Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam

by Fredrik Logevall

  It was a huge blow to the DRV’s attempt to secure recognition for her “sister” governments in Laos (Pathet Lao) and Cambodia (Khmer Issarak). Pham Van Dong had arrived in Geneva seeking to replace the French colonial state of Indochine with a new, revolutionary Indochina, in which the three “resistance governments” would join together under the leadership of the DRV. The dream was now dying. Zhou Enlai, seeking to advance the negotiations and to show wary non-Communist governments in Asia—notably India, Burma, and Indonesia—that the Viet Minh would not try to export Communism beyond Vietnam’s borders, had made clear that the situation in Laos and Cambodia was different from that in Vietnam and would be judged accordingly.15 In a long telegram to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leadership, he underscored his determination to secure Viet Minh agreement on the need to show flexibility on the key outstanding issues. Without such flexibility, “the negotiation cannot go on, and this … will not serve our long-range interests.” Zhou went on:

  If we take the initiative to make concessions in Cambodia and Laos, we will be able to ask for more gains in Vietnam as compensation to us. Our position in Vietnam being relatively strong in various aspects, we will not only be able to keep our gains there, but also will be capable of gradually consolidating and expanding our influence.… The emphasis of our strategy at this stage should be to encourage the [peace] initiatives of the French, to keep the French from listening to the Americans completely, to make sure the British support stopping the war, and to quickly reach an armistice agreement as long as the conditions seem reasonable.16

  Vietnamese sources, meanwhile, suggest Zhou Enlai may also have had another motivation for the new line: a desire by the CCP to incorporate Laos and Cambodia into China’s sphere of influence, if only to keep them from falling into Vietnam’s. Better to give the two states neutral status than to allow Ho Chi Minh’s government to dominate all of Indochina.17

  On June 19, the day before the chief delegates were scheduled to leave Geneva to return home to consult with their governments, Zhou Enlai told Canadian diplomat and China expert Chester Ronning that a settlement was within reach if only France would commit herself to a political solution. China and her allies had made important concessions, Zhou said, and now the French should follow suit. The next morning he reiterated these points to Eden and also expressed his keen desire to meet the new French premier. Eden, stopping in Paris en route to London later in the day, happily passed the message on to Pierre Mendès France. He urged the Frenchman to meet with Zhou at the earliest opportunity. Mendès France, having received the same recommendation from Jean Chauvel, agreed.18 But where should the meeting occur? The Chinese foreign minister would not go to Paris as long as his government was not recognized by France, while Mendès France feared he would be perceived as a supplicant if he went so soon to Geneva. Dijon was suggested, but the two sides settled instead on the Swiss city of Bern, on the pretext of thanking the Swiss Confederation president for providing a locale for the negotiations. The meeting was arranged for the following Wednesday, June 23, in the French embassy.19

  An epic encounter it would be. Zhou Enlai, attired not in his usual blue high-collared tunic but in a gray business suit and tie, looked younger and more relaxed than he had in Geneva, and he made an immediate winning impression on Mendès France: “L’homme était impressionnant.” Zhou opened sternly—China feared neither threat nor provocation and considered both to be illegitimate means of negotiation—but then followed a conciliatory line. He had lived in France and felt an attachment to the French people, he said, and moreover his view aligned with the French view, meaning military questions should take precedence over the resolution of political issues in Indochina. Achieving a cease-fire was the first priority. Much to the Frenchman’s satisfaction and relief, Zhou then made clear that he accepted not only the view that Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam should be evaluated separately but also, indirectly, the view that there existed “two governments in Vietnam.” Following an armistice, he went on, there should be elections for reunification of that country under a single government.

  Zhou declared that his government—like that of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam—intended to move swiftly toward recognition of Laos and Cambodia and to follow a policy of nonintervention toward both. He even hinted that Beijing would have no objection if one or both of the kingdoms chose to be attached to the French Union. What would not be acceptable, however, would be for the United States to misinterpret this Chinese and DRV policy as an excuse to turn the kingdoms into “bases of aggression.” In order to facilitate national reunification, both Phnom Penh and Vientiane should grant recognition to the resistance movements—Khmer Issarak and Pathet Lao—for the sake of unity. The latter, being a significant presence in Laos, should be granted a zone of administrative control, but Viet Minh forces that penetrated Laotian territory might be withdrawn after an armistice.

