Ba Cut

Lê Quang Vinh, (1923 – July 13, 1956), popularly known as Ba Cụt (Short Third in Vietnamese, referring to a shortened third finger), was a military commander of the Hòa Hảo religious sect, which operated from the Mekong Delta and controlled various parts of southern Vietnam during the 1940s and early 1950s.

Ba Cụt and his forces fought the Vietnamese National Army (VNA), the Việt Minh, and the Cao Đài religious movement from 1943 until his capture in 1956. Known for his idiosyncrasies, he was regarded as an erratic and cruel leader who fought with little ideological purpose. His sobriquet came from the self-amputation of a finger as part of a vow during his teenage years to defeat the French colonial forces; he later swore not to cut his hair until the communist Việt Minh were defeated. Ba Cụt frequently made alliances with various Vietnamese factions and the French. He invariably accepted the material support offered in return for his cooperation, and then broke the agreement—nevertheless, the French made deals with him on five occasions. The French position was weak because their military forces had been depleted by World War II, and they had great difficulty in re-establishing control over French Indochina, which had been left with a power vacuum after the defeat of Japan.

In mid-1955, the tide turned against the various sects, as Prime Minister Ngô Đình Diệm of the State of Vietnam and his VNA began to consolidate their grip on the south. Ba Cụt and his allies were driven into the jungle, and their position was threatened by government offensives. After almost a year of fighting, Ba Cụt was captured. He was sentenced to death and publicly beheaded in Cần Thơ.

Early life and background
A young slim man aged around 20, with sharp eyes and nose, wearing a cylindrical traditional Vietnamese cloth headpiece and tunic. Both the headpiece and tunic are black.
Huỳnh Phú Sổ, the leader of the Hòa Hảo

Ba Cụt was born in 1923 in Long Xuyên, a regional town in the Mekong Delta, in the far south of Vietnam. He was orphaned at an early age and adopted by a local peasant family. Ba Cụt was illiterate and was known from childhood as a temperamental and fiery person. The family's rice paddies were confiscated by a prominent landlord, the father of Nguyễn Ngọc Thơ. Ba Cụt's bitter personal experience imbued him with a permanent and fanatical hatred towards landowners. Thơ rose to become a leading politician in the 1950s and played a key role in Ba Cụt's eventual capture and execution.

Vietnam was a tumultuous place during Ba Cụt's youth, particularly in the Mekong Delta. In 1939, Huỳnh Phú Sổ founded the Hòa Hảo religious movement, and within a year had gained more than 100,000 followers. He drew adherents for two reasons: the prophecies he made about the outbreak of World War II and the conquest of South East Asia by Japan, which proved to be correct; and his work as a mystical healer—his patients claimed to have been miraculously cured from all manner of serious illnesses after seeing him, when Western medicine had failed. Sổ's cult-like appeal greatly alarmed the French colonial authorities.During World War II, Imperial Japan invaded and seized control of Vietnam from France; its defeat and withdrawal at the end of the war in 1945 left a power vacuum in the country.

The Hòa Hảo formed their own army and administration during the war, and started a de facto state in their Mekong Delta stronghold. They came into conflict with the Cao Đài, another new religious movement, which also boasted a private army and controlled a nearby region of southern Vietnam centred around Tây Ninh. Meanwhile in Saigon, the Bình Xuyên organised crime syndicate ruled much of the city through its gangster militia.[8] These three southern forces vied for control of southern Vietnam with the main protagonists: the French, who were attempting to re-establish colonial control across the entire nation; and the communist-dominated Việt Minh, who sought Vietnamese independence.

At the time, the many groups vying for power—including their respective factions—engaged in alliances of convenience that were frequently broken. Historian David Elliott said that "the most important eventual cause of the French decline was the inherently unstable nature of the political alliances they had devised ... The history of the French relations with the Hoa Hao sect is a telling illustration of the pitfalls of short-term political deals between forces whose long-term interests conflict."

The Hòa Hảo initially engaged in large-scale clashes with the Việt Minh in 1945, but by mid-1946 the two groups had agreed to stop fighting one another and to fight the French instead However, in June 1946, Sổ became estranged from his military leaders and started the Dan Xa (Social Democratic Party).Because of his charisma, the Việt Minh saw Sổ as a threat and assassinated him, leaving the Hòa Hảo leaderless and causing Sổ's military leaders to go their separate ways. The split caused an increase in violence as the various Hòa Hảo factions engaged in conflicts among themselves.



