Vietnam War

===Vietnamese soldiers===
Unlike the American women who went to Vietnam, both South and North Vietnamese women were enlisted and served in combat zones. Women were enlisted in both the PAVN and the Viet Cong, many joining due to the promises of female equality and a greater social role within society.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Wood |first=Jordan |date=October 2015 |title=Taking on a Superpower: A Salute to the Women of Vietnam |url=https://uknowledge.uky.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?&article=1340&context=kaleidoscope |journal=Kaleidoscope |volume=3 |issue=1}}</ref><ref name="BBC2016">{{Cite news |date=6 December 2016 |title=The women who fought for their country |work=BBC News |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/in-pictures-37986986 |access-date=19 June 2018}}</ref> Some women also served for the PAVN and Viet Cong intelligence services. The deputy military commander of the Viet Cong, was a female general, [[Nguyễn Thị Định]]. All-female units were present throughout the entirety of the war, ranging from front-line combat troops to anti-aircraft, scout and reconnaissance units.<ref name="Herman">{{Cite news |last=Herman |first=Elizabeth D. |date=6 June 2017 |title=Opinion {{!}} The Women Who Fought for Hanoi |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/06/opinion/vietnam-war-women-soldiers.html |access-date=1 June 2018 |issn=0362-4331|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20230416233246/https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/06/opinion/vietnam-war-women-soldiers.html|archive-date=April 16, 2023}}</ref> Female combat squads were present in the Cu Chi theater.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Nguyen |first=Hai T. |date=17 January 2017 |title=Opinion {{!}} As the Earth Shook, They Stood Firm |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/17/opinion/as-the-earth-shook-they-stood-firm.html |access-date=1 June 2018 |issn=0362-4331|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20230416233245/https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/17/opinion/as-the-earth-shook-they-stood-firm.html|archive-date=April 16, 2023}}</ref> They also fought in the Battle of Hue.<ref name=Bowden/>{{Rp|388–391}} In addition, large numbers of women served in North Vietnam, manning anti-aircraft batteries, providing village security and serving in logistics on the Ho Chi Minh trail.<ref name=Herman/><ref name=BBC2016/> Other women were embedded with troops on the front-lines, serving as doctors and medical personnel. [[Đặng Thùy Trâm]] became renowned after her diary was published following her death. The Foreign Minister for the Viet Cong and later the PRG was also a woman, Nguyễn Thị Bình.

[[File:WAFC-ARVN Pharmacist.jpg|thumb|Master-Sergeant and pharmacist Do Thi Trinh, part of the WAFC, supplying medication to ARVN dependents]]

In South Vietnam, many women voluntarily served in the ARVN's Women's Armed Force Corps (WAFC) and various other Women's corps in the military. Some, like in the WAFC, served in combat with other soldiers. Others served as nurses and doctors in the battlefield and in military hospitals, or served in South Vietnam or America's intelligence agencies. During Diệm's presidency, his sister-in-law [[Madame Nhu]] was the commander of the WAFC.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Shapiro |first=T. Rees |date=27 April 2011 |title=Mme. Ngo Dinh Nhu, who exerted political power in Vietnam, dies at 87 |newspaper=The Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/mme-ngo-dinh-nhu-who-exerted-political-power-in-vietnam-dies-at-87/2011/04/26/AFpwwF2E_story.html |access-date=4 February 2014|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20111224025629/http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/mme-ngo-dinh-nhu-who-exerted-political-power-in-vietnam-dies-at-87/2011/04/26/AFpwwF2E_story.html|archive-date=December 24, 2011}}</ref> Many women joined provincial and voluntary village-level militia in the [[People's Self-Defense Force]] especially during the ARVN expansions later in the war.

During the war, more than one million rural people migrated or fled the fighting in the South Vietnamese countryside to the cities, especially Saigon. Among the internal refugees were many young women who became the ubiquitous "bar girls" of wartime South Vietnam, "hawking her wares—be that cigarettes, liquor, or herself" to American and allied soldiers.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Gustafsson, Mai Lan |year=2011 |title=Freedom. Money. Fun. Love': The Warlore of Vietnamese Bargirls |journal=Oral History Review |volume=38 |issue=2 |pages=308–330 |doi=10.1093/ohr/ohr097 |pmid=22175096 |s2cid=7718015}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Hunt |first=Richard A. |title=Pacification: The American Struggle for Vietnam's Hearts and Minds |publisher=Westview Press |year=1995 |isbn=978-0-8133-3459-2 |page=40}}</ref> American bases were ringed by bars and brothels.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Barry |first=Kathleen |url=https://archive.org/details/prostitutionofse00barrrich |title=The Prostitution of Sexuality |publisher=NYU Press |year=1995 |isbn=978-0-8147-1277-1 |page=[https://archive.org/details/prostitutionofse00barrrich/page/133 133] |url-access=registration}}</ref> 8,040 Vietnamese women came to the United States as war brides between 1964 and 1975.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Trinh Võ |first1=Linda |url=https://archive.org/details/asianamericanwom00lind |title=Asian American women: the Frontiers reader |last2=Sciachitano |first2=Marian |publisher=University of Nebraska Press |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-8032-9627-5 |page=[https://archive.org/details/asianamericanwom00lind/page/144 144] |url-access=registration}}</ref> Many mixed-blood [[Amerasian]] children were left behind when their American fathers returned to the United States after their tour of duty in South Vietnam; 26,000 of them were permitted to immigrate to the United States in the 1980s and 1990s.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Lamb, David |date=June 2009 |title=Children of the Vietnam War |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/children-of-the-vietnam-war-131207347/ |magazine=Smithsonian Magazine|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20230524145514/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/children-of-the-vietnam-war-131207347/|archive-date=May 24, 2023}}</ref>