Replacing France: The Origins of American Intervention in Vietnam by Kathryn Statler. This book vividly illustrates failures by France and America in determining a free and democratic Vietnam. Kathryn directly addresses America’s tenuous relationship with France, watching as the French consistently flailed at war in Vietnam.
Kathryn sheds much needed light across a very complicated 10 year relationship (1950-60) at the dawn of the cold war. Her research helps fill gaps between US support for France and where we took over the war. The timeline begins stumbling forward in the late 1940s. Her scholarship is elevated by recently released archival materials from the US and Europe.
This is a much longer book review than normal. Even with multiple references, below simply I cannot fully address the deep impact of Kathryn’s research in a single post. This should be required reading for any college history class on the American war in Vietnam.
France made every effort to re-enter Indochina, patiently waiting for any chance to re-enslave the peoples of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Britain also fought to regain colonial control over Malaya at the end of World War II.
Since 1887, every aspect of Vietnamese society was under French control. This colonial monster had 80 years to metastasize across every aspect of Indochinese life. Among my Dien Bien Phu retrospective, this book helps answer how the tumultuous relationship between of France brought America into the war.
From the beginning of the new world (1945) the question between France and America was Vietnam’s independence. Britain joined Truman in supporting Indochina’s sovereignty. France chose to continue political and cultural control over the peoples of Indochina.
Six US Presidents: 1946-1975.
The “fog of war” began with Truman. Eisenhower expanded our commitment for 8 years, Kennedy for 3, Johnson for 6, Nixon for 6, all ending with Ford.
It is important to understand France demanded enslaving the peoples of Indochina after fighting Germany again to keep Europe free. However, upon their return they found a determined enemy in the Viet Minh. Drained by World War II, France looked to America for help reestablishing their colonial control. Yet FDR held a different approach to post war Asia. Truman was persuaded by those in FDR’s cabinet to turn away from FDR’s idea for an Indochinese trusteeship developed during war time conferences with Churchill and Stalin.
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The Truman administration began working on the question of aid early in 1950. A problem paper, drafted by a team of representatives from the Office of Western European Affairs, the Office of Philippine and Southeast Asian Affairs, and the Mutual Defense Assistance Program (MDAP), addressed the issue of U.S. policy regarding Indochina.
The report weighed the difficulty of convincing Congress and the American public that the United States should support a colonial war against the possibility that the U.S. failure to assist the Bao Dai government might cause the French to work actively against American goals in Europe and abandon Vietnam and the rest of Indochina.
The report concluded that aid was war-ranted on the basis that Indochina was important to U.S. security interests. By providing such aid, Washington hoped to gain significant leverage to compel Paris to grant independence to Bao Dai’s regime, although Acheson recognized that the greatest American bargaining power vis-à-vis France existed before the United States agreed to provide aid.
Oh yes, the French were playing for keeps in Vietnam. Most importantly, French control was no house of cards. For more than 75 years, France continued tightening an iron fist across Indochina. There could be no quick ‘Americanization’ of South Vietnam. This provided France the gift of time. Time to snake their way back into Vietnamese culture and society. They remained focused on retaking Vietnam.
At the same time, Katheryn offers details to the cold blooded desperation of France. Nothing more revealing than in the aftermath of Dien Bien Phu: 11,000 French soldiers were marching to prisoner camps after surrendering. Only 3,300 walked out four months later. Yet stunningly, France engaged the Viet Minh after Geneva, negotiating to establish new business arrangements in North Vietnam.
The Truman and Eisenhower Administrations found a defeated France still exploiting colonial rule across Vietnam. Key aspects addressed by Kathryn include how France ruthlessly continued to control vital aspects of Vietnamese society.
Infrastructure, Banking, Agriculture, and Culture & Education.
