Former Foreign Minister Nguyen Dy Nien, told the press about President Ho Chi Minh’s role and lessons in seizing opportunities for national independence: “Opportunity was vitally important. It would be more difficult to win independence if the revolution were one week later. It was the right timing chosen by President Ho Chi Minh while the French was toppled by the Japanese out of Indochina and the Japanese surrendered to the Alliance. That moment of power vacuum was seized by President Ho Chi Minh as he led the people to rise up for national independence and establishing the Democratic Republic of Vietnam within a short period of time and without violence.”

Former Foreign Minister Nien said that the lesson was then re-applied in various occasions during the anti-US war of resistance and later in national construction and international integration.