Win independence, maintain the right to master the country
In the spring of 1930, the birth of the Communist Party of Vietnam created a great turning point for the Vietnamese revolution. Right from its birth, the Party established its historical mission to lead the people to fight for national independence, and at the same time build a new social regime to bring happiness to the people.
In the Party's ideology and guidelines, national independence has never been an abstract goal or an end point. Independence is for the People to escape slavery, to be masters of the country, to live in freedom and to have conditions to build a better life. Winning independence for the nation is also to regain the right to be human, the right to self-determination and the right to seek happiness of every Vietnamese citizen.
In the context of the country being invaded, the people being oppressed, exploited, and imprisoned, the greatest aspiration was to escape slavery. In the autumn of 1945, under the leadership of the Party, the entire people achieved the victory of the August Revolution, seized power into the hands of the People, and founded the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. From slavery, Vietnamese people became citizens of an independent and sovereign country. This is the greatest happiness of our people after nearly a century living in the scene of losing their country.
From the status of slaves, the Vietnamese people became citizens of a sovereign country, the master of the country. The Declaration of Independence dated September 2, 1945 not only gave birth to the Democratic Republic of Vietnam but also is a declaration to the world about the right to life, freedom and the right to seek happiness of the Vietnamese people.
The slogan "Independence - Freedom - Happiness" is solemnly placed under the National Name of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, which is also a profound political declaration about the goals of the new social regime: Independence is the first condition, freedom is the basic value, happiness is the destination. These three values are closely linked, forming the core value system of the Vietnamese nation in the new development journey.
Immediately after seizing power, that ideology continued to be concretized by practical actions. The revolutionary government determined that fighting against the "hungry enemy", fighting against the "ignorance enemy" and fighting against foreign invaders were urgent tasks. If fighting hunger was to protect life, fighting illiteracy was to improve people's knowledge, then the General Election to elect the National Assembly of the I term on January 6, 1946 established a particularly important aspect of happiness: the right to political mastery of the People.
For the first time in history, the Vietnamese people from slave status directly exercised citizenship, holding the ballot to choose their representatives. Happiness in the new regime, therefore, is not only about having food, clothing, and education, but also the right to be the master of the country, the master of society, and the master of their own destiny.
Unifying the country, towards a prosperous and happy life
Those values continue to be tested and affirmed in the resistance wars to protect national independence. Throughout the historical journey of 1945-1975, the aspiration for happiness of the People continued to be written with the will to fight, sacrifice and the belief in absolute victory of the whole nation.
In the resistance war against French colonialism, the Vietnamese people fought not only to protect the young revolutionary government but also to protect the independence of a nation that had just escaped the yoke of colonialism. The Dien Bien Phu victory in 1954 became a symbol of the will for independence and the desire for freedom of a nation that did not accept the fate of dependence.
After that, the resistance war against the US for national salvation again placed the nation before a new historical challenge. The country is still divided, the people of the two regions have not lived in a unified country, so the nation's aspiration for happiness is still not complete. Therefore, the struggle to unify the country is not only a political goal but also a profound demand of the right to life, self-determination and the aspiration for reunion of millions of Vietnamese people.
In the spring of 1975, the victory of the resistance war against the US, national salvation, complete liberation of the South, and national reunification completed a special historical milestone: From seizing power, protecting independence to unifying the country. That was a turning point opening up the basic conditions for the whole nation to enter a new era, together building and developing the country.
According to Assoc. Prof. Dr. Le Quoc Ly - former Deputy Director of the Ho Chi Minh National Academy of Politics, from the spring of 1930 when the Communist Party of Vietnam was born, to the August Revolution in 1945 that gave birth to the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (now the Socialist Republic of Vietnam), the victory of the anti-French resistance war "glorious in five continents, shaking the globe" in 1954, the victory of the anti-American resistance war in the spring of 1975, the country unified in one strip, it can be seen that under the leadership of the Party, national independence was gradually transformed into specific values in the people's lives. Independence is therefore the condition for the People to have freedom, to have the right to be masters and to have the opportunity to build a prosperous and happy life. That is a profound and consistent humanistic value in the Party's leadership line.
