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

by Fredrik Logevall

  Yet these observers also identified more positive attributes in the man. His hostility to Communism was deep and profound, as was his hostility to the French—a terrific one-two punch. Even his detractors acknowledged his personal probity and courage. And there was the simple fact that the competition was weak. Each of the other candidates to succeed Buu Loc had his own shortcomings, some of them more crippling than Diem’s. As for the incumbent and those who came before him, the less said the better. Said Dillon from Paris: The U.S. government should accept the “seemingly ridiculous prospect” that Diem could take on the job if “only because the standard set by his predecessors is so low.”30

  To no one’s surprise, Diem was hostile on the issue of partition, even more so than Buu Loc had been. It would be a disaster, he insisted, a reward for international Communist aggression, a betrayal. In Washington, though, attitudes were more mixed. Smith, having returned from Geneva on June 20, argued in favor of accepting the inevitability of a division of Vietnam and the desirability of guaranteeing it, so as to discourage the DRV from trying to violate the agreement. But Pentagon planners reiterated the old view that the Red River Delta was vital to the defense of all of Southeast Asia. A north-south partition, at whatever line south of the delta, would therefore merely be a prelude to the loss of the entire region. This view had support within the Policy Planning Staff—upon learning of the results of the Zhou–Mendès France meeting in Bern, some of its members advocated “busting up” the Geneva Conference in order to “achieve a new climate” more amenable to the continuation of military resistance in Vietnam. At the very least, these analysts maintained, the administration should make unambiguously clear that it would accept no division below the line from Thakhek (in Laos) to Dong Hoi, just south of the eighteenth parallel, and that if necessary, it would send U.S. troops to protect that line.31

  Saigon ambassador Donald Heath thought the sentiment in Washington ran almost wholly in this direction. “All the people below the Secretary and Under Secretary are unanimous that we should intervene with or without the French,” he wrote Philip Bonsal, the director of the State Department’s Office of Philippine and Southeast Asian Affairs, who was in Geneva. Bonsal answered that the view in Geneva was different. American delegates to the conference doubted that intervention could produce more advantageous results than those to be gained from a negotiated agreement.32

  Eisenhower and Dulles in effect split the difference, with enormous long-term implications. Averse though they were to having any compromise agreement of any kind with Communist foes, they also were in no mood to rush in without allied support. The new French leader had made his intentions clear, as had the British. “Personally I think Mendès France, whom I do not know, has made up his mind to clear out on the best terms available,” Churchill wrote Eisenhower on June 21. “If that is so, I think he is right.” The prime minister added that “in no foreseeable circumstances, except possibly a local rescue, could British troops be used in Indochina, and if we were asked our opinion we should advise against US local intervention except for rescue.”33

  The only real answer, Eisenhower and Dulles determined, was to accept the likelihood that part of Vietnam would be lost at Geneva and to plan for the defense of the rest of Indochina and Southeast Asia. They had been contemplating this solution for several weeks, as we’ve seen, but only now did they take concrete steps to realize it. On June 24, Dulles told congressional leaders that any Geneva agreement would be “something we would have to gag about,” but he expressed optimism that the United States could “salvage something” in Indochina “free of the taint of French colonialism.” Specifically, Washington would assume responsibility for the defense of Cambodia, Laos, and southern Vietnam, with the first task the drawing of a line the Communists would not cross. Then, the secretary continued, the United States would “hold this area and fight subversion within with all the strength we have,” using economic and military assistance to the non-Communist governments as well as an American-led regional defense grouping modeled in part on NATO.34 It was a monumental decision, as important as any made by an American administration on Indochina, from Franklin Roosevelt’s to Gerald Ford’s. Its true import would become clear only with time, but even on that day the weight of the secretary of state’s words were hard to miss. The United States would thenceforth take responsibility for defending most of Indochina, he told the lawmakers, and without “the taint of French colonialism.”