  Mendès France liked what he heard, and he could see by the expression on Jean Chauvel’s face that the ambassador was pleased as well. The premier agreed that there should be no American bases in Cambodia or Laos, and he voiced support for elections in Vietnam. The vote could not happen immediately, though, and there was moreover the issue of what kind of temporary division to have in the meantime. Did the Chinese government support partition? Zhou Enlai initially evaded a direct answer but then said he favored a formula involving “large sectors.” Mendès France agreed that a “horizontal cut” was possible, but not as far south as suggested by the Viet Minh at Geneva. Everything else, he continued, depended on a resolution of this issue of the regroupment zones. Zhou concurred and said “this [is] also Mr. Eden’s opinion.” With hard work, he speculated, the military negotiators in Geneva ought to be able to reach agreement “within three weeks,” at which point the foreign ministers could return and be ready to sign the documents. Mendès France, finding this time limit (July 15) to be uncomfortably close to his own July 20 deadline for the settlement of all outstanding problems, replied that three weeks “should be regarded as a maximum.”20

  The meeting drew to a close. Both sides were pleased with the outcome and said they understood each other well, but neither doubted that tough slogging remained. Mendès France flew back to Paris, while his Chinese counterpart, having earlier held sessions with the leaders of the Cambodian and Laotian delegations (he promised them that Beijing would respect their sovereignty and independence), departed for a series of meetings in Asia, among them a two-day secret session with Ho Chi Minh.

  The following day in Paris, June 24, Pierre Mendès France summoned his four principal Indochina advisers to his home for a strategy session: General Ely, who had returned for a short visit from Saigon; Alexandre Parodi, the general secretary of the Foreign Ministry; and La Chambre and Chauvel. Their task: to establish the French diplomatic strategy for the climactic (as they saw it) portion of the Geneva meeting.

  Militarily, the picture looked grim—since Dien Bien Phu’s fall six weeks earlier, the Viet Minh had solidified their control over much of Tonkin and had assembled and deployed the main bulk of their fighting force around the delta; French intelligence estimated they were now in a position to launch a major assault at any time (though the analysts thought Giap would probably bide his time, pending the outcome at Geneva). Viet Minh reconnaissance units were active along the northern face of the delta’s perimeter, and there were signs also of increased infiltration along the southern face. The French, meanwhile, were evacuating isolated outposts and concentrating their forces around Hanoi and along the Hanoi-Haiphong axis, leaving the defense of other areas to VNA units of dubious reliability. Nam Dinh, the third largest city in the delta, would soon have to be abandoned, French planners recognized. To the south, apart from a coastal strip held by French Union units, central Vietnam was now mostly under Viet Minh domination. The important naval and air base of Tourane (Da Nang) was increasingly at risk, while in the area between Qui Nhon and Nha Trang the Viet Minh had the initiative and were increasi
ng their pressure.

  VIETNAMESE CIVILIANS ARE COMPELLED INTO SERVICE TO MAKE FORTIFICATIONS AT PHU LY, SOUTH OF HANOI, ON JUNE 22, 1954. (photo credit 23.1)

  Chauvel, long an advocate of partition and sensing the momentum coming his way, argued that this dire military picture called for accepting a line at Tourane, or roughly the sixteenth parallel, though the effort should be made to get it drawn higher, at the seventeenth. No one objected. On the subject of the election for reunification, the five men agreed on the need to avoid fixing a specific date, or at least setting it as far into the future as possible. La Chambre stressed that Bao Dai’s State of Vietnam would need time to consolidate her position in the south. Yes, Chauvel replied, and it would be imperative to get American assistance for this task.

