The Republic of Vietnam, commonly known as South Vietnam, was created by the partition of Vietnam in 1954 after the defeat of France at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu. It was ruled by an anti-Communist government allied with the United States and fought with the aid of the US against North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. The Republic of Vietnam should not be confused with the Communist-backed Republic of South Vietnam.
US forces withdrew in 1973, and the South Vietnamese government surrendered to North Vietnam and its South Vietnamese NLF allies on April 30, 1975. The interim communist Republic of South Vietnam was established, until a unified Socialist Republic of Vietnam was inaugurated on July 2, 1976.