  IV

  THE AMERICAN POLICY SHIFT HELPED SMOOTH WHAT OTHERWISE might have been a fractious Anglo-U.S. “summit” meeting in Washington in the last week of June. Dulles acknowledged on June 26 that partition was less objectionable in Vietnam than early nationwide elections—neither he nor Dwight Eisenhower doubted that Ho Chi Minh would win such a vote, and win handily. Agreement was also reached on the establishment of an Anglo-American study group, to convene in Washington for the purpose of considering, among other things, the necessary steps to create a Southeast Asian security pact (tentatively called the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, or SEATO).

  The tangible results of the summit were a joint communiqué, issued by Churchill and Eisenhower on June 28, and a secret list of Seven Points, drawn up the following day by Dulles and Eden. The communiqué was put out partly at the request of Mendès France who, though he had decided to seek a political solution on the best terms he could get, wanted the appearance of allied unity in order to strengthen his bargaining position at Geneva. He asked that the communiqué include a statement that a “serious aggravation” could result if no acceptable settlement was reached at Geneva. He got his wish—the statement warned that if the conference failed, “the international situation will be seriously aggravated.”35 In the Seven Points, meanwhile, Dulles and Eden laid out the minimum terms their two governments would “respect.”36 Notably, an agreement would have to preserve the integrity of Cambodia and Laos and assure the removal of Viet Minh forces; preserve the southern half of Vietnam and, ideally, an enclave in the Red River Delta; include no provisions that would risk the loss of the retained area to Communist control; and include the possibility of ultimate reunification of Vietnam.

  The French government saw much to like in both the communiqué and the Seven Points. The former showed the world that France’s allies maintained a strong interest in Indochina and the Geneva Conference, while the latter amounted to an acceptance (privately, at least) by Washington of partition as a solution.37 At the same time, Mendès France was puzzled by some of the ambiguities in the Seven Points. What did Dulles and Eden mean by “respect”? And wasn’t it potentially contradictory to speak of the possibility of national reunification while also ruling out a Communist takeover? What if Ho Chi Minh won the national elections? To Mendès France and Chauvel it seemed clear that Washington was still hedging its bets, still unwilling to fully commit itself to the negotiations. And this was a problem: As Chauvel said, the ultimate success of the conference depended on the Soviets and Chinese applying pressure on the Viet Minh while the United States did the same to Bao Dai’s State of Vietnam. He was not willing to wager money that either would happen.38

  CHAPTER 24

  “I HAVE SEEN DESTINY BEND TO THAT WILL”

  WHILE THE THREE WESTERN POWERS WERE TRYING TO COORDINATE strategy, and while the negotiations continued among the second-string officials at Geneva, a different kind of diplomacy was being carried on elsewhere. Chinese premier Zhou Enlai, en route to Beijing, made several stops to woo Asian leaders with talk of “peaceful coexistence.” In New Delhi he assured India’s prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru of Beijing’s nonaggressive intentions in Southeast Asia and its commitment to a compromise settlement in Indochina. The two men agreed that Laos and Cambodia should remain neutral so as to transform them into “a bridge for peace,” and they concurred on the need for Sino-Indian cooperation in forming a nonaligned movement of decolonized Afro-Asian states. With Nehru and then with Burmese leader U Nu in Rangoon, Zhou issued joint public
statements pledging mutual support for peaceful coexistence and for the right of countries having different social systems to coexist without interference from outside. “Revolution cannot be exported,” the Sino-Burmese statement said; “at the same time, outside interference with the common will expressed by the people of any nation should not be permitted.”1

  The Delhi and Rangoon sessions were the easy ones. Zhou knew he would face a much sterner test in his next encounter, with Ho Chi Minh on July 3–5 in the southern Chinese city of Liuzhou. It worried Zhou that the DRV delegates in Geneva, led by Ta Quang Buu, vice minister of defense and a senior negotiator, had become more belligerent in recent days. On June 26, Buu lashed out at the French for having a top-level meeting with Zhou but not with them; two days later he called for a line of division in Vietnam very far to the south, near the thirteenth parallel, or some three hundred and fifty miles from the French proposal of the eighteenth parallel. French forces should be given only three months to evacuate the north following the armistice, he further demanded, and the Pathet Lao should be granted virtually sovereign rights over the eastern half of Laos. Zhou saw various reasons for this hardening of the Viet Minh’s posture—Mendès France’s seeming desire for peace at any price; the worsening French military position, as demonstrated by the High Command’s evacuation of the entire southern part of the Red River Delta, in Operation Auvergne, launched in late June; and the temporary absence from Geneva of senior statesmen to surround and moderate the Viet Minh demands—but the task now was to get Ho to order a pulling back.2

