For the next few days the group resumed the journey southward. On May 21, they crossed the Day River and entered Tan Trao. To reduce the danger from potential enemy agents, Ho Chi Minh posed as an ordinary cadre and temporarily slept in the house of a local village sympathizer. The two U.S. radio operators set up their equipment in a well-camouflaged wooded area nearby. Then Ho and his host sought a new location for Ho to live, eventually selecting a spot about half a mile away in the midst of a small stand of bamboo adjacent to a small brook. In the meantime, villagers had begun to erect new buildings in the local style to serve as offices for the revolutionary leadership. Ho now turned his attention to plans for the general uprising, and called for a meeting of cadres in early June to discuss the situation. After hearing another report on the results of the Hiep Hoa conference, which had decreed the formation of a new liberated zone comprising seven provinces in the Viet Bac (Cao Bang, Bac Can, Lang Son, Ha Giang, Tuyen Quang, Thai Nguyen, and sections of adjacent provinces), he remarked that it would be too cumbersome to have the military forces in each province operate under separate orders, so he directed that all military units throughout the liberated zone be centered under the new VLA. The liberated zone itself, which contained more than one million people, was placed under the direction of a provisional executive committee. A resolution issued at the close of the meeting called for the holding of elections at all levels to create an administrative structure based on democratic principles, and for economic and social reforms to redistribute farmland, reduce taxes, and promote universal literacy. Ho hoped to convene a conference of cadres from throughout the country in the near future to carry out the directives of the meeting, but it soon became clear that under the circumstances such a meeting was impractical, so it was decided that Giap, after daily consultation with Ho Chi Minh, would coordinate the effort from his headquarters at Tan Trao.54
During the next two months, Ho Chi Minh and his colleagues scrambled to keep up with the rapidly evolving situation. There were now increasing indications that Allied forces were going to bypass Indochina and strike directly at the Japanese islands. The end of the war might be near. To win support from the local population, orders were issued to carry out the confiscation of the land of reactionary landlords within the liberated zone and to distribute communal village land to the needy. The practice of corvée was declared abolished, and people’s revolutionary committees were created at the village level through elections based on universal suffrage. Ho attempted to oversee the entire operation, and messengers departed every day carrying dispatches from him or from Vo Nguyen Giap to revolutionary units throughout the region.
One of the tasks that required attention was easier communication with Ho Chi Minh’s U.S. sponsors in south China. In a message to Kunming, Ho had offered the use of a thousand trained guerrillas located near Cho Chu for operations against the Japanese. Despite some reluctance among U.S. officers in Kunming and Chongqing over the possible political repercussions of a formal U.S. relationship with the Vietminh, after it became clear that French units under General Gabriel Sabbatier, who had fled to south China after the March coup, would be useless, Patti won the agreement of his superior, Colonel Helliwell, to pursue the matter. To facilitate the shipment of personnel and supplies, Patti radioed Ho Chi Minh, asking him to locate a small airfield that could be used to deliver personnel and equipment to the Vietminh headquarters at Tan Trao. Ho located a nearby site suitable for building a small airstrip. On June 30, he radioed Patti that he agreed to accept a team of Americans and asked for the date of their arrival. He warned, however, that no French personnel should take part in the operation. In the meantime, AGAS had air-dropped U.S. Army Lieutenant Dan Phelan into Tan Trao to set up a network to facilitate the rescue of downed Allied fliers and serve as U.S. representative until the arrival of the OSS team.
On July 16, Major Allison Thomas, head of the “Deer” team that had been assigned by OSS to establish contact with the Vietminh, parachuted with a small group into Tan Trao on a mission to evaluate the situation and assist the Vietminh in carrying out anti-Japanese operations. After two members of the team were helped down from the tree-tops where they had landed, they were all given a welcoming salute from two hundred guerrillas armed with a variety of captured weapons. Thomas was impressed:
I was then escorted to Mr. Hoe, one of the big leaders of the VML (Viet Minh League) Party. He speaks excellent English but is very weak physically as he recently walked in from Tsingsi. He received us most cordially. We then were shown our quarters. They had built for us a special bamboo shelter, consisting of a bamboo floor a few feet off the ground and a roof of palm leaves. We then had supper consisting of Beer (recently captured), rice, bamboo sprouts and barbecued steak. They freshly slaughtered a cow in our honor.
