First, Happy New Year everyone!!
Here is another small addition to my French Indochina collection, eleven Viet Minh infantrymen dressed and equipped as they would have been during the titanic battles along 'The Street without Joy' in 1953, and Dien Bien Phu the following year.
A popular western misconception is that the Viet Minh were poorly armed, while in fact they were often better equipped than their French adversaries, being well supplied by both Communist China and the USSR.
These soldiers were the precursors of the Viet Cong and NVA, and so were armed with many WWII era weapons. The Mosin Nagant rifle, the DP light machine gun and the PPSh/PPS series submachine guns would've been very common fixtures within the Viet Minh ranks. The assault units would have had a very high proportion of automatic weapons, reflecting their aggressive close combat doctrine.
The heavy machine gun on the low-slung wheeled carriage is a Soviet DSHK-38. The assistant/loader is providing supporting fire with a captured French MAT49 SMG and the flank guard has a Chinese made PPS.
I really liked this model as it brings a little sobering reality to our wee tabletop battlefields.
Finally, a shot of them with the rest of their platoon (really, a thinly veiled excuse to get the banner, with its bit of vibrant colour amongst the earth tones, in there somewhere).
Thanks for dropping in!