  For the most part he succeeded, as recently released Vietnamese and Chinese documents make clear, though there were testy moments. Much of the first day was devoted to consideration of the military situation and the balance of forces on the ground, with Vo Nguyen Giap sketching out the big picture. Dien Bien Phu had represented a colossal defeat for France, he began, but she was far from defeated. She retained a superiority in numbers—some 470,000 troops, roughly half of them Vietnamese, versus 310,000 on the Viet Minh side—as well as control of Vietnam’s major cities (Hanoi, Saigon, Hue, Tourane [Da Nang]). A fundamental alteration of the balance of forces had thus yet to occur, Giap continued, despite Dien Bien Phu, at which point Wei Guoqing, the chief Chinese military adviser to the Viet Minh, spoke up to say he agreed.

  “If the U.S. does not interfere,” Zhou asked, “and assuming France will dispatch more troops, how long will it take for us to seize the whole of Indochina?” In the best-case scenario, Giap replied, full victory could be achieved in two to three years. Worst case? Three to five years.

  That afternoon Zhou offered a lengthy exposition on the massive international reach of the Indochina conflict—much greater than the Korean War—and on the imperative of preventing an American intervention in the war. Given Washington’s intense hostility to the Chinese Revolution, and given the ominous words in Vice President Richard Nixon’s April 16 speech, one must assume the current administration would not stand idly by if the Viet Minh sought to win a complete victory. Consequently, “if we ask too much [at Geneva] and if peace is not achieved, it is certain that the U.S. will intervene, providing Cambodia, Laos and Bao Dai with weapons and ammunition, helping them train military personnel, and establishing military bases there.”

  Korea provided a sobering lesson: “The key to the Korea issue lay in U.S. intervention. It was completely beyond our expectation that the [American] reinforcement would arrive so quickly.… If there had not been U.S. intervention, the Korean People’s Army would have been able to drive Syngman Rhee’s [troops] into the ocean.” Because of American intervention, “we only achieved a draw at the end of the war, and were unable to win a victory.” The experience must not be repeated in Vietnam. “The central issue,” Zhou told Ho, is “to prevent America’s intervention” and “to achieve a peaceful settlement.” Laos and Cambodia would have to be treated differently and allowed to pursue their own paths, provided they did not join a military alliance or permit foreign bases on their territory. The Mendès France government, having vowed to achieve a negotiated solution, must be supported, lest it fall and be replaced by one committed to continuing the war.3

  Ho Chi Minh raised no major objections to any of this, but over the next two days disagreements emerged, mostly concerning what constituted an acceptable line of division between the two regroupment zones. Ho did not insist on the thirteenth parallel, as had Ta Quang Buu in Geneva, but he pressed hard for the sixteenth. Zhou answered: “We will endeavor to execute the will of President Ho but implore President Ho for general permission to permit flexibility.” Zhou noted that Route 9, the only line of transport linking Laos to the sea, ran closer to the seventeenth parallel, and that therefore this might be a suitable boundary. Ho Chi Minh was unmoved, but it seems he did not entirely close the door to a slight adjustment to the demarcation line, above 16 degrees.4

  The two men went their separate ways, Zhou making for Beijing and Ho returning to Vietnam. In short order the Central Committee of the Vietnamese Workers Party issued an internal instruction (known as the “Fifth July Document”), the contents of which reflected the agreements between Zhou and Ho at Liuzhou. But the full examination of Viet Minh options occurred a few days later at the party’s Sixth Central Committee Plenum. A remarkable session it was, as Ho Chi Minh and General Secretary Truong Chinh took turns articulating the need for an early political settlement so as to prevent a military intervention by the United States, now the “main and direct enemy” of Vietnam.5

