In 1950, the United States recognized the State of Vietnam, led by Bảo Đại, established diplomatic relations, and sent its first ambassador to Saigon. The country later became officially known as the Republic of Vietnam following the rise of President Ngô Đình Diệm in 1955. The US was opposed to the communist government of the North, led by Chairman Hồ Chí Minh, and did not recognize the northern regime.
At the end of the Vietnam War, the US Embassy in Saigon was shuttered and all embassy personnel evacuated on April 29, 1975, just prior to the capture of Saigon by North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces. Since the normalization of United States–Vietnam relations in 1995, the US Consulate General in Ho Chi Minh City stands adjacent to the site of the former embassy which was demolished in 1998. The US Ambassador to Vietnam is now seated in the US Embassy in Hanoi, the former capital city of North Vietnam and the current capital of the unified Socialist Republic of Vietnam.