Engineering a total framework of colonial control was amazingly extensive in reviewing this book. There should be no surprise that French control was complete and ruthless. They were in no way open to resigning Indochina to America:
Infrastructure
Beginning in 1856 French began modernizing Indochina. This provided overall control of infrastructure across the subcontinent providing far reaching impacts:
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French engineering “bestowed” on Vietnam a railway, several ports, an extensive canal system, roads reaching to every region, and a number of airports, as well as private plantations, a telephone system, and revenue- producing power companies.
In the government structure the French had held almost all positions of responsibility, from administrators, technicians, and civil servants, down to very routine work. The rapid withdrawal of this vast responsible group after the independence of South Vietnam was a severe blow to the operation of the government.
Banking
By 1945, France controlled over 80% of all banks across Indochina. The French franc was the forced currency throughout Indochina. Stunningly Vietnam held no national currency until 1978.
And while France imposed taxes on locals, they also controlled a near monopoly on the trade of opium. Colonial control of Vietnam’s monetary standard assured France total control over all financial developments:
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The economic task the Americans in Saigon faced after Geneva was daunting. According to USOM officials, all economic activity had been held by a small number of firmly entrenched French companies that had prospered under the colonial administration. For example, French colonialism was responsible for a monetary supply limited almost solely to the function of issuing banknotes.
Three French banks—Banque d’Indochine, Banque France-Chinoise, and Banque Nationale Pour le Commerce et l’Industrie—conducted 80 percent of the business. Even with the newly established National Bank of Vietnam’s supposed control of these banks, no oversight actually existed. Banking outside of Saigon and Hanoi was handled almost entirely by branches of French banks that contracted their operations after independence.
French banks refused to grant credit to importers, which helped explain the paralysis of American aid. In order to remedy the situation, Saigon created a national investment fund—Fonds National d’Investissement—and a commercial department in the Banque Nationale to halt the French monopoly.
Agriculture
French businesses were quick to exploit Indochina’s natural resources. As mentioned above the cultivation and control of opium was a key French export. Upon control across Indochina, the French multinational Michelin exploited ruthlessly the rich rubber plantations across Indochina.
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Equally problematic for American organizations was French dominance in agriculture. The French owned 96 percent of rubber plantations and 80 percent of tea plantations, and all of the sugar mills were French. The French rubber plantations were practicing bleeding the rubber trees to excess because they wanted to get the maximum profit before the country collapsed.
And in the trade sector, all South Vietnamese trade was monopolized by the French firms Diethebm, Optorg, Poinsard et Veyret, and Descours et Cabaud. These firms refused to work with the Foreign Operations Administration and paralyzed South Vietnamese trade. The French also emphasized trade over local production, and cultivation was oriented toward foreign markets rather than expansion of local demand.
David Maraniss’ book They Marched Into Sunlight addresses financial arraignments between French companies and the US Government. During battles at and around Lai Khe in 1967 resulted in damaged rubber trees on colonial plantations. This damage required the U.S. Government to compensate Michelin, the French tire and rubber company $300/tree. At the same time, families of American soldiers learned the financial amount provided to bury their sons was equal to a rubber tree. Danny Sikorski’s father learned about the US Military burial limit. “They say my son is worth three hundred dollars.” St. Adelbert’s Cemetery in Milwaukee is Danny’s resting place.
Culture & Education
The clash between France and America in the early 1950s focused on culture and education. Clearly America wanted to diminish established French institutions that impacted Vietnamese society at many levels. Yet this clash really did not move the needle. Did we really just change street names and not our mission of democracy?
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As U.S. agencies attempted to modernize and westernize South Vietnam while imprinting American values and culture on the Vietnamese population, the Eisenhower administration replaced the French colonial presence in South Vietnam with an American neocolonial one. The United States did not directly colonize South Vietnamese territory, but it certainly exhibited neocolonial behavior in the sense that Americans and American institutions took over former French functions at all levels of South Vietnamese society.