  “In the new situation, we cannot follow the old program,” Ho declared. “Before, our motto was, ‘war of resistance until victory.’ Now, in view of the new situation, we should uphold a new motto: ‘peace, unification, independence, and democracy.’ ” A spirit of compromise would be required by both sides to make the negotiations succeed, and there could be no more talk of wiping out and annihilating all the French troops. A demarcation line allowing the temporary regroupment of both sides would be necessary.

  The plenum endorsed Ho’s analysis, passing a resolution supporting a compromise settlement to end the fighting. But Ho and Truong Chinh plainly worried that, following such an agreement at Geneva, there would be internal discontent and “leftist deviation” and in particular that analysts would fail to see the complexity of the situation and underestimate the power of the American and French adversaries. They accordingly reminded their colleagues that France would retain control of a large part of the country, and that people living in this area might be confused, alienated, and vulnerable to enemy manipulations. “We have to make it clear to our people,” Ho said, that “in the interest of the whole country, for the sake of long-term interest, [they must] accept this, because it is a glorious thing and the whole country is grateful for that. We must not let people have pessimistic and negative thinking; instead, we must encourage the people to continue the struggle for the withdrawal of French troops and ensure our independence.”6

  Ho Chi Minh instructed the DRV delegation in Geneva to move ahead quickly to reach a settlement: “In view of France’s positive attitude … we must use the formula of being positive, aggressive, and pushing [for] an agreement. We must not be passive, sitting back to wait.”7

  In Beijing, meanwhile, Zhou Enlai informed the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party on July 7 that Liuzhou had gone well and that all efforts should go toward securing a deal at Geneva. Mao Zedong agreed. “For the purpose of uniting with the majority and isolating the few (the United States),” he told the group, “we should make concessions when such concessions are necessary, and should adhere to our own stand when such adherence is possible.”8

  For the Chinese as well as the Viet Minh, clearly, one thing mattered most of all: keeping the United States out.9

  II

  THE FINAL PHASE OF THE GENEVA CONFERENCE BEGAN ON JULY 10, when Pierre Mendès France arrived to take charge of the French delegation. Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov was already in place, having returne
d from Moscow on July 8, and Zhou Enlai and British foreign secretary Anthony Eden were soon due as well. This left the Americans, who to this point had resisted strong French and British pressure to have a top official—meaning either Secretary of State John Foster Dulles or Undersecretary of State Walter Bedell Smith—on hand for the climactic sessions. With only ten days to go until his self-imposed deadline, it infuriated Mendès France that Dulles might not come and might not send his top deputy. What message would that send about Western unity? Dulles coolly replied that no “united front in relation to Indochina” existed among the Western allies in any case, and he further maintained that an acceptable settlement would be more likely to result if the other side was kept guessing about Washington’s ultimate intentions. To Ambassador Douglas Dillon in Paris, he said the administration would want no part of an agreement that might superficially resemble the Seven Points but would contain clauses allowing the Communist takeover of all of Indochina within mere months.10

  He had another worry too. In the first week of July, the administration faced a drumbeat of domestic criticism for seemingly cooperating in what would amount to a Communist victory parade in Geneva—“another Munich,” a “second Yalta.” California Republican William Knowland’s pronouncements on this theme on the floor of the Senate caused much consternation in the White House. “Immediate problem before us,” Press Secretary James Hagerty wrote in his diary, “is Knowland’s speech and the fear that many of us have that it indicates a growing fear in the country, fanned to life, of course by the isolationists, that it would be better to wash our hands of the whole mess and even get out of the United Nations.” Knowland urged that neither Dulles nor Smith should return to Geneva. Vice President Richard Nixon agreed, as did Senate minority leader Lyndon Baines Johnson, a Texas Democrat, who said “it would be better not to be represented at a high level at Geneva.”11