Career

Ba Cụt joined the Hòa Hảo militia when it was formed in 1943–44 and became a commander within a year. He was feared by his enemies, and was described as "a sort of lean Rasputin." According to Bernard B. Fall, "The hapless farmers who were under the rule of the maniacal Ba Cut fared worse [than those under other military leaders], for the latter [Ba Cụt] was given to fits of incredible cruelty and had no sense of public duty." American journalist Joseph Alsop described Ba Cụt as "war-drunk". Ba Cụt was famous for inventing a torture contraption that drilled a steel nail through the victim's ear, a device he used to force villagers and wealthy landlords to fund his forces.

In 1947, he led his own faction of the sect after its various military leaders pursued their own policies towards the French and Hồ Chí Minh's Việt Minh in the wake of Sổ's death. At the time, France was in a ruinous financial state following World War II, and was experiencing great difficulty in its attempts to re-establish control over its colonies. In 1950, Ba Cụt was involved in a battle with another Hòa Hảo leader, Nguyen Giac Ngo. He was defeated and driven from the district of Chợ Mới. The French saw the disagreements as an opportunity to divide the Hòa Hảo and gain an anti-Việt Minh ally, and offered material aid, which Ba Cụt accepted.Ba Cụt repeatedly made treaties with the French colonial forces to fight the Việt Minh in return for arms and money, but he broke his end of the bargain and sometimes fought the Cao Đài instead of the communists. Ba Cụt made five such deals with the French, but he abandoned his military responsibilities each time. The French continued to furnish him with supplies despite his disloyalty and unreliability because they lacked the personnel to patrol all of Vietnam, but had spare equipment. The other Hòa Hảo commanders generally had the same general outlook as Ba Cụt; they were stridently opposed to the Việt Minh because of Sổ's assassination, and sometimes fought alongside and received supplies from the French, but at times they lapsed into apathy and refused to attack. Although Ba Cụt was infamous for his temper and cruelty, he was regarded as a moderate in outlook compared to the other Hòa Hảo leaders. The French continued to provide him with equipment despite the fact that when he was seventeen, Ba Cụt had cut off the top of his third finger as a symbol of his commitment to always fight the French.

The most notable instance of Ba Cụt's abandoning the fight against the Việt Minh came in mid-1953. At that time, his forces had been helping to defend the regional Mekong Delta town of Mỹ Tho, but the French decided to transfer more of the military power to their more mainstream allies, the Vietnamese National Army (VNA). As the French tried to undermine his position, tensions with Ba Cụt increased. On June 25, the Hòa Hảo leader ordered his men to evacuate their French-supplied bases; they took their weapons with them and razed the camps. Ba Cụt then withdrew his forces from a string of military posts in the Plain of Reeds and retreated to Châu Đốc in the extreme south of the country. As a result, the French-aligned presence in the Mekong Delta was severely dented and the Việt Minh made substantial gains in the area. Eventually, the French defeat at the Battle of Điện Biên Phủ in northern Vietnam in May 1954 signalled the end of French Indochina.

When the Geneva Conference in July 1954 ended the First Indochina War, it handed North Vietnam to Hồ Chí Minh's Việt Minh, and the south to the State of Vietnam. To reunify the country, national elections were scheduled for 1956, following which the French would withdraw from Indochina. The partition of Vietnam angered Ba Cụt and he vowed not to cut his hair until the nation was reunified. Having fought against the Việt Minh since 1947, Ba Cụt's principal criticism of Prime Minister Ngô Đình Diệm's State of Vietnam government stemmed from his belief that Diệm had been too passive in rejecting the partition, and that half of the country should not have been yielded to the communists.

In mid-1954, General Nguyễn Văn Hinh, the head of the State of Vietnam's VNA, announced that he did not respect the leadership of Prime Minister Diệm, and vowed to overthrow him. The coup never materialised and Hinh was forced into exile,but not before appointing Ba Cụt to the rank of colonel in the VNA in an attempt to undermine Diệm, as the Hòa Hảo warlord was openly contemptuous of the prime minister. In August, Ba Cụt and his 3,000 men broke from the VNA, and fought against it; this put him at odds with most Hòa Hảo leaders, who accepted government payments to integrate their forces into the VNA. The initial military offensive by the VNA against Ba Cụt was a failure, possibly because the details of the planned attack on his forces were leaked to him by a Hòa Hảo member of the National Defence Committee.