Americans trained, taught, guided, and controlled in their search for a stable, independent, and noncommunist South Vietnam. Although at first Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem appeared to share the American vision of South Vietnam, thus ensuring increased U.S. aid and commitments to his regime, it became clear by the late 1950s that he would pursue his own course.
The escalating clashes between South Vietnamese and American officials would eventually lead the Eisenhower administration to lose its anticolonial credentials as well as its ability to extricate itself from the ever more complicated situation in Vietnam. By the time Eisenhower left office, the United States was committed to a noncommunist, but not necessarily democratic, South Vietnam.
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The French sought to maintain cultural influence through their educational institutions, foreign exchanges, aid programs, commercial trade, and French language classes. The Americans worked to teach the South Vietnamese what they considered more relevant technical training, American education, and the English language.
The French viewed American forays into these areas as a “cultural offensive. ” National Assembly leader Michel Debré warned that no matter “the alliance with the United States, ” if France “allows the English language and culture to develop in Viet-nam, French cultural influence will cease to exist in the Far East. ” France could not “protest that American aid, professors, and grants to American universities exist in Vietnam, ” but should ensure that such programs were “in tangent with French goals and the general program of western culture in South Vietnam.
Such views encountered a hostile reception in Washington and Saigon. American officials perceived French cultural efforts as a pathetic attempt to maintain washed-up colonial control.
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According to a 1963 USIA report, the prime motivation of French cultural and information services was to preserve and, if possible, strengthen ties between new states with a French background and metropolitan France. A secondary motivation was the determination to “counteract non-French influences” in areas where French influence was still dominant.
The report warrants further discussion, as this was one of the few times that American officials accurately identified French motivations.
The authors of the report saw the traditional concept of the civilizing mission assuming “a new facet in recent years with the introduction of scientific and technical overseas training programs, ” which were considered of equal importance with cultural affairs. Another change in objectives had been to “integrate” French cultural activities, wherever possible, with existing national systems of education.
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Americans, for the most part, quietly stepped into places the French had vacated as they attempted to build South Vietnam on an American rather than French model. Americans asserted their influence by “recovering the spot. ”
They systematically replaced the French names for streets, buildings, institutions, roads, and just about every other French-designated object, with an American version. But Americans in Saigon did not create a more nationalist South Vietnam; they simply switched one authoritative western figure for another.
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But culture wars between France and America began costing GI lives: At the same time that the popularity of French cultural initiatives with both the Americans and the South Vietnamese grew, so too did North Vietnamese insurgency in the South.
On October 22, 1957, U.S. personnel were injured in a bombing of MAAG and USIS installations in Saigon. On July 8, 1959, communist guerrillas who attacked a Vietnamese military base at Bien Hoa killed and wounded several MAAG personnel.
As internal security became more difficult to achieve, French officials considered retaking political initiatives. According to French chargé d’affaires in Saigon René Fourier- Ruelle, “rebel activity had been increasing.
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Although France and the United States shared a “colonial mentality” in that representatives of both countries operated on the assumption of their cultural superiority, the two differed in why they used cultural initiatives in South Vietnam.
The French sought to preserve their civilizing mission; the Americans planned to stop the spread of communism. The French tried to separate cultural activities from propaganda whereas the Americans combined the two. It is perhaps fair to say that American cultural diplomacy in Vietnam began as propaganda in the war against communism, but propaganda eventually metamorphosed into cultural initiatives designed to build a nation.
Although the Americans thought they would be able to avoid earlier French mistakes by replacing the civilizing mission with one of modernization, they too would come to be seen as imperialists rather than liberators.
