Statue of Dien Bien Phu Victory

Location: The statue of Dien Bien Phu Victory is situated atop Hill D1, Dien Bien Phu City.
Characteristics: It is inaugurated in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of Dien Bien Phu Victory (May 7th, 1954 - May 7th, 2004).
The statue of Dien Bien Phu Victory represents the images of three Dien Bien soldiers, standing atop De Castries’s bunker, looking at three directions. One of them holds a rifle, one a flag and one holding a child with a bunch of flower. The words “Resolutely fight to win” are put in the flag under the suggestion of General Vo Nguyen Giap. The statue is made out of bronze by the Doan Ket Bronze Casting Company (Y Yen District, Nam Dinh Province). Nguyen Trong Hanh is the direct supervisor. The casting process of the 12 parts of the statue lasted 153 days until February 19th, 2004. The statue is 12.6m high (excluding the concrete pedestal, which is 3.6m high, 8m wide and 10m long). Its biggest part weighs 40 tons, the lightest 6 tons. The flag itself weighs 12 tons. The weight of bronze is 180 tons, which is equivalent to 220 tons of raw bronze material. All together, the statue weighs 360 tons.
In the morning of February 23rd, 2004, the convoy including 12 trucks of the Transport Service Company No. 2, the Heroic Unit of the Ministry of Transport, took the statue to Dien Bien Phu City. The transport faced numerous difficulties through the 600km road from Nam Dinh to Dien Bien. At noon of March 12th, 2004, the statue safely reached Dien Bien Phu. In the afternoon of April 12th, 2004, the staff of the Central Fine Arts Company finished the installation of the statue after 45 days of hard working.