Officially Vietnam has 54 ethnie groups, of which 21 live in Dien Bien Phu and the surrounding province, the Thai and Hmong being the most numerous. At the foot of thèse mountains, amid forest and creeping out onto the edge of the padi fields, are the small settlements of the local ethnie groups, the so-called montagnards or hill tribe people. Ahead, along the jagged crest of an even higher range of moun- tains, is the Lao border. The plane cuts sharply to the right around some mountain tops and a broad, flat valley opens up - 100 square kilomètres of bright green padi fields watered by the Muong Thanh River.
Dien Bien Phu, Vietnam: Managing a Battle Site, Metaphoric and Actualĭescending into Dien Bien Phu, a 40-minute flight from the Vietnamese capital, Hanoi, is like, I imagine, coming across the mythical Shangrila1.
