Grasping the Party’s guidelines on performing the two strategic tasks and the ideology on building up the strength for national construction and protection, the district of Yen Binh has been focusing on building an increasingly solid defensive zone for the sake of Homeland defence.

Yen Binh is a low-land district located in the centre of the Northwestern midland and mountainous region, covering three sides of Thac Ba lake, holding a position of importance to Yen Bai province’s economy, defence and security. Under the Party’s resolutions and the Government’s decrees on defensive zones, especially the 10^th Politburo’s Resolution 28-NQ/TW, dated September 22^nd, 2008 on continuing to build provinces and municipalities into solid defensive zones and the Government’s Decree 21/2019/NĐ-CP, dated February 22^nd, 2019 on defensive zones as well as the province’s resolutions and plans for socio-economic development and defence-security consolidation in the period of 2021-2025, the district’s Party Organisation, authorities, people, and armed forces have been both boosting socio-economic development and consolidating defence and security, particularly building a strong defensive zone to make significant contributions to the Homeland construction and protection in the new situation.

Chairman of the District People’s Committee giving rewards to individuals with great achievements in the district-level defensive zone exercise of 2021

First of all, the district has attached great value to building the politico-spiritual potential, especially a firm “posture of people’s hearts and minds.” Adhering to higher echelons’ directives and resolutions, the District Party Committee and People’s Committee have developed and issued many resolutions and action plans for the military-defence work and the building of a defensive zone. In this regard, emphasis has been placed on raising the awareness and responsibility of all-level party committees and authorities, cadres, party members, officials, the armed forces, and the people for the all-people national defence, the posture of all-people national defence associated with the posture of people’s security, and the building of a solid defensive zone. In the process of defence and security education, due attention has been paid to disseminating the Party’s guidelines and the State’s law on the military-defence task and the Homeland protection, educating citizens on patriotism and national tradition, combating ideological deviations and negative practices within the society, and unmasking the hostile forces’ “peaceful evolution” strategy. Besides, the district has concentrated on consolidating all-level defence and security education councils both qualitatively and quantitatively, renewing the contents and methods of defence and security education, and expanding groups of learners. On a yearly basis, the district directs the District Military Command (DMC) as the Standing Agency of the District Defence and Security Education Council to formulate plans for defence and security education on the spot and dispatch cadres to training courses held by higher echelons. Moreover, consideration has been given to organising defence and security education courses for students and equipping all people with knowledge of defence and security. As a result, the awareness and responsibility of all-level party committees and authorities, cadres, party members, officials, the armed forces, and all people for national construction and protection and the building of a defensive zone have been raised as the basis for cementing the national great unity block and making the “posture of people’s hearts and minds” increasingly strong.

In addition to building up the politico-spiritual potential, the district has both boosted socio-economic development and consolidated defence and security. More specifically, the district has closely combined socio-economic development with defence-security consolidation in its development plans in both long and short terms. To ensure that economic development would always help enhance the defensive zone’s potential, the district has directed the DMC to cooperate with offices and sectors in reviewing, appraising, and closely supervising investment projects to prevent them from affecting defence and security. The district has developed agriculture, forestry, and aquaculture into large-scale production zones, improved productivity and the quality of products, promoted product branding, preserved the existing area of forests, encouraged the people to extend the cycle of crops, and actively planted trees to increase the forest cover. Being seen as the incentive for industrial development, the district has taken advantage of all resources and attracted all investments to develop industrial zones and factories for economic growth. At the same time, due regard has been paid to attracting investment in developing ecotourism and community-based tourism, restoring and upgrading several cultural relic sites, such as Thac Ba Mau Temple, Kha Linh Communal House, and Thuy Tien Cave. Up to now, the district has developed over 100 hectares of speciality rice (Bach Ha rice), ensured food security, well reserved forests, increased the forest cover up to more than 54.8%, built the brand of “Thac Ba Lake fish,” and aligned production with consumption. The programme on building new-style countryside has been implemented synchronously with the participation of the entire political system and all people via creative, proper approaches, thereby positively changing the appearance of rural areas and considerably improving the people’s mental and material life. Due to its fractured terrain, the district has adopted breakthrough measures to develop a dual-purpose traffic system capable of facilitating socio-economic development and serving defence and security in the event. Over the years, the district has made investment in building and upgrading the routes of Hoang Thi, Hong Bang, and Cang Huong Ly - Van Phu, the National Highway No.32 in the communes of Dai Minh, Han Da, and Vinh Kien as well as roads within the township of Yen Binh. It has continued to design projects to construct, upgrade, and complete the transport routes of Tan Nguyen - Mau A, Cam An - Mong Son, and Tan Huong - Hoa Cuong. At the same time, it has directed the DMC to cooperate with relevant offices and sectors in devising plans to build the military posture within the defensive zone with specific components and forces. Projects to construct and arrange defence works have also been formulated. Besides, importance has been attached to conducting surveys and drawing maps to manage and improve natural caves, defence works, and defence land within the district. Up to now, the headquarters of the DMC and the District Public Security Force, the air defence battlefield, and barracks for training the reserve force have been basically constructed.

In the building of the defensive zone, the district has placed special emphasis on making the armed forces politically, ideologically, and organisationally strong, with a high level of synergy and combat strength, capable of playing a core role in the building and operation of the defensive zone for the Homeland protection. Over the years, the district has attached significance to consolidating the organisational structure of the armed forces in a “compact and strong” manner and in accordance with each force’s task and the district’s particularities. To be more specific, great weight has been added to building a “revolutionary, regular, elite, gradually modern” standing force, a “strong, extensive” militia and self-defence force, and a powerful reserve force ready for mobilisation in the event. Additionally, due attention has been paid to consolidating the Public Security Force’s organisational structure on a par with its task. Up to now, all reserve units have been sufficiently staffed; members of the militia and self-defence force have accounted for 1.8% of the district’s population; the programme on deploying police officers (graduated from police academies) to the district’s commune has been accomplished. Furthermore, the district has frequently directed military and public security offices to stringently maintain the order of combat readiness and raise the quality of combat training and exercises, especially the defensive zone exercises and commune-level defensive combat drills under the motto of “practicality, effectiveness, thrift, and safety.” Such exercises have enabled the district to supplement and complete the regulations on the defensive zone’s operation, and improve the armed forces’ synergy and authorities’ capacity to deal with situations relating to defence and security. Besides, the district has directed its military and public security offices to enhance coordination under the Government’s Decree 03/2019/NĐ-CP, dated September 5^th, 2019 so as to maintain political security and social order and safety within the area. It should be noted that in spite of performing the “dual task” of socio-economic development and COVID-19 combat, the District Party Committee and People’s Committee have drastically directed relevant forces to make all necessary preparations and successfully organised the district-level defensive zone exercise of 2021 which has been highly appreciated by the Military Region 2 and the province of Yen Bai.

Thanks to those above-mentioned measures, the district of Yen Binh has succeeded in building an increasingly solid defensive zone as the basis for fulfilling the military-defence task and strengthening the all-people national defence and the posture of all-people national defence associated with the posture of people’s security for the Homeland construction and protection.

AN HOANG LINH, Secretary of the District Party Committee