During the transition period between the signing of the Geneva Accords and the planned reunification elections, South Vietnam remained in chaos as the VNA tried to subdue the remaining autonomous factions of the Hòa Hảo, Cao Đài, and Bình Xuyên militias. In early 1955, during a battle with the Cao Đài forces of Trình Minh Thế, Ba Cụt was severely wounded by a bullet that penetrated his chest. It seemed that he would die, but a French Air Force helicopter flew in and airlifted him to a colonial hospital. Ba Cụt eventually recovered, and in the meantime, the fighting stopped. By this time, with France preparing to withdraw from Indochina, senior French officers had begun to undermine Diệm's leadership and his attempts to stabilise South Vietnam. The VNA later implicated the French in the organisation of weapons air drops to Ba Cụt, prompting a protest from Diệm's government. Diệm complained to a French general, alleging that Ba Cụt's men were using French equipment that was of higher quality than that given to the VNA.


Last stand against Diệm
See also: Battle for Saigon and State of Vietnam referendum, 1955
A portrait of a middle-aged man, looking to the left in a half-portrait/profile. He has chubby cheeks, parts his hair to the side and wears a suit and tie.
Ngô Đình Diệm, the Prime Minister of the State of Vietnam

In 1955, Diệm tried to integrate the remaining Hòa Hảo armies into the VNA. Ba Cụt was one of four Hòa Hảo military leaders who refused the government offer on April 23, and continued to operate autonomously. At one stage, the Cao Đài, Hòa Hảo and Bình Xuyên formed an alliance called the United Front, in an attempt to pressure Diệm into handing over power, and Ba Cụt was named as their senior military commander. Initially, American and French representatives in Vietnam hoped that Diệm would take up a ceremonial role and allow the sect leaders—including Ba Cụt—to hold government positions.However, Diệm refused to share power and launched a sudden offensive against the Bình Xuyên's Saigon headquarters in late April, quickly crushing them.

During the fighting, the Hòa Hảo attempted to help the Bình Xuyên by attacking towns and government forces in their Mekong Delta heartland. Ba Cụt's men blockaded the Mekong and Bassac rivers and laid siege to various towns, stifling the regional economy. Soon after, they retreated to a Hòa Hảo citadel on the banks of the Bassac. After reinforcing their base, the Hòa Hảo proceeded to fire mortars across the water into the city of Cần Thơ, which stood on the opposite side of the river.

With the Bình Xuyên vanquished, Diệm turned his attention to conquering the Hòa Hảo. As a result, a battle between government troops led by General Dương Văn Minh and Ba Cụt's men commenced in Cần Thơ on June 5. Five Hòa Hảo battalions surrendered immediately; Ba Cụt and three remaining leaders had fled to the Cambodian border by the end of the month.The soldiers of the three other leaders eventually surrendered, but Ba Cụt's men continued to the end, claiming loyalty to the Emperor Bảo Đại. Diệm responded by replacing the officers of Bảo Đại's personal regiments with his own men and used the royal units to attack Ba Cụt's rebels.Knowing that they could not defeat the government in open conventional warfare, Ba Cụt's forces destroyed their own bases so that the VNA could not use their abandoned resources, and retreated into the jungle. Ba Cụt's 3,000 men spent the rest of 1955 evading the 20,000 VNA troops who had been deployed to quell them, and a reward of one million piasters was put on their leader's head. Ba Cụt scattered trails of money in the jungles, hoping to distract his pursuers, but to no avail.

Despite his weak military situation, Ba Cụt sought to disrupt the staging of a fraudulent referendum that Diệm had scheduled in order to depose Bảo Đại as head of state. Ba Cụt distributed a pamphlet condemning Diệm as an American puppet, asserting that the prime minister was going to "Catholicize" the country—the referendum was partly funded by the U.S. government and various Roman Catholic organisations.Diệm had strong support from American Catholic politicians and Cardinal Francis Spellman, and his brother Ngô Đình Thục was a bishop. Ba Cụt said that the referendum was a means "for Diem to gather the people from all towns and force them to demonstrate one goal: to depose Bao Dai and proclaim the puppet Diem as the chief-of-state of Vietnam."On the day of the poll, Ba Cụt's men prevented voting in the border regions that they controlled, and ventured out of the jungles to attack polling stations in Cần Thơ. Despite that disruption, Diệm was fraudulently credited with more than 90% of support in Hòa Hảo-controlled territory, and a near unanimous turnout was recorded in the area. These results were replicated across the nation, and Diệm deposed Bảo Đại.

