60. Nguyen Luong Bang, “Gap Bac o Tan Trao” [Meeting Uncle at Tan Trao] in Tan Trao, 1945–1985 (Ha Tuyen, 1985), p. 52, cited in BNTS, vol. 2, p. 258. Also see Tran Trong Trung, “92 ngay dem: Bac Ho o Tan Trao” [92 days and nights: Uncle Ho at Tan Trao], Tap chi Lich su Quan su [Journal of Military History], April 1995.
61. Hoang Van Hoan, Drop in the Ocean, p. 213.
62. Histoire de la révolution, pp. 119–20. A somewhat longer version appears in Van kien Dang (1930–1945), vol. 3, pp. 410–11. One of Ho’s stratagems rot winning the support of other Party leaders was apparently to play up the issue of Allied support. According to Patti (Why Viet Nam?, p. 551), the National Uprising Committee consisted of Truong Chinh, Vo Nguyen Giap, Tran Dang Ninh, Le Thanh Nghi, and Chu Van Tan. For the debate ovet strategy at the meeting, see Nguyen Luong Bang, “Moi vstre-chii c tovarishchim Ho Shi Minh,” [My meeting with comrade Ho Chi Minh] in Nash Prezident Ho Shi Minh [Our president Ho chi Minh] (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Press, 1967), pp. 97–99. See also Récits de la résistance Vietnamienne (1925–1945) (Paris: François Maspero, 1966), pp. 19–22.
63. Tran Trong Trung, “92 ngay dem,” pp. 15–17. Nguyen Luong Bang, “Mes rencontres avec l’Oncle Ho,” in Souvenirs, p. 76. This is a slightly different version of the article in Nash Prezident cited in the previous note. For an account of the congress by a participant, see Tran Huy Lieu, “Di du Tan Trao” [Going to Tan Trao], in NCLS, no. 17 (August 1960). Henry Prunier recalls that as the U.S. contingent filed by the congress hall en route to Thai Nguyen, they noticed portraits on the wall of the meeting hall. Among them was a portrait of General Claire Chennault, but Ho’s was not among them (Prunier remarks at OSS-Vietminh Conference, September 23, 1997). Also see Patti, Why Viet Nam?, p. 134.
64. The complete appeal is contained in Van kien Dang (1930–1945), vol. 3, pp. 404–5. For the ceremony, see Nguyen Luong Bang, in “Mes rencontres,” p. 77.
X | The Days of August
1. For an estimate of the number of deaths, see David G. Marr, Vietnam 1945: The Quest for Power (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1995), p. 104. Shipments of grain to the north were hindered by a variety of factors, including U.S. air attacks, the mining of Haiphong harbor, and Japanese requisitions of all large vessels for their own use—see the memoirs of Lt. General Nguyen Quyet, “Hanoi in August,” in Hanoi Moi, August 26–31 and September 4, 1980, translated in JPRS, no, 81,203, July 2, 1982.
2. Histoire de la révolution d’août (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Press, 1972), pp. 125–26; Vo Nguyen Giap, “Ho Chi Minh: Père de l’armée révolutionnaire du Vietnam,” in Souvenirs, p. 212; remarks by Henry Prunier at OSS-Vietminh Conference, September 23, 1997.
3. See Nguyen Khang, “Hanoi khoi nghia” [The Hanoi uprising], in Nhung ngay thang tam [The Days of August] (Hanoi: Van hoc, 1961), pp. 125–27. According to Khang, by the end of 1944 the Party had already enrolled about three thousand members in its organizations, and was able to buy weapons or obtain them from secret supporters in the native army. The terrorist units were selected from the most enthusiastic members of the Youth National Salvation Association, who were released from other duties and placed under the direct control of the regional committee.
4. Ibid., p. 133; Nguyen Quyet, “Hanoi in August.”
5. Tran Huy Lieu, Lich su thu do Ha noi [A history of the city of Hanoi] (Hanoi: n.p., 1960), pp. 213–15; Nguyen Khang, “Hanoi khoi nghia,” pp. 133–34. Nguyen Quyet, “Hanoi in August.”