  But would Washington even accept partition? Chauvel felt confident that Undersecretary of State Walter Bedell Smith had come around on the matter and saw no realistic alternative, but what about Eisenhower and Dulles? “The United States has a tendency to think in terms of an anticommunist crusade,” Chauvel acknowledged, which was why the Eisenhower administration wanted to retain Haiphong as a base for future operations in Asia—presumably for a war to drive the Communists out of Indochina and perhaps out of China too. The British government, on the other hand, still desirous of normalizing relations with Beijing, would accept a DRV-dominated Vietnam if the Geneva powers could guarantee the country’s neutrality. A crucial question in the coming weeks would be whether the Anglo-Saxons would adopt a single position, and which one it would be.

  None of the men present in the premier’s home that day believed they could retain Hanoi or Haiphong in any negotiated agreement. Possibly they could hang on to one or two of the Catholic bishoprics in the north, General Ely opined, or at least secure for them some kind of neutral status, but Chauvel foresaw a full French withdrawal from Tonkin, in three stages: to Hanoi, then to Haiphong, and finally out of northern Vietnam. Mendès France’s suggestion that perhaps the United States would be satisfied if Haiphong was retained for a year or two was met with a collective shake of the head. Chauvel said he could think of no justification for keeping the port city. Better to focus on securing a line of division, with no Viet Minh enclaves below it. The others agreed.21

  “We must go fast,” Mendès France declared at this point, “not only because of the time limit we have set for ourselves, but also because the situation is quite favorable. Everybody is more or less undecided at present and is searching for the way. If France displays determination and indicates clearly what it regards as important, what it will not surrender at any cost, and what concessions it is prepared to make, it will reverse the present situation and regain the political initiative at the negotiations.”22

  That day, June 24, 1954, Pierre Mendès France did what Georges Bidault and Joseph Laniel had always refused to do: He formally agreed to seek the temporary division of Vietnam, as a means of bringing the long and bloody Indochina war to an end.23

  III

  THAT SO MUCH OF THE DISCUSSION AT THE FRENCH PREMIER’S home that fateful day should revolve around American policy and American intentions is revealing. No one present doubted that any partition agreement would require U.S. backing, tacit or formal, or that one had to go through the Americans to have any hope of gaining the backing of Bao Dai’s State of Vietnam, whose pro-Washington leanings were increasingly evident. The Saigon government had not been a key player at the Geneva Conference, but from the start it had made clear its misgivings about the whole enterprise and its staunch opposition to any division of the country. Bao Dai, aware that the French had long since lost faith in him, more and more saw his fortunes as being tied to the United States. Facing pressure from various quarters to replace the ineffectual Buu Loc as prime minister in anticipation of the post-Geneva environment, Bao Dai selected a man who, in addition to being a staunch anti-Communist and committed nationalist, had lived in America and had several influential American backers: Ngo Dinh Diem.

  A portly and ascetic bachelor and devout Catholic, Diem had impeccable nationalist and anti-Communist credentials. Already in 1933, he had been a minister in then-Emperor Bao Dai’s government, but he had resigned within months in protest of France’s unwillingness to give Vietnam greater autonomy. Later, at the end of World War II, Diem turned down Ho Chi Minh’s offer to collaborate with the Viet Minh—he reportedly called Ho a war criminal to his face—and in 1947–48 he refused to back the “Bao Dai solution” unless the French granted Vietnam true independence. When Bao Dai subsequently asked Diem to form a government, he declined. In 1950 he opted for exile abroad. He visited Europe, stopping in Rome for an audience with the pope before moving on to two Maryknoll seminaries in New Jersey and New York. He meditated and did some writing, but occasionally he emerged from behind the cloistered walls to travel to New York City and Washington or to address academic audiences. At Cornell University in February 1953, for example, Diem castigated France for clinging stubbornly to a bankrupt colonial system and called for the United States to assume a direct role in training the Vietnamese National Army.

