17 February 1979: The day China attacked Vietnam

Vietnamese veteran Nguyen Duy Vinh, 56, cleans the grave of a comrade at a military cemetery outside Hanoi February 17, 2012. China attacked Vietnam on February 17, 1979, starting a brief border war during which an estimated 20,000 Chinese soldiers and 10,000 Vietnamese soldiers died. In the ensuing years the Vietnamese and Chinese governments have tried to forget the conflict and improve relations. There are no ceremonies in either country to mark the anniversary of the start of the war but in Vietnam, where anti-China sentiment still runs deep, people visit cemeteries to remember the dead. REUTERS/Kham