6. See Tran Van Giau, Giai cap cong nhan Viet Nam [The Vietnamese working class], vol. 3, 1939–1945 (Hanoi: Su that, 1963), pp. 238–43; Nguyen Quyet, “Hanoi in August.”
7. Tran Van Giau, “Mot so dac diem cua khoi nghia thang tam 1945 o Nam bo, Sai gon” [A few remarks about the August 1945 Revolution in Saigon], Tap chi Lich su Dang [Party History Review], no. 34 (June 1990), pp. 4–10. Giau admitted (p. 5) that in 1945 non-Communist political elements outnumbered the ICP by a ratio of 10 to 1.
8. Tran Van Giau, Giai cap cong nhan Viet Nam [The Vietnamese working class], vol. 1 (Hanoi: Su that, 1957), p. 256. On Tran Van Giau, see Stein Tonnesson, The Vietnamese Revolution of 1945: Roosevelt, Ho Chi Minh, and de Gaulle in a World at War (London: Sage, 1991), p. 142; Tonnesson quotes Tran Van Giau as remarking that three hundred comrades in prison with him in 1940 were protected from the full force of the official represssion and constituted a sort of “reserve force” for the Party in its future rise to power. Pham Ngoc Thach was at this time an affluent medical doctor and a French citizen, and some Party members questioned his fitness for Party membership—see the interview with Tran Van Giau in Marr, Vietnam 1945, p. 217.
9. Tran Van Giau, “Mot so dac diem,” pp. 8–10; Archimedes L. A. Patti, Why Viet Nam? Prelude to America’s Albatross (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1980), pp. 182–89; Truong Nhu Tang, Vietcong Memoir: An Inside Account of the Vietnam War and Its Aftermath (San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1985), p. 7.
10. Vo Nguyen Giap, Unforgettable Days (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Press, 1975), pp, 9–16; BNTS, vol. 2, p. 269; Nhung su kien lich su Dang [Events in the history of the party], vol. 1 (Hanoi: Su that, 1976), p. 660. For Ho’s remark on the flooding, see Tran Dan Tien, in Avec l’Oncle Ho (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Press, 1972), p. 103. Ho Chi Minh’s route from Tan Trao to Hanoi is traced in BNTS, vol. 2, 267–70. Also see Nguyen Quyet, “Hanoi in August.” There is some disagreement on the date of Ho’s arrival in Hanoi. Some sources give August 25, others the twenty-sixth. I am inclined to accept the former, since Archimedes Patti received an invitation to meet him at noon on August 26 and Ho was already settled in. Daniel Hémery contends that he arrived in Hanoi on August 21—see Hémery, Ho Chi Minh: De l’Indochine au Vietnam (Paris: Gallimard, 1990), p. 89.
11. Vo Nguyen Giap, Unforgettable Days, p. 22.
12. Patti, Why Viet Nam?, pp. 199–211.
13. In his memoirs, Bao Dai declared that the audience, most of whom were probably officials or courtiers, took the news of the abdication in stunned silence—see S. M. Bao Dai, Le Dragon d’Annam (Paris: Plon, 1980), pp. 117–21. Tran Huy Lieu provided his own version of the occasion in “Tuoc an kiem cua Hoang de Bao Dai” [The abdication of Emperor Bao Dai], in NCLS, no. 18 (September 1960), pp. 46–51. In Lieu’s account, the voyage south was marked by exuberance on the part of the local population en route. After the abdication, the palace and the property therein, along with the imperial tombs in the mountains west of the city, were turned over to the local people’s committee for safekeeping. In the awkward moments after the abdication, Lieu asked Bao Dai whether the domination of his country by the French and the Japanese had been painful. Bao Dai simply replied, “Yes, it was often painful” (see p. 50). In his own memoirs, Bao Dai described Tran Huy Lieu as “a seedy-looking runt who hid behind his dark glasses such a squint that it was not possible to look at him without embarrassment.”
