The French Leave Vietnam, We Step In

    

               Dwight D Eisenhower and John F Kennedy

In January of 1953 Dwight Eisenhower became president. We had already been supporting the French in their effort to regain control of Vietnam for eight years, with money, advisors, and military equipment. With the Korean conflict ending, the Pentagon was concerned that the Chinese would be freed up to enter Vietnam in support of the Viet Minh, and we would be forced to enter the war ourselves. But they advised Eisenhower to avoid direct involvement at all costs. Winning would require a full commitment, which would be expensive and would put our international prestige on the line. 

The Korean war ended with an armistice in July of 1953, and the involved powers met the next April in Geneva to negotiate terms of the armistice. The Viet Minh had just defeated French forces at Dien Bien Phu, so Vietnam was included in the negotiations. According to the accords, Vietnam was divided into northern and southern sections, the north to be led by the communists under Ho Chi Minh, and the south by the Christian nationalist, Ngo Dinh Diem, appointed Premier by the French puppet, Bao Dai. Vietnam was to be united under leadership to be determined by elections held in 1956. 

Here was an excellent opportunity for the US to correct its mistake and get out of Vietnam. The French had been defeated and Vietnam was again under the control of the Vietnamese, Ho Chi Minh in the north and Ngo Dinh Diem in the south, and there was an international agreement in place to reunite the country under one government. Why didn’t we just abide by the agreement and get out of Vietnam, preserving what little respect we had left in SE Asia? 

As the French gradually phased out their control of the South Vietnamese government and military, Eisenhower put off the decision on whether to withdraw our support or transfer it to the new Diem government. He ordered a study by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, which concluded that no amount of training would enable the South Vietnamese military to be successful against the communists without the backing of a strong effective leader, and they saw no evidence of that in Diem. 

Eisenhower sent a letter to Diem saying that US aid would depend on him establishing a government that would meet our standards of performance, and he sent a trusted colleague from WWII, General J Lawton Collins, to Vietnam to evaluate the situation. Collins’ report was also negative. He found no popular support for Diem, and he recommended withdrawing support if Diem failed to make progress.  As for sending in US troops, General Matthew Ridgeway, Army chief of staff, reported that Vietnam did not have the infrastructure to support a modern army, and entering the war would require the huge expense of building infrastructure and at least ten divisions of troops. He advised against it. 

In spite of all these recommendations, Eisenhower decided to continue sending financial aid to Diem, and he started making plans to train the South Vietnamese army. 

Why? 

According to Barbara Tuchman, “Once a (government) policy has been adopted and implemented, all subsequent activity becomes an effort to justify it.” Support of the South Vietnamese government had become established government policy.  

After the Geneva agreements, evidence continued to build that our support of Diem was a mistake. The South Vietnamese government was corrupt and ineffective, and not supported by the people. Diem filled government positions with family members and Catholics in a country that was mostly Buddhist, and dealt with political opponents by jailing or executing them. He was turning into a dictator.  His army was weakened by desertions, and he could only count on a small part of it to be loyal to him. In 1955 he was almost overthrown by a coup. Even the French had given up on Diem’s government. They sent a diplomatic mission to Hanoi to try and make a deal with Ho Chi Minh to maintain economic ties after Diem fell. 

After the coup, there was another opportunity to withdraw our support for Diem. He hadn’t satisfied Eisenhower’s criteria for support. None of our allies supported him, not even France. But in spite of all the evidence to the contrary, even with his prestige as a WWII hero, Eisenhower continued to support Diem. Russian military forces had taken over Hungary, and communists under Fidel Castro had taken over Cuba while we did nothing. Why was Vietnam considered a greater threat? Because it had become established government policy. Eisenhower justified his decision with his “falling dominoes” theory, that if Vietnam fell to communism, then the other countries in Southeast Asia would also fall. 

Communism was the biggest issue during the Eisenhower administration. The USSR had exploded their own atom bomb, so the US was forced into an arms race as well as the “Cold War.” The communists were in power in most of eastern Europe, as well as in North Korea and China, and there were strong communist parties in several countries in western Europe, including France. Back home Joe McCarthy was heading up a Senate committee investigating communists in the US government, creating pressure on government officials to prove their anticommunist sentiments. 

Between 1955 and 1960 Diem made no attempt at democratic reforms. It was against his interest, which was in maintaining power. By giving others a say in decision making, and making the country more democratic, he would risk losing control. So as we bolstered his government by providing 60 to 75% of its funding, he used strong arm tactics rewarding people who informed on “traitors,” whom he jailed or put in re-education camps. His land reform program favored the landlords over the peasants and was riddled by corruption. When ten of his cabinet members quit and signed a manifesto demanding his resignation along with government reform, he had them thrown in jail. In 1960 he barely survived another coup. That same year the NLF, or National Liberation Front, was formed. They demanded reforms, and the overthrow of Diem and the American “imperialists.” They started building a network of insurgents in the South, which became known as Viet Cong, ready to take over when the Diem government fell.  

Meanwhile in North Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh was busy. Cut off from the rice fields of the South, his people suffered from hunger as he executed landlords and confiscated their farms. Opposition to his government was ruthlessly put down, as he consolidated power and built up his military, stockpiling weapons and recruiting troops, preparing for an invasion of the South. Refugees from South Vietnam were trained in guerilla tactics and sent back to join the Viet Cong. They infiltrated communities and used terror tactics to intimidate the population. According to the Saigon government the Viet Cong had assassinated 1400 local officials by 1960. In 1961, when John F Kennedy became president, Ho was ready to invade South Vietnam.