At the same time, the post war world was reshaping very quickly. The Soviet Union began driving communism while Paris watched rapid turnover in their Presidents:
4th Republic
Presidents:
Maréchal Pétain: 11 July 1940/19 August 1944
Charles de Gaulle: 3 June 1944/26 January 1946
Félix Gouin: 26 January 1946/24 June 1946
Georges Bidault: 24 June 1946/28 November 1946
Léon Blum: 16 December 1946/16 January 1947
Vincent Auriol: January 1947/16 January 1954
René Coty: 16 January 1954/8 January 1959
On the surface Truman focused on convincing a dying empire to forgo enslaving their former colony. America’s Marshall Plan assisted Paris in rebuilding their country and economy. France bled severely in World Wars I and II. Their economy in ruins. Paris relied upon the Marshal Plan in rebuilding their country and economy. They literally were clinging onto any strand to remain a world power.
France needed to shift expenditures back home. Their new priority: protecting their own country and European neighbors from the emerging Soviet threat.
MAAG
In September 1950 Truman formally established the Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) Vietnam. This provided assistance to France fight the Viet Minh. Eisenhower continued supporting MAAG Vietnam. After January 1953, MAAG was expanding to Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Taiwan by 1956 to address communist threats:
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The Truman administration soon found another way to exercise some influence on French decision making, sending the Military Assistance and Advisory Group (MAAG) to Saigon in September 1950 under the leadership of General Francis Brink. As Assistant Secretary of State Dean Rusk stated, the United States had “no choice” but to help France, even though this would provoke charges of “imperialism.”
MAAG, which comprised army, air force, and naval inspection teams, would play a critical role in creating an enduring American foothold in Viet-nam, and, eventually, replacing French military advisers. MAAG’s initial role was to process, monitor, and evaluate American military aid to French and Vietnamese forces, but it gradually began to establish military programs, help build a national Vietnamese army, and coordinate U.S. military aid with French operational plans. The French rarely made American inspections of equipment or attempts at coordination easy.
In turn, MAAG members were often frustrated by French disorganization and failure to account for materials….. French commanders resented MAAG from the beginning, and with good reason. Content at first with simply sup-plying aid and personnel, MAAG became interested in taking over instruction of Vietnamese officers, training Vietnamese pilots, and supervising the French war effort.
A French serpent just lying in wait
Paris made backroom deals attempting to continue a power role in Vietnam’s future. Before Geneva, Paris was secretly talking to China. Post-Geneva talks included the Viet Minh. They were slowly biding their time to remove Diem:
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French status in South Vietnam continued to rise with the Franco-Vietnamese accords of March 24, 1960, which transferred the last piece of French public property to the Diem government and allowed Paris and Saigon to move forward with economic exchanges.
The political relationship between the two countries had also become more stable. France had once again become an important player in South Vietnamese affairs. According to Lalouette, what the United States had not yet accepted was that a “re-birth of amity” toward France existed among the South Vietnamese and that “increasing Franco-Vietnamese collaboration [was] paired with increasing anti-Americanism.”
French observers in Saigon watched as the South Vietnamese and Americans failed to resolve divisive political, economic, and social problems in the South. French officials in Saigon had become staunch advocates of reform in South Vietnam. In May 1960, Lalouette suggested to American ambassador Elbridge Durbrow that a tripartite meeting be held to discuss South Vietnamese domestic difficulties.
Wary of moving too fast, Paris forbade Lalouette to take the initiative for holding a three-power consultation on the means to remedy the situation in South Vietnam since the French position “could be misunderstood or interpreted as a return to colonialism.
France and Britain versus America?
Kathryn is not the first to annotate Britain and France attempts to bend FDR. They pushed hard for continued colonial rule:
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The Chinese communists’ victory in 1949 and the Soviet explosion of an atomic bomb the same year led the Truman administration to consider increasing its support of the Bao Dai government. Sensing an opportunity, Paris capitalized on communist successes by renewing its plea for increased American aid to Indochina. As early as May 1949, many French military officials described the war in Indochina as an anticommunist effort and insisted that Bao Dai’s establishment of a base there would stop the communist advance.
The British also encouraged an American commitment to South-east Asia since they feared that if Vietnam fell, areas under British influence— such as Siam, Burma, and Malaya—would be next.
