The plan had taken shape over several months and was the product of considerable high-level discussion, involving also Chinese advisers. At the Fourth Plenum of the Communist Party (formally, the Vietnamese Workers Party), held in January 1953, senior strategists had determined to strike where the enemy was weak, in order to force the French to disperse their troops to the greatest extent possible, as far away from the Red River Delta as they could be lured. That was a main motivation behind the Laos invasion in the spring, and it remained the operating assumption throughout the summer. Giap
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