon fell with a whimper. Diehard palace guards fought a fierce last fight with the communist tanks which rolled into the grounds and elite Government paratroops fought to the finish near Tan Son hut airbase.
But, as another Reuter correspondent reported, the city capitulated virtually without resistance and the population in fear of final bloodbath - greeted the NLF troops with great relief.
The correspondent watched the first NLF troops enter the centre of Saigon - a jeepload of barefoot, teenage guerillas.
They were followed by regular soldiers, perhaps of the North Vietnamese army. clad in jungle fatigues and carrying assault rifles and grenade launchers.
A festive mood instantly replaced the anarchy and fear. As soon as the communists arrived, looting and armed robberies stopped.
The collapse came only hours after the Americans completed their disorderly pullout which President Ford described as closing a chapter in the American experience.
Four hours before the tanks entered at 9-30 a.m. (IST), the last American helicopter plucked the final dozen Americans from the roof of the now-pillaged US embassy.
The end of US involvement came in chaos. Weeping Vietnamese begged to be taken out and tried to force their way into the Embassy.
In all some 1,000 Americans and 5,300 Vietnamese were evacuated on the last day. Moments after the last marines left today, escorted by helicopter gunships people broke into and looted the building.
The consular building was set ablaze, writing a fiery end to a war that claimed more than one million lives, some 33,000 of them Americans.
The disarray of the evacuation was visible too at the other end of the helicopter flights from Saigon to offshore warships. The choppers were pushed wholesale into the sea to make room for others to land.
President Minh gave up as the flow of Vietnamese refugees already had begun to land in the US, much as previous runaways from hostilities - Hungarians in the 1930's, Cubans in the 1960's had done.
American relief agency officials said as many as 60,000 Vietnamese will eventually settle in the US.
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