Trending Now
We have updated our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for Eurasia Group and its affiliates, including GZERO Media, to clarify the types of data we collect, how we collect it, how we use data and with whom we share data. By using our website you consent to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, including the transfer of your personal data to the United States from your country of residence, and our use of cookies described in our Cookie Policy.
{{ subpage.title }}
Vietnam War, 50 years on
Fifty years ago today, North Vietnamese troops seized Saigon, and ended the Vietnam war with a communist victory. GZERO writers and producers have taken a deep dive into the history behind this solemn occasion, exploring life in Saigon during the war, the emotional and chaotic scenes that unfolded as thousands fled, the life Vietnamese-Americans built from scratch in their new homes, and asking whether we have learned the lessons of the war.
50 Years on, have we learned the Vietnam War's lessons?
Fifty years after the fall of Saigon (or its liberation, depending on whom you ask), Vietnam has transformed from a war-torn battleground to one of Asia’s fastest-growing economies — and now finds itself caught between two superpowers. Ian Bremmer breaks down how Vietnam went from devastation in the wake of the Vietnam War to become a regional economic powerhouse.
Saigon’s Last Day: The fall, the flight, and the aftermath of the Vietnam War

Don Shearer, US Defense Department via National Archives
Saigon, April 29, 1975. For six weeks, South Vietnamese forces have been falling back in the face of a determined communist offensive. American troops have been gone for two years. The feeble government is in disarray. The people are traumatized by three decades of war and three million deaths.
Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” begins playing on radios across the capital.
Some Saigonese know it’s a sign: It is time to run.
Lien-Hang T. Nguyen, now a Columbia University history professor, was just five months old, the youngest of nine children. After a failed first escape attempt by helicopter, her family heard about an uncle with access to an oil transport boat. More than 100 refugees crammed aboard the small vessel, where they waited for hours to set sail. Nguyen’s father nearly became separated when he dashed back into the city in a futile attempt to find more relatives.
At nightfall, they finally departed, crossing enemy-controlled territory under cover of darkness before being ordered onto an ammunition barge floating off the coast, bursting with over 1,000 refugees.
“When the sun rose the next day, April 30, we realized Saigon had fallen,” says Nguyen.
Read more about the amazing stories of survival, and just what happened to Vietnam after the war here.
PODCAST: Revisiting the Vietnam War 50 years later, with authors Viet Thanh Nguyen and Mai Elliott
On the GZERO World Podcast, two authors with personal ties to the Vietnam War reflect on its enduring legacy and Vietnam’s remarkable rise as a modern geopolitical player.
Life in Saigon during the Vietnam War
On GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, author Mai Elliott recalls how witnessing the human toll of the Vietnam War firsthand changed her views — and forced her to keep a life-altering secret from her own family.
Growing up as a Vietnamese refugee in 1980s America
On GZERO World with Ian Bremmer,Pulitzer Prize-winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen shares what it was like growing up as a Vietnamese refugee in the US — and how the Americans around him often misunderstood the emotional toll of displacement.
Growing up as a Vietnamese refugee in 1980s America
On GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen shares what it was like growing up as a Vietnamese refugee in the US—and how the Americans around him often misunderstood the emotional toll of displacement.
When Nguyen’s family fled Vietnam in 1975, they joined over 130,000 South Vietnamese refugees trying to rebuild their lives in the United States. Nguyen grew up in a tight-knit refugee community steeped in anti-communism and Catholicism, watching his parents work 14-hour days while sending money to relatives they had left behind. “We were a community that had lost so much,” he says, “and we were trying to rebuild our shattered lives.”
Nguyen, the author of the bestselling novel "The Sympathizer," tells Ian Bremmer that while Vietnamese refugees were navigating grief, separation, and survival, many Americans failed to grasp their reality. Shaped by war footage and one-dimensional portrayals, the public often viewed Southeast Asians as either victims or enemies. “There was a lot of misunderstanding... a lot of incomprehension,” he says—especially in parts of the country that had little exposure to Asian communities.
Watch full episode: 50 years after the Vietnam War
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube. Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔).GZERO World with Ian Bremmer airs on US public television weekly - check local listings.
Life in Saigon during the Vietnam War
On GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, Mai Elliott recalls how witnessing the human toll of the Vietnam War firsthand changed her views—and forced her to keep a life-altering secret from her own family.
As a young researcher in Saigon working for the RAND Corporation during the Vietnam War, Mai Elliott had a rare window into the lives of North Vietnamese fighters and rural civilians. What she saw challenged everything she had been raised to believe. “I came from a very anti-communist family... but I began to change my views because I thought it was unjust for the peasants to pay for the cost of the war,” she says.
