During the 1950s, just a few thousand Americans identified themselves as Vietnamese.  Since the Vietnam War ended on April 30, 1975, the population of people identifying as Vietnamese alone or in combination with one or more other detailed Asian groups or races has grown to nearly 2.3 million.

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Following World War II, fear that communism would spread throughout Southeast Asia led President Harry S. Truman to send military advisors to Vietnam—then known as French Indochina—in 1950. When Vietnamese troops defeated the French to end colonial rule, the Geneva Accords of 1954 divided the nation at the 17th parallel creating the communist Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) and the democratic Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam).

In 1961, President John F. Kennedy sent thousands of military advisors to South Vietnam. Advisors trained the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) to defend against North Vietnam's efforts to unify Vietnam as a single, communist nation. Four years later, President Lyndon B. Johnson sent the first combat troops to South Vietnam to protect the air base in Da Nang. At the end of 1965, 184,300 American soldiers were in Vietnam. By 1973, approximately 2.7 million Americans had served in Vietnam.

The war grew increasingly unpopular as the number of casualties grew and Americans watched daily televised reports about the brutal conflict. In 1969, the U.S. military began transferring responsibility for combat operations to the ARVN. After U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and representatives of North and South Vietnam signed the Paris Peace Accords on January 27, 1973, a tenuous ceasefire began. The United States agreed to withdraw its troops from Vietnam within 60 days, leaving behind only a small contingent of U.S. Marines to guard Tan Son Nhut air base and the U.S. embassy in Saigon.

South Vietnam's President Nguyen Van Thieu agreed to the Paris Peace Accords because Kissinger assured him that American economic and military aid would continue to flow into South Vietnam. However, when North Vietnam broke the ceasefire, the United States was distracted by domestic and economic issues. 

Bolstered by its unexpected success on the battlefield  and the lack of a U.S. military response in 1973 and 1974, North Vietnam launched what it planned would be a limited offensive into Vietnam's Central Highlands in March 1975. Their progress exceeded expectations. By the end of March, North Vietnamese troops had captured the cities of Pleiku, Kon Tum, Hue, and Da Nang. The valiant efforts of ARVN troops to halt the North Vietnamese Army's advance were hampered by shortages of ammunition, gasoline, and spare parts. In the meantime, military and political leaders in both North and South Vietnam waited anxiously for an American military response that never materialized.

On April 21, 1975, South Vietnam's President Thieu resigned. The next day, the U.S. House of Representatives Armed Services Committee rejected President Gerald Ford's request for more than $700 million of emergency aid for South Vietnam. A day later Ford, during a speech at Tulane University in New Orleans, announced that as far as the United States was concerned, the Vietnam War was over.

By April 27, 100,000 North Vietnamese troops surrounded Saigon. Artillery and rockets targeted sites throughout the city. After just one week in office, President Tran Van Huong resigned as South Vietnam's president on April 28. He was succeeded by General Duong Van Minh. As President Minh read his acceptance speech, the North Vietnamese Air Force bombed and strafed Saigon's Tan Son Nhut air base using captured South Vietnamese aircraft. Evacuation of American government employees, contractors, and their dependents from Tan Son Nhut ended as repeated attacks made it too dangerous for fixed-wing aircraft to use the air base.

On April 29, U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam Graham Martin requested that the United States initiate "Operation Frequent Wind"—the evacuation of all Americans and at-risk Vietnamese in Saigon by helicopter. As the temperature in Saigon soared past 100°F, the U.S. Armed Forces radio station played the song, "White Christmas" signaling evacuees to proceed to designated emergency assembly sites. From April 29 to April 30, helicopters evacuated thousands of people from the U.S. embassy, Saigon rooftops, and landing sites located throughout the city. At 4:58 am on April 30, a U.S. Marine Corps CH-46E Sea Knight helicopter whisked Ambassador Martin away from the U.S. embassy to the USS Blue Ridge (LCC-19) stationed off the coast of Vietnam. The last of the embassy's Marine Corps security detail left from the building's rooftop helipad at 7:58 a.m.

Operation Frequent Wind concluded at 9:00 a.m., on April 30, 1975. Thirty minutes later, President Minh ordered all ARVN troops to stop fighting. Shortly before noon, North Vietnamese tanks crashed through the gates of Saigon's presidential palace where President Minh and his cabinet stoically waited to surrender. Minh announced South Vietnam's official surrender over Radio Saigon at 2:30 p.m. The Vietnam War was over.

