Vietnam

State · Capital: Hanoi

Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam, is a country at the eastern edge of Mainland Southeast Asia with a population of over 102 million, the world's 16th-most populous country; its capital is Hanoi and its largest city is Ho Chi Minh City. It was under Chinese rule from 111 BC until 939, then ruled by successive monarchical dynasties until the Nguyen dynasty surrendered to France in 1883 and its territory was integrated into French Indochina in 1887. After World War II, France was defeated in the First Indochina War in 1954 and Vietnam was divided; the Vietnam War then pitted communist North Vietnam, supported by the Soviet Union and China, against anti-communist South Vietnam, supported by the United States. Upon the North Vietnamese victory in 1975, Vietnam reunified as a communist state under the Communist Party of Vietnam in 1976, and in 1986 the party launched economic reforms transforming the country into a socialist-oriented market economy.