Eventually, Ba Cụt was surrounded, and sought to make a peace deal with the Diệm government to avoid being taken prisoner. Ba Cụt sent a message to Nguyễn Ngọc Thơ, the public official who oversaw the civilian side of the campaign against the Hòa Hảo, asking for negotiations so that his men could be integrated into mainstream society and the nation's armed forces. Thơ agreed to meet Ba Cụt alone in the jungle, and despite fears that the meeting was a Hòa Hảo trap, he was not ambushed. However, Ba Cụt began asking for additional concessions and the meeting ended in a stalemate. According to historian Hue-Tam Ho Tai, Ba Cụt's lifelong antipathy towards Thơ's family influenced his behaviour during his last stand. Ba Cụt was arrested by a patrol on April 13, 1956, and his remaining forces were defeated in battle.




Trial and execution
Dishevelled man dressed in white folds his arms as he stands in the dock.
He is guarded by two soldiers, one with a machine gun.
The courtroom is crowded.
Ba Cụt in Cần Thơ Military Court, 1956

Diệm's government put Ba Cụt on trial. During the proceedings, Ba Cụt theatrically removed his shirt so that the public gallery could see how many scars he had suffered while fighting the communists. This, according to him, demonstrated his devotion to Vietnamese nationalism. He challenged any other man to show as many scars. However, Diệm's judge was unimpressed; Ba Cụt was found guilty of committing multiple murders, and sentenced to death. Diệm's adviser, Colonel Edward Lansdale from the CIA, was one of many who protested the decision. Lansdale felt that the execution would tarnish Diệm—who had proclaimed the Republic of Vietnam (commonly known as South Vietnam) and declared himself President—and antagonise Ba Cụt's followers.Ngô Đình Nhu—Diệm's younger brother and chief adviser—said that a reprieve was not possible, as the army, particularly Minh, was opposed to clemency. Some sections of the southern public were sympathetic to Ba Cụt, who was compared to a character from the Wild West.

Ba Cụt was publicly guillotined[ on July 13, 1956, in Cần Thơ. Some followers, led by a hardcore deputy named Bay Dom, retreated to a small area beside the Cambodian border, where they vowed not to rest until Ba Cụt was avenged. Many of his followers later joined the Vietcong—the movement that succeeded the Việt Minh their leader had fought—and took up arms against Diệm.
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State of Vietnam referendum, 1955

The State of Vietnam referendum of 1955 determined the future form of government of the State of Vietnam, the nation that was to become the Republic of Vietnam (widely known as South Vietnam). It was contested by Prime Minister Ngô Đình Diệm, who proposed a republic, and former emperor Bảo Đại. Bảo Đại had abdicated as emperor in 1945 and at the time of the referendum held the title of head of state. Diệm won the election, which was widely marred by electoral fraud, with 98.2% of the vote. In the capital Saigon, Diệm was credited with over 600,000 votes, even though only 450,000 people were on the electoral roll. He accumulated tallies in excess of 90% of the registered voters, even in rural regions where opposition groups prevented voting.

The referendum was the last phase in the power struggle between Bảo Đại and his prime minister. Bảo Đại disliked Diem and had frequently attempted to undermine him, having appointed him only because he was a conduit to American aid. During the period, the country was going through a period of insecurity, as Vietnam had been temporarily partitioned as a result of the 1954 Geneva Accords that ended the First Indochina War. The State of Vietnam controlled the southern half of the country, pending national elections that would reunify the country under a common government. The Vietnamese National Army was not in full control of the country, with the Cao Dai and Hoa Hao religious sects running their own administrations in the countryside with their private armies, while the Binh Xuyen organised crime syndicate controlled the streets of Saigon. Despite Bảo Đại’s interference, Diem had managed to subdue the private armies and enforce government over the country by mid-1955.

