Vietnam War

THE VIETNAM WAR HAD its origin in American involvement in what was French Indochina in World War II. After the capitulation of France in June 1940 to Nazi Germany, the collaborationist regime of Marshal Henri Petain at Vichy took over the French colonial empire, including Syria and Lebanon in the Middle East and Indochina in Southeast Asia. When Japan went to war in December 1941, as an ally of Nazi Germany, it technically “occupied” French Indochina, rather than conquering it as the Japanese did the Dutch East Indies or the Philippines. This fiction was continued until March 9, 1945, when the Japanese struck at the Vichy authorities and took control militarily. France's French Foreign Legion soldiers who resisted were slaughtered at Ha Giang. Some 5,000 French troops, including those of the Fifth Foreign Legion Regiment, made a fighting retreat into friendly territory in China.

The Japanese coup had a direct effect on American intelligence operations in Southeast Asia, an outgrowth of the work of the American OSS (Office of Strategic Services) in China. American intelligence officers (those foreign nationals recruited are more precisely called the “agents”) had entered French Indochina to help provide assistance for American airmen whose planes had been damaged on bombing flights against Japan. Among those who entered Indochina was the OSS officer Archimedes Patti, who made contact with the Communist leader of the nationalist resistance to the French, Ho Chi Minh. (In Vietnamese, the name means “he who enlightens.”) Ho had been born in about 1890 as Nguyen That Thanh, and had became a communist while in France during World War I. The Communist International (Comintern) had sent him to Moscow for training in 1923.

Ho became fully involved in support of the Americans and saved a large number of “downed” flyers, although exact figures are unclear. For the PBS series, The American Experience: Vietnam, Patti was interviewed. He recalled, “I first met Ho on the China border between China and Indochina in the last days of April of 1945. He was an interesting individual. Very sensitive, very gentle, rather a frail type. We spoke quite at length about the general situation, not only in Indochina, but the world at large. … There, for the first time, we saw what kind of troops the Viet Minh were. They were a very willing, fine young nationalist, really what we used to say ‘gung ho' type. They were willing to risk their lives for their cause, the cause of independence against the French.”

When the Japanese surrendered on September 2, 1945, Ho issued a declaration of independence for the “Democratic Republic of Vietnam.” In drafting it, Ho had been heavily influenced by the American Revolution against the British in 1775. Patti stated, “Of course, [Page 480]it was in Vietnamese and I couldn't read it and when it was translated for me, I was quite taken aback to hear the words of the American Declaration of Independence. Words about liberty, life, and the pursuit of happiness, etcetera. I just couldn't believe my own ears.”

...