You can learn more about the Vietnam War, veterans, and our nation's Vietnamese population using U.S. Census Bureau data and records. For example:

• First President of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (1945-1969) Ho Chi Minh was born in Vietnam in 1890 when it was called French Indochina. Before leading Vietnam's independence movement against Japan and France in 1941, he worked overseas in France, China, London, Moscow, and the United States. Following a brief stay in New York City, New York, and he worked as a baker at the famed Parker House Hotel in Boston, Massachusetts in 1912. Shortly before his arrival in the United States, the 1910 Census reported that 13,394,213 people in the United States were foreign-born like Ho Chi Minh. The 1910 Census categorized people from French Indochina and all Asian ethnicities as "Indian, Chinese, Japanese, and all other." That year, New York's "Indian, Chinese, Japanese, and all other" population was 12,578, while Massachusetts was home to 3,435 people identified as "Indian, Chinese, and all other." In 2023, the Census Bureau estimated that New York City was home to more than 1.2 million people identifying as Asian alone, while 66,500 people identifying as Asian alone called Boston home. 
• Nguyen Van Thieu was president of South Vietnam from 1967 until his resignation shortly before the Fall of Saigon. Following his resignation, he and his wife lived in exile in Taiwan and England before finally settling in the Norfolk County, Massachusetts town of Foxborough in the 1990s. At the time of the 1990 Census, 15,449 Vietnamese called Massachusetts home, including 1,140 in Norfolk County. Prior to Thieu's death in 2001, the 2000 Census counted 33,962 identifying as Vietnamese alone in Massachusetts and 32,274 in Norfolk County. In 2021, 52,841 people in Massachusetts identified themselves as Vietnamese alone, including 10,943 people in Norfolk County.
• According to the U.S. Veterans Administration, more than 8.5 million Americans served in the U.S. Armed Forces during the Vietnam era from 1964 to 1973, about 2.7 million in Vietnam. In 2023, the Census Bureau estimated that 15,813,955 Americans identified as veterans. Among them: 5,220,018 Vietnam War veterans; 4,429,658 Gulf War (September 2001 or later) veterans; 3,925,943 Gulf War (August 1990-August 2001); and 547,743 Korean War veterans. Only 91,008 World War II veterans were still alive in 2023. The last American veteran of World War I died in 2001.
• The census did not collect data on the number of Vietnamese in the United States until 1980. As a result, there is very little population data available for Vietnamese Americans before that time. However, the Office of Homeland Security Statistics (OHSS) does maintain records of the number people granted lawful permanent residence status dating as far back as 1820. According to OHSS data, the United States granted lawful permanent resident status to just 290 Vietnamese immigrants between 1950 and 1959. Between 1960 and 1969, 2,949 Vietnamese received lawful permanent resident status, and the number jumped to 121,716 between 1970 and 1979. With the arrival of thousands of Vietnamese refugees following the end of the Vietnam War, the 1980 Census was the first census to include "Vietnamese" as a response to the ancestry question. In 1980, 215,184 people reported being of Vietnamese ancestry. By 1990, 614,547 identified as Vietnamese in the United States.
• The Hmong—an ethnic group native to China and Southeast Asia—were allies of the United States during the Vietnam War.  They fought alongside American troops, rescued downed American pilots in Laos, and supplied vital intelligence about North Vietnamese operations.  After the war, thousands of Hmong immigrated to the United States.  In 2023, there were 337,925 people identifying as Hmong alone in the United States.  In 2021, cities with the nation's largest Hmong populations included St. Paul, Minnesota (34,706) which has the largest Hmong population of any city in the nation, followed by Sacramento, CA (29,798), and Fresno, CA (26,250).
• The population of Vietnam more than doubled since the end of the Vietnam War. According to the United Nations, the population of Vietnam was an estimated 46.5 million in April 1975.  According to Census Bureau estimates, Vietnam's population was 105.8 million in July 2024, making it the world's 16th largest nation between Egypt (population 111.2 million) and Iran (pop. 88.4 million).
• Like the United States, Vietnam also conducts censuses every 10 years as of April 1. The country has conducted five censuses in years ending in "9" since 1979. In 1979, Vietnam's population was approximately 52.7 million. It grew to 64.4 million in 1989; 76.3 million in 1999; and 85.8 in 2009.  During the most recent 2019 Census, Vietnam's population exceeded 96.2 million people.