Emboldened by his success, Diem began to plot Bảo Đại’s downfall. He scheduled a referendum for October 23, 1955, and pushed Bảo Đại out of the political scene, despite the former emperor’s attempts to derail the poll. In the period leading up to the vote, campaigning for Bảo Đại was banned, while Diem’s election campaign focused on personal attacks against Bảo Đại. These included pornographic cartoons of the head of state and unverified rumours claiming that he was illegitimate and linking him to various mistresses. The government-controlled media launched polemical attacks on Bảo Đại, and police went door-to-door, warning people of the consequences of failing to vote. After his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu successfully rigged the poll, Diem proclaimed himself president of the newly created Republic of Vietnam.

Background
Main articles: Geneva Conference (1954), Operation Passage to Freedom, and Battle for Saigon

The defeat of the French Army at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, followed by the Geneva Accords, led to a divided Vietnam. The French-backed State of Vietnam led by former Emperor Bao Dai, provisionally held control south of the 17th parallel. Ho Chi Minh's Vietminh held the north under the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, which Ho had proclaimed in 1945. The agreements stated that nation-wide elections were to be held in 1956 to unify the country under a common government. In July 1954, during the transition period, Bao Dai appointed Diem as Prime Minister of the State of Vietnam. On October 11, 1954, the border was closed by the International Control Commission, after a period of 300 days during which free passage between both halves of Vietnam had been allowed. Under the Geneva Accords, anti-communist military personnel were obliged to evacuate to the south, while communist forces were to be moved north. Civilians were free to move to whichever zone they preferred. During the 300 days, the Catholic Diem and his US CIA adviser Colonel Edward Lansdale staged a campaign to convince people to move to South Vietnam. The campaign was particularly focused on Catholics, who were to provide Diem's power base in his later years, with the use of the slogan "God has gone south". Between 800,000 and 1,000,000 people migrated to the south, mostly Catholics. At the start of 1955, French Indochina was dissolved, leaving Diem in temporary control of the south.

At the time, Diem had little authority beyond the gates of his own palace. Bao Dai had little confidence in him and gave him meagre support—the pair had clashed in the past, with Diem resigning as Bao Dai's Interior Minister two decades earlier, believing the head of state to be weak and ineffective. Most historians believe that Bao Dai selected Diem because of his ability to attract US support and funding. During the transition period, the French Expeditionary Corps maintained a presence in South Vietnam. This led to tension between France and the State of Vietnam; Diem was a passionate nationalist detested the French, who returned his feelings and hoped that he would fail, even calling for his removal on occasions.

Diem faced challenges to his authority from four more groups. The Hoa Hao and Cao Dai religious sects had private armies that controlled the Mekong Delta and the areas west of Saigon, respectively. The Binh Xuyen was an armed, organised crime empire that controlled much of Saigon with a 40,000 strong private army, while the Vietminh still controlled much of the rural area. Diem's Vietnamese National Army (VNA) was led by General Nguyen Van Hinh, a French citizen who loathed and frequently disobeyed him. To make matters worse, Bao Dai sold the operating license of the national police to the Binh Xuyen, thereby putting administrative control of the police in the hands of a crime syndicate.

Amid growing French and US skepticism of his ability to provide stable rule, Diem forced the matter to a head in April 1955. He ordered the Binh Xuyen to relinquish control of the National Police and submit to his command by integrating into the VNA or disbanding, threatening to crush them if they refused. He bribed Hoa Hao and Cao Dai commanders into joining the VNA, gradually resulting in the defection of some commanders and their units, while others continued to lead their forces against Saigon. The Binh Xuyen defied Diem's ultimatum and on April 27, the VNA initiated the Battle for Saigon. After a brief but violent battle that left between 500 and 1,000 people dead and about 20,000 homeless, the Binh Xuyen were crushed. Diem had regained both US confidence and control of the police. Jubilant crowds lauded Diem and denounced Bao Dai, who had tried to dismiss him in the middle of the battle to prevent him from quelling the Binh Xuyen. In addition, General Paul Ely, the head of the French presence in Vietnam, tried to impede Diem, and his troops put road blocks against the VNA and gave intelligence to the Binh Xuyen.