Elliott eventually became quietly anti-war, even lobbying members of Congress to stop funding the conflict—but she kept it hidden from her family. “I never told them... I think they would’ve felt I was betraying them,” she admits.
Watch full episode: 50 years after the Vietnam War
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube. Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔).GZERO World with Ian Bremmer airs on US public television weekly - check local listings.
50 years after the Vietnam War
On GZERO World with Ian Bremmer speaks with Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Viet Thanh Nguyen and historian Mai Elliott—two authors whose lives were shaped by the Vietnam War—to understand how one of the 20th century’s most devastating conflicts continues to shape the world today. “We were a community that had lost so much,” Nguyen, author of the bestselling novel "The Sympathizer," says of the Vietnamese refugee experience in the US. Elliott recalls the physical and emotional toll of the war she witnessed firsthand, “I didn’t care who won the war by the end of it—I just wanted it to stop.”
But the conversation also turns to Vietnam’s surprising present: a country that has become a regional success story, balancing its economic rise with geopolitical pragmatism. While welcoming US re-engagement, beginning in the 1990s, Vietnam remains cautious not to provoke China—its largest trade partner and historic rival. “If Vietnam gets too close to China, it could lose its country. Too close to the US, and it could lose its regime,” Elliott explains. Nguyen adds, “Vietnam is a country, not a war”—a reminder that the nation has moved forward, even if its history remains unresolved.
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube. Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔).GZERO World with Ian Bremmer airs on US public television weekly - check local listings.
- Trump’s 4D checkers, China’s opportunity, climate hopes, and more: Your questions, answered ›
- The end of polarization in America? ›
- Henry Kissinger: Towering (and polarizing) figure in US foreign policy dies at 100 ›
- In blow to China, US secures closer partnership with Vietnam ›
- Vietnam War reflections: 50 years on ›
Revisiting the Vietnam War 50 years later, with novelist Viet Thanh Nguyen and author Mai Elliott
Listen: It’s been 50 years since the fall of Saigon, but the impact of the Vietnam War still reverberates across generations and continents. On the GZERO World podcast, Ian Bremmer speaks with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen and historian Mai Elliott—two writers whose lives were shaped by the conflict. Nguyen, author of the bestselling book and TV series "The Sympathizer," recounts growing up in a tight-knit refugee community in California, where “melancholy, rage, anger, bitterness, sadness—the whole gamut of emotions” defined the postwar experience. Elliott, who interviewed insurgents during the war, came to see its human cost up close, saying, “I didn’t care who won the war by the end of it—I just wanted it to stop.”
But the episode is not just about the past. It’s also about Vietnam’s present and future. The country has become one of Asia’s fastest-growing economies and most strategically important players, carefully navigating a relationship with China and the United States. “If Vietnam gets too close to China, it could lose its country,” Elliott explains. “Too close to the US, and it could lose its regime,” Nguyen adds that while tensions remain between the Vietnamese state and its diaspora, Vietnam’s diplomatic pragmatism is rooted in a thousand-year history of resisting Chinese domination while embracing growth opportunities.
As Washington and Beijing compete for influence in Southeast Asia, Vietnam is charting its path—one shaped by memory, resilience, and the long shadows of war.
Subscribe to the GZERO World Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast platform, to receive new episodes as soon as they're published.
50 Years on, have we learned the Vietnam War's lessons?
Fifty years after the fall of Saigon (or its liberation, depending on whom you ask), Vietnam has transformed from a war-torn battleground to one of Asia’s fastest-growing economies—and now finds itself caught between two superpowers. Ian Bremmer breaks down how Vietnam went from devastation in the wake of the Vietnam War to becoming a regional economic powerhouse.
For North Vietnam, the war was a hard-fought victory for independence; for South Vietnamese refugees, it marked a heartbreaking loss of homeland. For the United States, it was a national trauma and a cautionary tale about military overreach and unclear objectives. But beyond the battlefield, the country’s postwar path tells a remarkable story of recovery.
After years of economic stagnation and international isolation—including a costly occupation of Cambodia and reliance on a crumbling Soviet Union—Vietnam had little choice but to pivot. The collapse of the USSR forced the country to look elsewhere, and by the late 1990s, it began opening its economy to the West. With the normalization of ties under President Clinton, Vietnam entered a period of rapid economic growth, joining the WTO and becoming a major global exporter, particularly in manufacturing.
