Lawrence Person's BattleSwarm Blog 6/6/2026
• “Why did communists in Vietnam end up adopting the economic system of the country they spent 20 years fighting a war against?
• “After the fall of South Vietnam’s capital of Saigon in April 1975, they finally got their wish. The result was a disaster.”
• “After taking over the country, the communists collectivized the farms. Farmers didn’t get paid based on how much they grew, but rather how many days they showed up, and because there was no connection between effort and reward, the collective farming campaign ended in total failure. Famine swept the country whenever harvests were poor.” Just like what happened in the Soviet Union and Communist China when they tried collectivizing agriculture.
• “Throughout the 1980s, Vietnamese families were given ration cards that determined how much food they were allowed to eat. People lined up for hours, sometimes overnight, at government food distribution centers.”
• “In less than a generation, the entire country’s economy had collapsed. Nearly 80% of the population lived in poverty, while annual inflation exceeded 100%. By the end of the 1980s, Vietnam was one of the poorest countries on Earth.”
More:
https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=71906https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=it9EHZLhyQ4