Buoyed by his successes, and fuelled by increased hatred of the French and Bao Dai after their attempts to prevent him from dismantling the Binh Xuyen, Diem became more confident as he went about consolidating his hold on power. On May 15, Diem abolished Bao Dai's Imperial Guard; its 5,000 men became the 11th and 42nd Infantry Regiments of the VNA. Diem then stripped Bao Dai of his extensive crown lands. On June 15, Diem had the Council of the Royal Family at Hue declare that Bao Dai be stripped of his powers, and that he, Diem, be made president. Bao Dai's relatives condemned him for abdicating as head of state in favour of Ho in 1945, which they described as a crime against the nation, and excoriated him for his links with France and the Binh Xuyen. Historians have speculated that the royals agreed to turn on Bao Dai so that Diem would not seize their assets.




Organization of the referendum
Man with dark hair and moustache in a dress uniform, suit and tie,
sitting at a table, with a star indicating his rank, in front
of a map on a wall.Colonel Edward Lansdale, who
helped Diem in his campaign

On July 7, 1955, the first anniversary of his installation as prime minister, Diem announced that a national referendum would be held to determine the future of the country. On July 16, Diem publicly announced his intention to not take part in the reunification elections. He said that "We will not be tied down by the [Geneva] treaty that was signed against the wishes of the Vietnamese people." Diem said that it was impossible to have a fair election with communists and as result, he argues that it was necessary to create an anti-communist state in South Vietnam.This was echoed by the Saigon press, which ran articles assailing communist elections as shambolic, rigged and meaningless; at the time, the northern half of Vietnam had a greater population than the south.

A month earlier, Prime Minister of North Vietnam, Pham Van Dong, wrote to Saigon asking to begin negotiations over the specific details of the elections. While the Americans were happy to avoid elections because of fears of a communist victory, they hoped that Diem would enter the dialogue over planning matters and wait for North Vietnam to object to a proposal, and thus use it to blame Ho for violating the Geneva Accords.The Americans had earlier advised Diem, who had been acting in defiance of Bao Dai, that continued aid was contingent on Diem establishing a legal basis for usurping the head of state's power.

On October 6, Diem announced that the referendum would be held on October 23. The election was open to men and women aged 18 or over, and the government arranged to have a polling station set up for every 1,000 registered voters.The poll was contested by former Emperor Bao Dai, who had spent much of his time in France and advocated a monarchy, and Diem, who ran on a republican platform..According to historian Jessica Chapman, it was a choice between "the country's obsolete emperor and its far-from-popular prime minister, Ngo Dinh Diem". In announcing the referendum, Diem portrayed his decision as being motivated by a love of democracy and popular discontent with the rule of Bao Dai. The prime minister cited a plethora of petitions from various social, religious and political groups calling on him to stage a plebiscite to remove Bao Dai and said that he was motivated by these "legitimate and democratic" sentiments. However, it is believed that the petitions were not sincere and were either coerced or made for political reasons.

Lansdale cautioned Diem against using electoral fraud, believing that he would win a free election, stating "While I'm away I don't want to suddenly read that you have won by 99.99%. I would know that it's rigged then." American officials thought that a fair election would have seen Diem poll around 60–70% of the vote.

Under the Elysee Accords and the subsequent legislation that created the State of Vietnam in 1949, Bao Dai's position as head of state was neither permanent nor indefinite. Sovereignty was presumed to rest solely upon the people, with Bao Dai being a mere conduit. As a result, the referendum itself was within the law.Diem had not been elected to his post, so he saw the referendum as an opportunity to rebuff opponents, who claimed that he was undemocratic and autocratic. The event also gave Diem an opportunity to boost his prestige by defeating Bao Dai in a head-to-head contest. It was previously agreed that a National Assembly would be elected first, but Diem went ahead with the plebiscite, which meant that he would have total power if he deposed Bao Dai before a legislature was formed.

US diplomats were concerned that the move would be seen as a power grab, as Diem was organising and driving an electoral process in which he was a candidate. The Americans felt that a legislature should be formed first and that the body should oversee the referendum, but Diem ignored their advice.Ambassador G. Frederick Reinhardt informed Washington that Diem had no intention of allowing a level playing field for the opposition, and that the foreign press had already made much of Diem's democratic pronouncements being a facade. The Department of State agreed and opted to avoid trumpeting the referendum as an exercise in democracy for fear of attracting negative reactions to their foreign policy. Nevertheless, the US were pleased with the referendum, as they saw it as an opportunity to strengthen South Vietnam and avoid defeat to the communists, as they saw a republican model as being more robust.