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Before the reforms mentioned in Lebret’s study could be discussed, on November 10 a military coup was attempted in Saigon. In a subsequent meeting with Lalouette, Nhu stated that the French had been “totally correct in their actions” during the coup attempt, but that he believed American agents had supported the rebels. Therefore, Nhu wanted “to work more closely with the French since he could not trust the Americans.”
A USIS report detailing the coup attempt against Diem noted that the Diem regime expressed its appreciation for “objective reporting of the coup especially by French and British correspondents, ” which caused much seething amongst the American correspondents.
Among French circles the thought occurred that the American secret services aided the 1960 coup attempt, and that the coup failed because the majority of the army and navy supported Diem. “His sang froid and the timidity of insurgents worked for him.”
Eisenhower missteps regarding Diem and France
There is no question that Eisenhower’s lack of decisive leadership at a critical point in US/France relationships fell flat. Eisenhower chose to withhold a nuclear attack on Dien Bien Phu. He missed how Geneva would impact America for the next 20 years?
The Eisenhower Administration found France defeated only in battle after Geneva. Yet the Viet Minh did not win either. China’s first entrance onto the world’s stage at Geneva robbed Ho Chi Minh of any victory during negotiations.
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American officials in South Vietnam faced an additional problem in convincing Diem to follow a U.S. model—themselves. Despite Eisenhower’s assurance to Durbrow that he was indeed the top U.S. official in South Vietnam, Diem, with the support of other Americans, routinely ignored Durbrow’s suggestions for reform.
In theory, Durbrow was responsible for coordinating civilian agencies and had wide discretion to act, but Lieutenant General Samuel Williams, who had replaced John O’Daniel as the leader of MAAG, consistently undermined Durbrow and the U.S. Embassy in Saigon. Williams promised Diem that the Eisenhower administration would continue to support him whether he implemented political and economic reforms or not.
Williams also had the support of the CIA. Diem trusted Williams, and Williams argued he had the right to consult with Diem about defense matters and bypass the embassy since Diem still served as his own defense minister. Williams was convinced that exposure to American training schools and methods would resolve ARVN’s problems and establish internal security.
Durbrow had attempted to remove Williams a number of times, but Diem insisted he stay. In fact, Williams stayed until 1960, with the result that embassy officials and MAAG officers continued to battle inconclusively. It would not be until May 1960 that the issue of how to handle Diem would be brought up at a regular NSC meeting.
American agencies also disagreed over whether to prioritize economic and political reform or military security. The embassy and USOM contended that the economic development of South Vietnam was at least as important as military training; MAAG and Diem argued that military considerations were paramount. Diem was thus able to play one American agency against another.
These hard power tactics would be applied against Diem as well. As a result of Diem’s attempts to distance himself from the Americans and his refusal to engage in political and economic reform, the Eisenhower administration finally appeared to be toughening its stance toward him.
American officials in Washington and Saigon worried that the South Vietnamese population would begin to hold the United States responsible for Diem’s failure to implement reforms. They also recognized that Diem would not adopt the necessary reforms unless the United States increased pressure to do so.
Finally, a number of officials suggested that if Diem would not adopt what the United States considered “essential” reforms, Washington would have “no choice but to support some new leader who will. ”Such claims were some-what premature as the opposition to Diem, the most active of whom were in France, was divided, and there was no one personality who could challenge him.
Beginning in mid-1960, Durbrow indicated to Diem the strong American concern over corruption in his government, and that the United States was considering withholding military aid unless Diem agreed to political and economic reforms.”
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Although France and the United States shared a “colonial mentality” in that representatives of both countries operated on the assumption of their cultural superiority, the two differed in why they used cultural initiatives in South Vietnam. The French sought to preserve their civilizing mission; the Americans planned to stop the spread of communism.