  All the while, Diem showed a talent for connecting with people who could help his cause. Through Wesley Fishel, a university professor, he was introduced to New York’s Francis Cardinal Spellman, who in turn brought him together with lawmakers in Washington. Two were fellow Catholics: Montana Democratic senator Mike Mansfield and Massachusetts Democratic representative-then-senator John F. Kennedy. Diem also met periodically with midlevel officials in the State Department and won the confidence of such individuals as Supreme Court justice William O. Douglas and Georgetown University administrator Edmund Walsh.24

  No other Vietnamese politician possessed anything like this network of contacts in the United States, or engaged in this kind of lobbying, and some authors have concluded that U.S. officials must have forced Bao Dai’s hand in June 1954 and pushed through their “protégé.” This is going too far. For one thing, the evidence is strong that senior American policy makers in spring 1954 were at best dimly aware of Ngo Dinh Diem’s existence and credentials. (As late as May 22, Dulles told the U.S. delegation at Geneva there was “no immediate substitute” for the current regime.)25 For another, Diem had a power base also in Vietnam, and even before his departure in 1950, he had turned down an offer by Bao Dai to become prime minister. In May 1953, he left American soil and settled at a Benedictine monastery in Belgium, from which he lobbied on his own behalf in the important Vietnamese community in Paris. This effort yielded results, and by the spring of 1954, his anti-French posture put him on every short list of contenders to succeed Buu Loc.26

  Yet the American connection mattered enormously in the end. Consider Bao Dai’s own explanation for why he chose Diem as premier. “From my earlier experience with him, I knew that Diem had a difficult character,” he wrote in his memoirs.

  I was also aware of his fanaticism and his messianic tendencies. But, in the present situation, there was no better choice. He was well known to the Americans, who appreciated his intransigence. In their eyes, he was the man best suited for the job, and Washington would not be sparing in its support of him. Because of [Diem’s] past and because of the presence of his brother at the head of the “Movement for National Union,” he would have the cooperation of the fiercest nationalists, those who had brought down [Nguyen Van] Tam and then Buu Loc. Finally, because of his intransigence and his fanaticism, he could be counted on to resist communism. Yes, he was truly the right man for the situation.27

  Also suggestive is that Bao Dai, who did not attend the Geneva Conference personally, chose Diem’s brother Ngo Dinh Luyen to be his representative in communications with the American delegation. Beginning in the third week of May, Luyen pressed U.S. officials in Geneva, including Walter Bedell Smith, for their views about a change of government in general and one headed by Ngo Dinh Diem in particular. Smith and his aides passed along to the State Department their impression that Bao Dai was “obviously trying to find out whethe
r the U.S. is disposed to replace France in Indochina to an extent which would virtually free Bao Dai from the need for taking into account French views.” They concluded that Bao Dai “might well play the Ngo Dinh Diem card if he could be sure we would support him; otherwise not.” A few days later, after Nguyen again asked if Bao Dai could count on American backing if he adopted “an entirely new stand,” Secretary of State John Foster Dulles cabled the U.S. delegation: “In view of role which U.S. may be called upon to play in Indochina, we have given much thought to Bao Dai’s offer.… I believe this offer should be discreetly exploited.”28

  A smoking gun? Not quite. But it’s one more piece of evidence that Bao Dai insisted upon—and received—American approval before proceeding with the Diem appointment. Did the appointment also depend on Vietnamese internal politics, on Diem’s powerful backing among Vietnamese Catholics, and on the shrewd maneuverings by him and his aides (notably his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu) in the decisive weeks in May and early June? Unquestionably. The Eisenhower admistration did not engineer his appointment, as is often alleged. But its role was nonetheless vital.

  Interestingly, many who interacted with Diem in this period seconded Bao Dai’s description of him as a “difficult character” with “messianic tendencies”—and not merely French officials, who were predisposed to view him harshly for his unshakable nationalist convictions. Among leading lights in the Vietnamese community in Paris, he came across as obscurantist and long-winded and utterly humorless. To Douglas Dillon, the U.S. ambassador to France, Diem was a “Yogi-like mystic” who appeared “too unworldly and unsophisticated to be able to cope with the grave problems and unscrupulous people he will find in Saigon,” while to Robert McClintock of the U.S. embassy in Saigon, who was on hand when Diem arrived to assume power in late June, he was a “messiah without a message.” With notable foresight, McClintock saw in Diem “a curious blend of heroism mixed with a narrowness of view and egotism which will make him a difficult man to deal with.”29