Having declared his disdain for the 1956 reunification elections, Diem saw the referendum as the first step in creating a long-term state to rule over South Vietnam. He repeatedly said that the creation of a legislature and a constitution for his new state would follow the referendum. Diem saw the poll as an opportunity to legitimise him as a symbol of Vietnamese democracy, so that he could frame and justify his refusal to participate in national elections as a struggle between freedom and communist authoritarianism.Diem asserted that South Vietnam would eventually reunify the nation under a democratic administration and liberate their northern compatriots from communist oppression, and championed the referendum as a first step in nurturing democracy. Diem's support base was to use this as a means of justifying the deposal of Bao Dai, citing past decisions that according to them, were pro-communist.

One of Diem's themes was that the referendum would usher in a new era of unprecedented democracy. He said "This shall be but the first step made by our people in the free use of our political rights." The day before the poll, Diem said that "This 23 October, for the first time in our country's history, our men and women will exercise one of many basic civil rights of a democracy, the right to vote. A government proclamation four days before the poll said "Dear compatriots, proclaim your will forcefully! Go forward firmly in the path of Freedom, Independence and Democracy!"




Campaign

Diem ran a personal attack campaign against the head of state, for whom campaigning was prohibited.The army and national police went about enforcing the ban on pro-Bao Dai and anti-Diem activities.Police went from door to door, explaining the consequences of failing to vote. They also organized conferences in rural villages and addressed the populace with loudspeakers. In general, Diem's line of attack was to portray Bao Dai as a drunken womanizer who was preoccupied with immoral pleasures and unconcerned with the problems of the populace.Vietnam's monarchic tradition was built on Confucianism and the emperor's mandate of heaven, and Diem's campaign sought to prove that Bao Dai had lost this mandate through his debauched lifestyle. According to Joseph Buttinger, who was based in Vietnam as the second in command at the International Rescue Committee, the methods used to influence the poll were "outrageous". Donald Lancaster, a journalist who covered the poll, said "Whereas Bao Dai was given no opportunity to defend himself, the government-controlled press proceeded to overwhelm him with scurrilous abuse."

Diem's advertising included the parading of giant pageant-style floats of Bao Dai through the streets of Saigon, depicted with bags of money on his shoulders, a deck of cards in his hands, and with naked blonde women and bottles of cognac in his arms. This was a reference to the head of state's reputation for opulence, gambling and womanising.In particular, the blonde hair referred to Bao Dai's penchance for European mistresses with whom he liaised with on the French Riviera. Bao Dai's dummy was accompanied by a that of a Frenchman putting gold into his pockets, thereby questioning his nationalist credentials.Posters and effigies associating Bao Dai with a pig's head were disseminated,while a prominent newspaper composed and encouraged the people to sing polemical and insulting songs about the head of state.

Walls and public transport vehicles were plastered with slogans, including "Beware of the evil king Bao Dai's preference for gambling, women, wine, milk, and butter. Those who vote for him betray their country." Aside from referring to his opulent lifestyle, other slogans such as "Bao Dai, puppet king selling his country", and "Bao Dai, master keeper of gambling dens and brothels", also referred to his alleged softness towards the communists.

On the other hand, Prime Minister Diem was described as the "hero of the people" and "father of all children". The slogans exhorted the populace to vote for the prime minister because "To vote for the revolutionary man Ngo Dinh Diem is to build a society of welfare and justice".They portrayed Diem as a patriotic and nationalist anti-communist, proclaiming "To kill communists, depose the king, [and] struggle against colonialists is a citizen's duty in Free Vietnam".

Diem's government-controlled press overwhelmed Bao Dai with endless personal propaganda attacks, with special editions of newspapers being devoted to polemical biographical accounts of the former emperor. This allowed Diem's campaign to condemn Bao Dai with much more salacious detail than was possible through slogans.[35] This started in August when the daily newspaper Thoi Dai started a three week series that disseminated unsubstantiated and scandalous details about Bao Dai's life, especially his relationships. These were written by editorialist Hong Van, who called the head of state a "dung beetle who sold his country for personal glory".

Hong Van firstly claimed that Bao Dai was an illegitimate son of Emperor Khai Dinh. He alleged that Khai Dinh was infertile and had married a maid, before claiming the maid's son—who purportedly fell pregnant to another man— as his own. The paper claimed that Bao Dai was "big like a lubber, had many children, and was very fond of women" while Khai Dinh was uncomfortable with females, hinting that the different personalities were inconsistent with a common biological lineage.