Today, Vietnam plays a careful geopolitical balancing act, especially as tensions rise between the US and China. When President Trump slapped sweeping tariffs on Vietnamese goods in April—only to pause them 90 days later—Chinese President Xi Jinping seized the moment to deepen ties with Hanoi. Now, Vietnam must decide whether Trump’s aggressive trade policy will push it further into China’s orbit, a reversal of centuries of resistance to Chinese influence.
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube. Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔).GZERO World with Ian Bremmer airs on US public television weekly - check local listings.
Trump’s inaction on wrongful deportation may spark constitutional crisis
Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.
If the US won't work to return a wrongly deported man to El Salvador despite a Supreme Court ruling, are we headed towards a constitutional crisis?
It certainly appears that way, and I think this is the constitutional crisis that the Trump administration would love to have. Because wrongfully deporting someone without evidence who is in the country illegally and therefore guilty of a misdemeanor, but sending them to a max security prison, which the Supreme Court says you shouldn't do, but now is in another country. Very few Americans are sympathetic to the case of this person. And indeed, Trump won on the basis in part of being sick and tired of allowing illegal immigrants to spend enormous amounts of time in the United States without recourse.
So he's breaking the law here. He's flouting independent judiciary and their decision-making, but he's doing it on an issue that most Americans have no sympathy on the other side. So the Democrats would have to be very wary of making this a hill they want to die on, and Trump knows exactly what he's doing. It is pretty impressive playbook for undermining rule of law and checks and balances on an increasingly authoritarian leaning executive. That's where we are.
Trump claims China-Vietnam talks are intended to "screw" the US. Does this run the risk of pushing Vietnam to China?
Certainly, most Vietnamese now are more well-disposed towards China than the US. First time we've seen that since the war. It's not true across Southeast Asia. Philippines, about 80% still pro-US, not pro-China. But it is a problem, and Xi Jinping understands that. And that's why he went in and was received directly by the president as opposed to the prime minister last time who met him at the airport. 45 big deals that they're signing on trying to improve economic coordination. Clearly a bit of a surprise to Trump, just as the direct retaliation from the Chinese, even though the Americans warned them, "Negotiate, don't retaliate." But that's exactly what China did, and Trump frankly should have expected that was coming. Now he looks a little bit weaker in the way he's backing down and creating exemptions for a lot of people in this space.
Saudi Arabia plans to pay off Syria's World Bank debt. Could this be a major turning point for Syria's future and its ties with regional allies?
It certainly helps. We've also seen the Qataris already say they're going to offer gas through Jordan into Syria. I think that this is all promising. The Saudis were never going to do that, provide any support as long as Assad was in place. Now they are. The Americans are pulling troops out, and Turkey is going to be the most important country on the ground. But economically, it's going to be the Gulf States, and that gives this new Syrian regime a better chance to succeed. Something we all clearly are rooting for in terms of one of the places that we'd like to see a little more stability from. Anyway, that's it for me, and I'll talk to you all real soon.
- Zelensky snubs China’s peace push, Trump vows to end war “very quickly” ›
- China’s vows to pump up its economy — with one eye on Trump’s tariffs ›
- El Salvador's president wins big. What does this mean for the country and its neighbors? ›
- El Salvador's Bukele refuses to return wrongly-deported Maryland man, and offers to jail US citizens too ›
Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks to Russian journalists before his departure at Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi, Vietnam June 20, 2024.
Bamboo diplomacy: Vietnam goes with the flow on Putin visit
Russian President Vladimir Putinsigned a series of agreements in Hanoi on Thursday that commit Moscow to cooperating with Vietnam on energy, science, health, and education measures. Compared with the first leg of his overseas trip to North Korea, this was a more sedate affair, but Putin is hoping his warm reception proves Russia isn’t as geopolitically isolated as it’s often portrayed.
While North Korea was eager to sign a security agreement with Moscow, none of the 12 publicly released agreements with Vietnam had to do with defense. Unlike Pyongyang, Hanoi actually has friends all over the place, thank you very much, and it won’t be seen supplying the Russian war machine.
Vietnam isn’t giving up its relationship with Moscow, its primary ally during its long struggle for colonial liberation, but it also won’t do anything that would threaten warm ties with the US, Australia, and Europe. Hanoi calls this bamboo diplomacy: being flexible enough to sway in the winds of geopolitics without snapping.
What we’re watching: Putin seemed to recognize that nuanced position in an editorial he wrote for state newspaper Nhan Dan on Thursday, in which he thanked “Vietnamese friends for their balanced position on the Ukrainian crisis.” Indeed, Vietnam has thus far maintained good relations with Kyiv, too, evensending some aid in 2022. Hanoi is a good bellwether for how the middle powers with few direct interests in the conflict are thinking about next steps as the conflict appears to stalemate.