Not all of the Deer team received an enthusiastic welcome, however. One of the new arrivals rescued from the trees was a French army officer, Lieutenant Montfort. When Thomas met with Ho on the morning of the seventeenth, Ho said that if the guards had known Montfort was French, they might have shot him. “I like the French, but many soldiers don’t,” he remarked. Although ten million Americans would be welcomed, he said, no French would be allowed. Montfort and two other French citizens were ordered out of the camp and eventually joined refugees en route to China. To make his new visitors comfortable, Ho instructed the local chef in how to prepare roast chicken the way Americans liked it and sent one of his followers to find bottles of champagne and Dubonnet for a welcoming banquet.55
Ho Chi Minh found accommodations for the Americans in a house next to his own. A day after their arrival, Ho asked Thomas to inform U.S. authorities that the “VML would be willing to talk to some High Ranking French officer (General Sebotier, eg) [sic] and see what the French would have to offer.” In Kunming, Patti forwarded this message to Major Jean Sainteny, head of the Free French Military Mission that had recently arrived there to prepare for a resumption of French authority in postwar Indochina. A few days later, Ho indicated his willingness to talk with a French representative, either in Indochina or China, and forwarded an appeal for future reforms to take place after the end of the war. Among the points to be raised were the election of a parliament chosen by universal suffrage, the return of natural resources to the Vietnamese people, prohibition of the sale of opium, and commitments by France that all freedoms outlined in the United Nations Charter would be granted to the Indochinese people and that independence would be restored to Vietnam in not less than five not more than ten years.56
There was no immediate response from the French. But Ho Chi Minh had already begun to make an impression on his American visitors. Thomas was impressed with the quality of the Vietminh armed forces and, with approval from Kunming, his men began to provide local military units with instructions on how to use U.S. weapons (such as the M-I title, the carbine, and the bazooka) and guerrilla tactics. One hundred of Ho’s best troops were selected to take part in a training program that took place about two miles outside of Tan Trao village. As Henry Prunier, a U.S. member of the Deer team, recalled, they were quick learners.
Ho Chi Minh also set out to allay the possible suspicions of his visitors as to the ideological orientation of the movement. As Thomas remarked in a report to Kunming: “Forget the Communist Bogy. VML is not Communist. Stands for freedom and reforms from French harshness.” Lieutenant Phelan of AGAS himself had initially been reluctant to take part in the operation because he felt that Ho Chi Minh probably had Communist leanings, but Ho soon put to rest the young American officer’s suspicions. On one occasion he asked Phelan if he knew the opening words in the U.S. Declaration of Independence, which Ho intended to incorporate into the declaration for his own country. “But he actually seemed to know more about it than I did,” Phelan reported. In one cable sent from Pac Bo to Kunming, Phelan described the Vietminh in telegraphese as “not anti-French merely patriots deserve full trust and support.” Phelan apparently never changed his mind. Many years later he de
scribed Ho to the journalist Robert Shaplen as “an awfully sweet guy. If I had to pick out the one quality about that little old man sitting on his hill in the jungle, it was his gentleness.”57
But the strain of the long journey from China now began to under-mine Ho’s already fragile physique. Although he was only fifty-four years old, he had contracted tuberculosis During his long months in Chinese prisons, and many observers remarked on his weakened condition after his release. He had apparently fallen ill once again on his journey into Indochina from Jingxi, but continued with his efforts in spite of that. As Vo Nguyen Giap tells the story:
The strain had an effect on his health. He fell ill. For several days, in spite of the fatigue and the fever, he pushed himself and continued his work. Every day in coming to make my report, I worried about his condition. Invariably he responded: “It will pass. Come on in and bring me up to date.” But I clearly saw that he was weakening and had lost considerable weight. One day, I found him in a state of crisis, delirious with fever. We were terribly short of medicine, just had some aspirin and quinine tablets. He took them, but they had no effect. Ordinarily, except for his moments of repose, he never lay down. Now he lay on his cot for hours in a coma. Of all those who worked habitually by his side I was the only one who had stayed at Tan Trao, He was so tired one night that when I suggested that I stay the night with him, insisting that I was free, he opened his eyes and nodded his head slightly in agreement.