The French tried to separate cultural activities from propaganda whereas the Americans combined the two. It is perhaps fair to say that American cultural diplomacy in Vietnam began as propaganda in the war against communism, but propaganda eventually metamorphosed into cultural initiatives designed to build a nation.
Although the Americans thought they would be able to avoid earlier French mistakes by replacing the civilizing mission with one of modernization, they too would come to be seen as imperialists rather than liberators.
Diem’s threat to the Saigon gangs resulted in obvious feedback. France viewed Diem as American’s hand picked puppet and a direct threat to their remaining hold on colonial rule. Yet Eisenhower’s Administration including Edward Lansdale believed they held a stronger position than France to establish a democratic South Vietnam. Eisenhower’s efforts resulted in removing the above French elements.
The Sect Crisis of 1955
Diem’s threat to the Saigon gangs resulted in obvious feedback. France viewed Diem as American’s hand picked puppet and a direct threat to their remaining hold on colonial rule. France of course, strategically chipping away overthrowing Diem, supported a coup d’état known as the Sect Crisis, a major incident that tested American resolve:
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Paris maintained that Diem could not defeat the Binh Xuyen militarily. The Quai pointed out that Diem had never been a national figure, that he had no roots in South Vietnam, and that he had managed to alienate just about everyone—Catholics, sects, police, army, administration, politicians, and intellectuals. A political solution was therefore required.
The French argued that Bao Dai should be approached and that he should call a meeting in Europe with Diem and sect leaders to broaden the government. Dulles was shocked by this plan. His opposition, according to the French, stemmed in part from his “puritan disgust” for the Binh Xuyen and Bao Dai.
Dulles believed that the French were closely connected to the Binh Xuyen and that they were only paying lip service to Diem. In a conversation with French ambassador to the United States Maurice Couve de Murville, who had replaced Henri Bonnet in February 1955, Dulles made it perfectly clear that if Diem left, the United States would withdraw from South Vietnam as well.
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In fact, the Americans were moving in a very specific direction. Once Diem proved his mettle in dealing with the sects, Eisenhower and Dulles decided they no longer needed French support or Bao Dai’s blessings as they had during previous South Vietnamese crises.
Indeed, much of the U.S. leadership advocated taking over completely. General Charles Bonesteel of the NSC encapsulated the crossroads the United States had reached, suggesting that getting the French to leave would “disengage us from the taint of colonialism.”
Although this might result in “substantial commitment, ” Bonesteel argued that it was “by no means certain” and that there was a “real likelihood” that training, technical assistance, and moderate aid would “be all that is required.
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Further, the French were capable of negating U.S. programs, as demonstrated by their attempts to bring about the downfall of the Diem government through an internal coup and to influence Bao Dai to dismiss Diem.
The French could also refuse to cooperate in the training of the Vietnamese army, withdraw completely from Indochina (thus forcing the United States to increase substantially its political, financial, and military commitments in the area), or unilaterally reach a rapprochement with the DRV and insist on executing their obligations under the Geneva agreement by working to-ward holding the elections scheduled for July 1956.
All of these factors led American organizations in South Vietnam to disassociate themselves from the French.
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Although Diem had won the battle, Franco-American conflict over South Vietnam’s future continued. The French complained about American intervention, in particular Lansdale’s role in Diem’s victory over the sects.
In turn, the Americans pointed out that the Binh Xuyen strongholds left in Saigon were in areas controlled by the French and that French personnel had been found in them. General Fernand Gambiez’s decision to try to stop the fighting also furthered American suspicions that France was protecting the Binh Xuyen.
This is roughly just half of Kathryn’s content worthy of review. It is easily to continue this book review in a new blog post. In conclusion, did America just change the names and not their mission? For so many American’s who would see their sons deployed to Vietnam, Kathryn provides an honest view of those key early failures that doomed America for the next 20 years.
Without her scholarship, key developments over French colonial rule would contribute to our long fog of war.