14. Vo Nguyen Giap, Unforgettable Days, pp. 24–25.
15. Hoang Van Hoan, A Drop in the Ocean: Hoang Van Hoan’s Revolutionary Reminiscences (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1988), p. 217; BNTS, vol. 2, p. 272; Vo Nguyen Giap, Unforgettable Days, pp, 25–26.
16. Vo Nguyen Giap, Unforgettable Days, pp. 27–28. The place was named after a French bishop in Indochina in the nineteenth century. Ho Chi Minh suggested that the spot be renamed Ba Dinh Square in honor of three villages in Thanh Hoa province that had fought against the French conquest in the late nineteenth century—see Kobelev, p. 174. For information on Ho’s change of residence, see Georges Boudarel and Nguyen Van Ky, Hanoi, 1936–1996: Du drapeau rouge au billet vert (Paris: Editions Autrement, 1997), p. 99.
17. NR 63 from XUF, dated September 2, 1945, Box 199, Folder 3373, RG 226, USNA. For the size of the crowd, see Marr, Vietnam 1945, p. 530, fn 239; Marr estimates that the crowd was unlikely to have exceeeded 400,000, given the fact that the population of the city at that time was only about 200,000. According to some observers, when the Allied planes passed overhea
d, Vietminh officials announced proudly, “Those are ours.” I have taken the translation of Ho Chi Minh’s speech from Ho Chi Minh: Selected Writings (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Press, 1977), pp. 55–56. Patti gives his own version (p. 250), taken verbatim and translated later into English. One Vietminh veteran recently recounted that when Ho’s speech was broadcast at Tan Trao, villagers tried to open the radio—which they had never seen before—to see if they could find the speaker inside—comments by Tran Minh Chau, OSS-Vietminh Conference, September 23, 1997.
18. See Histoire de la révolution, pp. 120–21. According to Georges Boudarel, Ho’s khaki suit was specially made at his own request. When his private secretary Vu Dinh Huynh, pleaded with him to buy a better suit and leather shoes, Ho refused and demanded something simple, practical, and comfortable, rather than expensive or elegant—see his comments in Boudarel, Hanoi, pp. 99–100. Ho remarked to Huynh that he had never worn a necktie, but that was certainly not true, as numerous photographs attest.
19. Vo Nguyen Giap, Unforgettable Days, pp. 39–41, and Bui Diem, In the Jaws of History (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1987), p. 39. One Vietnamese source states that in the fifteen provinces of the Red River delta the total rice harvest for the autumn of 1945 was only 500,000 metric tons, as compared with 832,000 the previous year—see Nguyen Kien Giang, Viet Nam nam dau tien sou cach mang thang tam [Vietnam in the years immediately following the August Revolution] (Hanoi: Su that, 1961), pp. 140–41, citing the newspaper Su That [Truth], December 12, 1945.
20. Nguyen Kien Giang, Nam dau tien, pp. 153–54, citing Sit That, September 13, 1946.
21. Philippe Devillers, Histoire du Vietnam, 1940–1952 (Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1952), p. 189; Nguyen Cong Binh, “Ban ve tinh chat cuoc each mang thang tarn” [On the nature of the August Revolution], in NCLS, no. 17 (August 1960), p. 4.
22. Patti, Why Viet Nam?, p. 284. According to Patti (p. 291), the total number of Chinese troops never exceeded 50,000. “Yesterday’s elite corps” is a reference to disciplined troops who had arrived the day before and were stationed in the citadel or on the grounds of the governor-general’s palace.
23. “Nghi quyet cua Toan quoc Hoi nghi Dang Cong san Dong duong” [Resolution of the National Conference of the Indochinese Communist Party], in Van kien Dang (1930–1945) [Party Documents (1930–1945)], vol. 3 (Hanoi: Ban Nghien cuu lich su Dang Truong uong, 1977), pp. 412–23, especially pp. 415–17.
