Celebrations in Ho Chi Minh City to mark 50 years since the end of the Vietnam War

HO CHI MINH CITY, April 30 (Reuters) - Vietnam is celebrating the end of the Vietnam War on Wednesday with a grand military parade and an air show 50 years after the fall of Saigon, the event that marked the definitive conclusion of the decades-long conflict.

The historic anniversary commemorates the first act of the country's reunification on April 30, 1975 when Communist-run North Vietnam seized Saigon, the capital of the U.S.-backed South.

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The victory, about two years after Washington withdrew its last combat troops from the country, marked the end of a 20-year conflict that killed some 3 million Vietnamese and nearly 60,000 Americans, many of them young soldiers conscripted into the military.

The fall of Saigon was seared into many memories by the images of U.S. helicopters evacuating some 7,000 people, many of them Vietnamese, as North Vietnamese tanks closed in. The final flight took off from the roof of the U.S. embassy at 7:53 a.m. on April 30, carrying the last U.S. Marines out of Saigon.

Saigon was later renamed Ho Chi Minh City in honour of the North's founding leader.

"Communist troops rolled into the South Vietnamese capital virtually unopposed, to the great relief of the population which had feared a bloody last-minute battle," said a cable from one of the Reuters reporters in the city on the day it fell.

The cable described the victorious army as made up of "formidably armed" troops in jungle green fatigues but also of barefoot teenagers.

The formal reunification of Vietnam was completed a year later, 22 years after the country had been split in two following the end of French colonial rule.

"The victory of April 30 is the victory of human conscience and righteousness," a spokeswoman for Vietnam's foreign ministry told reporters last week.

That bond is now being tested by the threat of crippling 46% tariffs on Vietnamese goods that Biden's successor, Donald Trump, announced in April.

The tariffs have been largely paused until July and talks are underway. But if confirmed, they could undermine Vietnam's export-led growth that has attracted large foreign investments.

CHINESE TROOPS, HELICOPTERS

While Hanoi has re-established relations with the United States, it has maintained close ties with Russia, which is its top supplier of weapons.

Vietnam has also nurtured closer relations with northern neighbour China despite a complex history involving several conflicts and a rivalry in the disputed South China Sea.

China is now a major investor in its economy and the source of many of the components that are used in products that are then exported to the U.S.

Underlining the warming ties, Vietnam's defence ministry invited the Chinese army to take part in the military parade and 118 soldiers will walk through the streets of Ho Chi Minh City "to honour the international support Vietnam received during its struggle for independence," according to state media.

They will be marching alongside about 13,000 Vietnamese soldiers, policemen and members of other forces in a procession following an air show featuring Russian-made fighter jets and military helicopters.

Reporting by Minh Nguyen, Thinh Nguyen in Ho Chi Minh City, Francesco Guarascio in Hanoi; Additional reporting by Phuong Nguyen; Editing by Kate Mayberry

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