The black night and the jungle held our little hut on the mountainside in a vice. Each time that Uncle Ho recovered his lucidity, he returned to the current situation: “The circumstances are favorable to us. We must at all costs seize independence. We must be ready for any sacrifice, even if the entire chain of the Central Mountains must catch fire.” When he could put a little order in his thoughts, he insisted on the points that preoccupied him: “In guerrilla war, when the movement rises, it is necessary to take advantage of it to push further, to expand and create solid bases, in preparation for critical times.” At that moment I refused to believe that he had confided in me his last thoughts, but on later reflection, I told myself that he felt so weak that he was giving me his final recommendations. The moments of lucidity and agitation succeeded themselves all night. In the morning, I urgently informed the Party Central Committee of his condition. Then I asked the local villagers if they knew how to make some mixture of wild plants. They told me of a man who … was reputed for his medicinal preparations against fever. I sent a courier immediately to fetch him. The old man, who was of Tay origin, took his pulse, burned a root that he had just dug up in the forest, sprinkled the cinders in a bowl of rice soup and fed it to the patient. The miracle occurred. The medicine was efficacious. The President emerged from his coma. The next day the fever diminished, he took that mixture two or three times during the day. His condition continued to improve. After the fever subsided, he arose and resumed his daily work.58
American sources tell a different story. One of the OSS members who had been parachuted into the area was a nurse; he quickly diagnosed Ho Chi Minh’s illness as a combination of malaria and dysentery, and injected him with quinine and sulfa drugs. Whether it was that treatment that cured him is unclear; Thomas later commented that although Ho was sick, he was “not sure that he would have died without us.”59
One of the key tasks for Vietminh leaders at Tan Trao was to respond to a recent Central Committee directive that a Party plenum and a congress of Vietminh delegates from around the country should be convened as soon as possible. With Allied forces rapidly approaching the Japanese home islands, Ho urged his colleagues to make arrangements to hold the two events without delay. An effort to hold the congress in July proved abortive, however, because delegates were unable to arrive in time, and the meeting was postponed until mid-August.
By early August, Ho became ever more insistent. On hearing radio reports that an atomic bomb had been dropped on Hiroshima on the sixth, he directed all Vietminh organizations throughout the country to send delegates to Tan Trao as soon as possible. Four days later, he met with Truong Chinh and other members of the Central Committee who had just arrived from Hanoi. Some felt that the Party did not need to convene a congress of delegates and should simply seize power on its own initiative, but the majority eventually came around to Ho’s view. When it proved difficult to agree on a date, Ho retorted: “We should hold the congress right away and shouldn’t put it off. We must struggle to do it immediately. The situation is about to change very rapidly. We can’t lose this opportunity.” The meeting of the National People’s Congress was finally scheduled for August 16. The Central Committee would hold its ninth plenum three days earlier.60
During the next few days, still weak from his recent illness, Ho Chi Minh continued to follow the world situation closely on Major Thomas’s radio receiver. The creation of the United Nations in San Francisco, the entry of the Soviet Union into the war against Japan, and the dropping of the second atomic bomb on Nagasaki all came in rapid succession and made it clear that the end of the war was near. After some reluctance (possibly because of his illness), Ho had previously agreed to meet with a representative of the Free French Movement in Kunming; at one point in early August he went to the airstrip to await his flight, but the plane sent from China could not land because of the weather. When the news about Hiroshima arrived, Ho canceled his plans and decided to remain at Tan Trao. On August 12, Party leaders decided to move directly toward launching a general insurrection throughout the country, and (even though several delegates had not yet arrived) to hold their party conference, known to Vietnamese historians as the Ninth Plenum, the following day.
