The Radicalization of Ho Chi Minh

[Hawk1981]

In 1919 a small nondescript man in a rented suit arrived at the Palace of Versailles seeking an audience with officials at the Peace Conference where he hoped to present his demands on behalf of the people of Vietnam. Inspired by United States President Wilson's diplomatic point for peace that called for "A free open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the population concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined."

The man who became known as Ho Chi Minh was not received at the Conference, but his letter was accepted. In it, the self-appointed spokesman for his country demanded a list of basic freedoms and equality:

• Complete amnesty of Vietnamese political prisoners.
• Legislative reform in Indochina providing the same guarantees for Vietnamese and Europeans.
• Freedom of the press and freedom of opinion.
• Freedom of association and freedom of assembly.
• Freedom of emigration and residence abroad.
• Right to education with the opening of technical and occupational schools in all provinces.
• Substitution of a system of laws instead of a system of decrees.
• A permanent Vietnamese representative elected in Vietnam to the French parliament.

Ho Chi Minh in 1921

Regrettably, the Versailles Conference did not settle many colonial issues, beyond parceling out the conquered colonies of the defeated Central Powers. A disappointed Ho Chi Minh transferred his faith to Socialist action calling on the French Socialist Party in 1920 to "act practically to support the oppressed natives."

When the French Socialists refused to take a decisive stand regarding colonial issues, Ho Chi Minh left the party and became a founding member of the French Communist Party who were willing to promote national liberation in the colonies.

In subsequent years, Ho traveled to the Soviet Union for Marxist education and training as an agitator. Always a nationalist first, he returned to Vietnam to lead the fight against the Japanese, and then the colonial French and the American supporters of the regime controlling the partitioned section of the country in the south.

 

[Hawk1981]

Late in his life Ho was interviewed by American reporters and surprised them with his fluency in English and the information that he had lived in New York City prior to America's entry in the First World War.

Pointing out what seemed to him an inconsistency in American thinking, he wondered how the Americans as a colonial people who had gained their independence in a revolution, could fight to suppress the independence of another colonial people. Ho stated, "I think I know the American people, and I don't understand how they support their involvement in this war. Is the Statue of Liberty standing on her head?"

 

[Tom Paine 1949]

Anyone who lived through the Vietnam War who still does not know this history should be ashamed of themselves. The American involvement in Vietnam was directly responsible for killing millions there, and also for dividing our own country in ways still evident. Yet even the simplest facts about its origins are unknown to most Americans. Of course every Vietnamese child knows about this history, and much more.

Thankyou.

 

[TheParser]

Sadly, Ho does not qualify as a genuine hero.

Like Mao and other revolutionaries, when he gained power, he did not implement democratic principles.

He became a dictator.

Unlike George Washington (excuse me for mentioning the slave owner's name!), he did not set an example by stepping down from power and turning the government over to elected successors.

Even today an economically Vietnam is a dictatorship that punishes dissent.

*****'

Thanks for the info. History is fascinating.

 

[Tom Paine 1949]

Many decades after Ho Chi Minh became a Communist In 1921, long after the totalitarian degeneration of the Comintern under Stalin, Ho Chi Minh, like the equally cultured Zhou En Lai in China, was still deeply involved in waging revolutionary struggle in his own country.

Even today, most Americans don’t know much of Ho Chi Minh’s history before the U.S. got involved in the 1960s. By that time he was old and respected, but no longer really in day to day control of his movement. Dwight Eisenhower admitted that HoChiMinh would have won democratic elections if they had been held as scheduled in 1955. Most people don't know that as early as 1945, Ho’s national liberation forces already effectively held Hanoi, and HoChiMinh in September of that year announced Vietnam's Independence before huge rejoicing crowds -- only to have his provisional government violently crushed subsequently by British and French re-occupying troops.

Here are two short important articles on the political situation in those years, from unmistakeably Conservative sources. One by the U.S. Council of Foreign Affairs briefly discusses events in 1945, the other is from Eisenhower's memoirs about the situation in Vietnam after he became president. Eisenhower's remarks show how he and the French army in the 1950s -- just as later LBJ in the 1960s -- shared deep illusions about the possibility of a military victory. It also shows that the struggle in Vietnam was seen in the West (unsurprisingly after the Korean War) primarily as part of the fight against world communism -- though of course this was not at all how the Vietnamese peasantry saw the issue.

https://www.cfr.org/blog/remembering-ho ... dependence
https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/v ... ection.htm

Finally, here is a fascinating interview with Archimedes Patti, U.S. Office of Strategic Services point man in Hanoi in the period when the Viet Minh occupied the city and declared national Independence:

http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_326 ... 230D618AE6

 

[Sunni Man]

Ho Chi Minh's personal mission was to free his country and people from foreign occupation, and would align his armed struggle with any ideology that would provide the financial backing and training he needed to achieve this goal. ...