24. Charles Fenn, Ho Cbi Minh: A Biographical Introduction (New York: Scribner, 1973), p. 8.
25. See William Duiker, U.S. Containment Policy and the Conflict in Indochina (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1994), p. 27. The issue of trusteeships had been discussed at length at San Francisco and there was disagreement among U.S. officials as to whether the United States should insist on future independence or just self-government. The latter view prevailed, despite the plea by FDR adviser Charles Taussig that Roosevelt had insisted on independence. Other officials felt that Great Britain would not accept “independence” and that would wreck the whole concept. See William Conrad Gibbons, The U.S. Government and the Vietnam War: Executive and Legislative Roles and Relationships, vol. 1 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1986), pp. 14–15.
26. Patti, Why Viet Nam?, p. 289. Patti’s superiors in China felt that should the United States become involved in Franco-Vietminh negotiations, it could lead to “serious trouble. See cable Davis to Heppner, September 1, 1945, Box 199, and Heppner to Davis, cable dated September 1, 1945, Entry 154, Box 18, both in Foldet 3373, RG 226, USNA.
27. For a description of conditions in Saigon by an American observer, see the report by Captain J. Herbert Bluechel, dated September 30, 1945, in U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Causes, Origins, and Lessons of the Vietnam War, 92d Congress, 2d sess., 1972, pp. 283–84. For criticism of Tran Van Giau within the ICP, see Marr, Vietnam 1945, p. 462.
28. An OSS detachment had been dispatched to Saigon with responsibility for investigating war crimes and prisoners-of-war conditions, and protecting U.S. property. For a source reflecting Gracey’s point of view, see Peter M. Dunn, The First Vietnam War (New York: St. Martin’s, 1985), especially p. 155.
29. Contemporary official reports of the attack are contained in Senate Committee, Causes, pp. 283–98. I have also drawn on the remarks by George Wickes at the OSS-Vietminh Conference, September 22–23, 1997.
30. Ho Chi Minh’s letter, dated September 29, 1945, is in the Patti Collection. Gracey considered Dewey to be “an unpleasant man,” while U.S. officers criticized Gracey for his “bull-like attitude.” See the comments by Wickes, OSS-Vietminh Conference, September 22–23, 1997. According to Wickes, most of the other British officials were more sympathetic to the Vietnamese than was General Gracey. Also see Dunn, First Vietnam War, p. 156. For a report on the incident by Captain Bluechel, see Senate Committee, Causes, pp. 283–84, letter by Bluechel dated September 30, 1945.
31. Reported in telegram Paris to Secretary of State, October 12, 1945, RG 59, UPA.
32. Nguyen Kien Giang, Nam dau tien, pp, 117–18; untitled Vo Nguyen Giap article in Cuu Quoc, no. 83, October 5, 1945. For additional information on the religious sects, see Hue-Tam Ho Tai, Millenarianism and Peasant Politics in Vietnam (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1983), and Jayne Werner, “Cao Dai: The Politics of a Vietnamese Syncretic Religious Movement” (Ph.D. diss., Cornell University, 1976).
33. Bao Dai, Dragon, pp. 130–31. The reference to opium is from Vu Thu Hien, Dem giua ban ngay [Between Night and Day] (Westminster, Calif.: Van Nghe, 1997), p. 108. Despite his efforts, Ho Chi Minh was apparently detained by the Chinese authorities on at least one occasion (ibid, p. 28). Still, Lu Han ceased calling him “Mr. Ho” and addressed him as “Chairman Ho”—see Mai Van Bo, Chung toi hoc lam ngoai giao voi Bac Ho” [I studied diplomacy with Uncle Ho] (Ho Chi Minh City: NXB Tre, 1998), p. 46.