• According to the Census Bureau's American Community Survey, Vietnamese alone was one of the largest segments of the Asian population in the United States in 2023: 4.7 million identified as Asian Indian alone; 4.5 million as Chinese alone; 3.6 million as Other Asian alone; 3.1 million as Filipino alone; 1.9 million as Vietnamese alone; 1.5 million as Korean alone; and 725,773 as Japanese alone.
• In Vietnam, nearly 40 percent of the population shares the surname Nguyen. As a result, the growth of the Vietnamese population in the United States can be tracked using census surname data. A study of 2000 Census data found that Smith, Johnson, Williams, and Brown were the most common surnames in the United States. However, with more than 1.1 million people identified as Vietnamese alone in 2000, Nguyen ranked as the nation's 59th most common surname. Ten years later, Smith, Johnson, Williams, and Brown remained the most common surnames. As the population of people identifying as Vietnamese alone rose to 1.5 million in 2010, Nguyen became the nation's 38th most common surname. Other Vietnamese surnames found to be among the most common last names identified by the 2010 Census included Tran (ranked 132), Le (277), Pham (370), Huyhn (620), Phan (918), Vo (960), and Vu (962).
• The Selective Service Act of 1948 requires all men 18 to 26 years of age to register for the Selective Service. During the Vietnam War era (1964-1973), 1,857,304 men were drafted into military service. Included among those inductees were some of the nation's 2,143,526 18- and 19-year-old males counted during the 1950 Census; 1,261,572 18-year-old and 1,114,545 19-year-old males counted in 1960; and 3,656,469 18- and 19-year-olds counted during the 1970 Census. Although 18-year-old males are still required to register with the Selective Service, the U.S. Army inducted the last draftee on June 30, 1973. In 2023, the Census Bureau estimated there were nearly 4.5 million 18- and 19-year-old males in the United States.
• The Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC, lists the names of American military personnel who died as a result of their service during the Vietnam War. Yale undergraduate student Maya Lin designed the memorial that was dedicated on November 13, 1982. The more than 58,000 names on the memorial were etched in Memphis, Tennessee, onto black granite panels that masons cut and fabricated in Barre, Vermont. Nicknamed the "Granite Center of the World," Barre is home to many establishments supporting its granite industry including quarries, masons, cemetery memorial manufacturers, etc. In 2022, the Census Bureau's County Business Patterns series found that the United States was home to 395 establishments in the Dimension Stone Mining and Quarrying sector (NAICS code 212311); 2,134 establishments in the Cut Stone and Stone Product Manufacturing sector (NAICS 327991); and 18,481 establishments in the Masonry Contractors sector (NAICS. 238140).
• Twenty years after the Fall of Saigon and closure of the U.S. embassy in Saigon, President William J. Clinton announced the restoration of diplomatic relations with Vietnam on July 11, 1995. The two countries also opened their borders to increased trade. In 1992, the United States exported just $7 million in goods to Vietnam and imported $0. In 1995, exports to Vietnam rose to $252.3 million and imports grew to $199 million. Within 10 years of normalizing relations, the United States was importing more than $6.6 billion and exporting nearly $1.2 billion to and from Vietnam. In 2024, the United States exported nearly $13.1 billion of goods to Vietnam. Imported goods like electronics; furniture; tires; medical equipment; seafood; coffee, tea, and spices; candles; carpet and textiles; and thousands of other items totaled more than $136.5 billion.

Joseph C. G. Kennedy, superintendent of the census from 1850 to 1853 and 1860 to 1865, was born in Meadville, Pennsylvania on April 1, 1813.

Kennedy was an attorney and journalist in Pennsylvania when President Zachary Taylor appointed him secretary of the newly created Census Board—precursor to the U.S. Census Bureau—in May 1849. He oversaw the 1850 Census that collected, tabulated, and published data from 23,191,876 Americans.

Kennedy returned to supervise the 1860 Census, but he curtailed plans to publish detailed data tables after the American Civil War began in 1861. During his wartime tenure as superintendent of the census, he frequently travelled and corresponded with President Abraham Lincoln. As a trusted advisor to the president, Kennedy used the recently collected 1860 Census data to create tables and maps that proved invaluable to Lincoln and Union Army military planners.

Later, Kennedy worked as a real estate agent and bank attorney in Washington, DC. On July 13, 1887, a disgruntled former client murdered Kennedy as he left his office.