Trần Nghệ Tông
[9] Nghệ Tông faced his first failure in March 1371 when king of Champa Chế Bồng Nga commanded troop attacked directly Thăng Long, the capital of Đại Việt, after the petition of Nhật Lễ's mother.
[10]: 92–93 Unable to confront with the strong and well-organized opponent, the imperial court of the Trần dynasty had to flee from Thăng Long and let the capital be violently looted by Chế Bồng Nga's army.
[8] By nature Duệ Tông was an arrogant and hard-headed ruler who ignored the advice from mandarins about the power of Champa's army, therefore right after the enthronement he began to prepare a military campaign in the southern border against Chế Bồng Nga's troop.
[7] After some skirmishes caused by Champa, Duệ Tông began his decisive campaign in December 1376 in which the Emperor personally commanded with the assistance of Hồ Quý Ly and Đỗ Tử Bình.
Eventually, the campaign was ended by a disastrous defeat of Đại Việt's army in Đồ Bàn Battle when the Emperor with many high-ranking mandarins and generals of the Trần dynasty were killed by Champa's force.
As a result, Nghệ Tông even decided to hide money in Lạng Sơn in fearing that Chế Bồng Nga's troop might assault and destroy the imperial palace in Thăng Long.
[18] However, in June 1383, Chế Bồng Nga opened a major campaign against Đại Việt, this time Trần Nghệ Tông was so afraid of the enemy that he escaped from Thăng Long ignoring advice from the imperial court.
[21][22] Phế Đế was downgraded to Prince Linh Đức and forced to commit suicide while his supporters in imperial court were swept by Hồ Quý Ly's side.
After another defeat of Đại Việt's army under the command of Hồ Quý Ly by Champa, in November 1389 Nghệ Tông appointed Trần Khát Chân for the position of general who conduct all military operations against Chế Bồng Nga's troop.
[24] Only a few months after taking charge of the position, Trần Khát Chân had a decisive victory over Champa on January 23, 1390, which resulted in the death of Chế Bồng Nga and thus the stable situation in southern border of Đại Việt.