34. Patti, Why Viet Nam?, p. 300.
35. Vo Nguyen Giap, Unforgettable Days, p. 68; Devillers, Histoire, p. 177; Mai Van Bo, Chung toi hoc lam, p. 46.
36. Sainteny’s departure deprived Ho Chi Minh of one of his most conciliatory French adversaries. Sainteny had no liking for some of the more militantly anti-French members of the nationalist movement and observed in a report to Paris that should the new Vietnamese leaders (such as Ho Chi Minh) be driven into exile, they might return with French support to become “our best allies”: Note of October 3, 1945 (SA1–02/3), cited in Philippe Devillers, Paris: Saigon: Hanoi (Paris: Gallimard, 1988), p. 98. He also remarked that the Vietnamese had no idea of the true meaning of independence, but were simply entranced by the symbolism of the word. Also see Patti, Why Viet Nam?, p. 299.
37. Telegram, Kunming (Sprouse) to Secretary of State, September 27, 1945, in RG 59, UPA. The report sent in early September was contained in Donovan letter to Ballantine, Director of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs, September 5, 1945, in ibid.
38. Memo from FE (Vincent) to U (Acheson), “Indochina,” September 28, 1945, in RG 59, UPA. Ho Chi Minh confirmed that he was Nguyen Ai Quoc in a lengthy conversation with Patti on September 30—see Patti, Why Viet Nam?, pp. 371–73.
39. The quote is from Memo from Bonbright to Matthews (EUR), October 2, 1945, in RG 59, UPA.
40. “Possible Viet-Minh Representative en Route to Washington” (memo of conversation dated October 31, 1945), in ibid.
41. Remarks by Carlton Swift at OSS-Vietminh Conference, September 22–23, 1997. Ho’s letter to Truman, dated October 22, 1945 is contained in Consulate General (Kunming) to Sec, October 24, 1945, in RG 59, UPA. Also see Patti, Why Viet Nam?, pp. 373–74.
42. See Truong Chinh, “The August Revolution,” in Truong Chinh: Selected Writings (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Press, 1977), pp. 45–47. According to Nguyen Van Tran, Tran Van Giau also had some reservations about Ho’s moderate strategy—see his Viet cho me va Quoc hoi [Letter to my mother and the National Assembly] (Garden Grove, Calif.: Van Nghe, 1996), p.152.
43. Se
e, for example, Harold R. Isaacs, No Peace for Asia (New York: Macmillan, 1947). Isaacs had known Ho Chi Minh when he was living a shabby existence in Shanghai during the 1930s. During an interview with Isaacs at the Northern Palace in the fall of 1945, Ho laughed and said, “And now, I’m president of the provisional government of the RVN [sic]. They call me ‘Excellency.’ Funny, eh?” (p. 163).
44. Ibid., pp. 165, 177.
XI | Reconstruction and Resistance
1. Greg Lockhart, Nation in Arms: The Origins of the People’s Amy of Vietnam (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1989), p. 175; Yves Gras, Histoire de la guerre d’Indochine (Paris: Destins Croisés, 1992), p. 88, gives a figure of 30,000 Vietminh in the north alone.
2. According to Bao Dai, most of the members of the cabinet did not understand the humor in the comment, since they were from central Vietnam, where sausage made from dog meat was not a delicacy as in the north. For gold week, see Archimedes Patti, Why Viet Nam? Prelude to America’s Albatross (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1980), pp. 337–39. For information on the armed buildup, see Vo Nguyen Giap’s Unforgettable Days (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Press, 1975), pp. 82–88.
3. Georges Boudarel and Nguyen Van Ky, Hanoi 1936–1996: Du drapeau rouge au billet vert (Paris: Editions Autrement, 1997), p. 103; Vu Thu Hien, Dem giua ban ngay [Between Night and Day] (Westminster, Calif.: Van Nghe, 1997), p. 227. Ngo Dinh Diem, of course, later served as president of the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam), thus emerging as Ho Chi Minh’s main rival for the role of savior of the country.
4. See K.N.T., “Jours passés auprès de l’Oncle Ho,” in Avec l’Oncle Ho (Hanoi; Foreign Languages Press, 1972), p. 352. For the meetings and nationalist demands, see Nguyen Kien Giang, Viet Nam nam dau tien sau cach mang thang tam [Vietnam in the first years following the August Revolution] (Hanoi: Su that, 1961), pp. 130–33.
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