The Party conference was held in a small house in Tan Trao village. In attendance were about thirty delegates, including General Secretary Truong Chinh and Nguyen Luong Bang (representing north Vietnam), Nguyen Chi Thanh (representing central Vietnam), Ha Huy Tap’s brother Ha Huy Giap (representing south Vietnam), Vo Nguyen Giap and Hoang Van Hoan (representing the Viet Bac), and additional delegates from Thailand and Laos, as well as Ho Chi Minh himself.
Because of illness, Ho Chi Minh did not attend the opening sessions, but he did present the main report at the Ninth Plenum. He opened with an overview of the international situation, noting the imminent surrender of Japanese forces throughout Asia, and predicting that Allied troops would soon arrive in Indochina. The presence of foreign occupation troops, whether British, French, or Nationalist Chinese, would be a complicating factor, he admitted, but the Party had no alternative but to be in contact with them. With that in view, it was important to be in a strong position to deal with them by seizing independence from the surrendering Japanese administration. As soon as Tokyo announced its surrender, he urged that the Party launch a general uprising to seize political power throughout the country.61
Debate over Ho Chi Minh’s proposal was intense. Some Party leaders (probably including Truong Chinh) were reluctant to launch an early insurrection, citing the weakness of the revolutionary armed forces. Although the VLA had grown in size from about 500 in March to 5000 in mid-August, they argued that it was still no match for the Japanese forces inside Indochina, much less an Allied occupation force. If that were the case, the Party would be better to demand independence through negotiations with the Allied powers or the French. But Ho Chi Minh insisted that if the Party hoped to confront the Allies from a strong position, it had no alternative but to attempt to seize power on its own. Power was not beyond reach, he declared, since we have a mass following throughout the country. If it proved impossible to consolidate revolutionary authority, then it was vital to liberate areas prior to the arrival of the foreign troops and prepare for a protracted struggle while exploiting the contradictions among the Allies to obtain advantages for themselves.
In the end, Ho Chi Minh had his way. The conference called for the launching of a general insurrection to seize power throughout the country, and selected a national uprising committee (uy ban k hoi nghia toan quoc) under Truo
ng Chinh to provide central direction for the Party’s military forces. The committee immediately issued an order to all troops:
Soldiers and compatriots throughout the country. The hour of general insurrection has sounded. The unique opportunity has been given to all our troops and to the entire Vietnamese people to launch the reconquest of national independence. We must act promptly with our entire energies but also with extreme care. The country demands from us all great sacrifices. Total victory is in our hands!62
On August 16, 1945, shortly after the news of the Japanese surrender had become known in Indochina, the leaders of the Vietminh Front (now becoming known as the Tong Bo, or General Bureau) convened a so-called National People’s Congress in Tan Trao. Sixty delegates from all areas of the country and abroad attended, some having walked for weeks to get there. Many brought gifts of rice or meat. One delegate of the Tay minority even offered a live buffalo. The conference was held in a specially constructed three-room wood and thatch communal house situated on the banks of a small stream. The meeting itself took place in a room at one end. Portraits of Lenin, Mao Zedong, and General Claire Chennault were placed on the walls. The central room contained an altar and was festooned with captured Japanese weapons. At the other end was a library for revolutionary literature, which also doubled as the delegates’ dining room. After an opening report by Truong Chinh, Ho Chi Minh took the floor. Astonishingly, few in attendance knew his real identity, for the organizational committee at the congress simply presented him as Ho Chi Minh, a veteran revolutionary. But some of the more sophisticated began to whisper among themselves that “the old man of Tan Trao,” as he was familiarly named at the congress, was really Nguyen Ai Quoc.63
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