Ho Chi Minh trail

Hồ Chí Minh Trail
Southeastern Laos
Ho Chi Minh Trail, 1967
Type	Logistical system
Site information
Controlled by	National Liberation Front
Site history
Built	1959–1975
In use	1959–1975
Battles/wars	Operation Barrel Roll Operation Steel Tiger Operation Tiger Hound Operation Commando Hunt Cambodian Incursion Operation Lam Son 719 Ho Chi Minh Campaign Operation Left Jab Operation Honorable Dragon Operation Diamond Arrow Project Copper Operation Phiboonpol Operation Sayasila Operation Bedrock Operation Thao La Operation Black Lion
Garrison information
Past commanders	Võ Bẩm Phan Trọng Tuệ Đồng Sỹ Nguyên Hoàng Thế Thiện
Garrison	5,000–60,000

The Hồ Chí Minh trail (also known in Vietnam as the "Trường Sơn trail") was a logistical system that ran from the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) to the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam) through the neighboring kingdoms of Laos and Cambodia. The system provided support, in the form of manpower and materiel, to the National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam (called the Vietcong or "VC" by its opponents) and the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN), or North Vietnamese Army, during the Vietnam War.

It was named by the Americans after North Vietnamese president Hồ Chí Minh. Although the trail was mostly in Laos, the communists called it the Trường Sơn Strategic Supply Route (Đường Trường Sơn), after the Vietnamese name for the Annamite Range mountains in central Vietnam. According to the United States National Security Agency's official history of the war, the Trail system was "one of the great achievements of military engineering of the 20th century."

Parts of what became the trail had existed for centuries as primitive footpaths that facilitated trade. The area through which the system meandered was among the most challenging in Southeast Asia: a sparsely-populated region of rugged mountains (500–2,400 metres (1,500–8,000 ft)), triple-canopy jungle and dense primeval rainforests. During the First Indochina War the Việt Minh maintained north/south communication using this system of trails and paths.

In 1959, Hanoi established the 559th Transportation Group under the command of Colonel (later General) Võ Bẩm to improve and maintain a transportation system to supply the NLF uprising against the South Vietnamese government. Originally, the North Vietnamese effort concentrated on infiltration across and immediately below the Demilitarized Zone that separated the two Vietnams.