Capitalising on anti-French sentiment, the paper went on to discuss Bao Dai's upbringing in France, claiming that he was already womanising as a teenager because of his European upbringing. Bao Dai later married a ethnic-Vietnamese French citizen, who became Empress Nam Phuong. The editorial accused Nam Phuong of being an agent loyal to France and claimed that she had treated the queen mother badly, a serious character fault as Confucianism strongly emphasized respect for family elders. Hong Van went on to claim that Bao Dai's sequence of Gallic lovers was an indication that colonial officials were successfully using sex to turn the head of state into a French puppet.

The culmination of the newspaper campaign was a satirical pornographic cartoon titled "The Story of Bao Dai". It summarized the scandalous depictions of the head of state made by Thoi Dai in the preceding weeks and was published on October 19, four days before the referendum. The pictures featured full frontal nude depictions of Bao Dai and his mistresses, with genitalia clearly visible,including one frame that showed a naked blonde performing an erotic dance for the head of state.

Aside from painting Bao Dai as a sexually insatiable glutton, Diem's campaign also attacked the head of state's nationalist credentials. They criticised him as being too soft in his dealings with French colonial authorities, and for serving as the head of state of the Empire of Vietnam, a puppet regime set up by Imperial Japan after they invaded during World War II.They also accused him of ceding half the country to the communists. The communists had already captured more than half the country on the battlefield,and Bao Dai claimed that he had no choice, but Diem's campaign portrayed him as incompetent and unwilling to take the blame. As a further example, Diem's supporters pointed to a September 1955 interview in which Bao Dai admitted to keeping in contact with the communist leadership. Bao Dai was further criticised for supporting the various sects, and accused of helping the French citizen General Hinh in his attempted coup against Diem.

Diem used the Ministry of Information's electoral education campaign as a partisan political tool. Instead of using it purely to explain the democratic process, the campaign was used to extol Diem and his allies.After explaining what democracy was, a pamphlet outlined why "Deposing a chief-of-state is a vital act",After elaborating on the powers of the head of state, the pamphlet went on to champion Diem as an anti-communist who could defend people's freedom, while explaining why Bao Dai was unfit to lead, saying that he did not have respect among the international community.
Response of Bao Dai

On October 15, Bao Dai issued a statement protesting against the referendum. He further urged the governments of France, the United Kingdom, the United States, India and even the Soviet Union not to recognise Diem, asserting that he was an obstacle to the reunification of Vietnam under the Geneva Accords. He accused Diem's poll of being "a governmental activity which conforms neither to the profound sentiment of the Vietnamese people nor to the common cause of peace".

On October 18, Bao Dai made the token gesture of formally dismissing Diem. On October 19, he denounced "the police methods" of Diem's "dictatorship" and warned the Vietnamese populace "against a regime that was bound to lead them to ruin, famine, and war".Bao Dai accused Diem of trying to foment conflict between the French and the Americans. On the eve of the poll, Bao Dai stated "I can even tell you that I know the percentage of favourable votes that Mr. Diem has decided to obtain". With no means of propagating his views inside Vietnam, Bao Dai's actions had little effect.




Other opposition

The staging of the election was subsidised by foreign funding. The United States government and a combination of American Catholic charities contributed USD2 million each. Ba Cut, a leader of an anti-government Hoa Hao militant group, distributed a pamphlet condemning Diem as an American puppet, citing the funding as proof and further asserting that Diem was going to "Catholicize" the country. The Vietnamese Socialist Party, which was affiliated to the Hoa Hao, claimed that Diem "bribed the world of laborers and young students to petition in support of Diem's rise to chief-of-state and to petition in favor of deposing Bao Dai" using the American election funding.Another Hoa Hao rebel leader, General Tran Van Soai, assailed Diem as being undemocratic regime and declared the referendum illegal. He invited "friendly countries and the people of Vietnam to distrust this political maneuver".Opponents claimed that Diem's declarations about the value of democracy were hollow. Diem had earlier told a cabinet minister that only one political party—Nhu's outfit, and went about eradicating opposition by force.



Logistics and voting

Lansdale advised Diem to print his ballots in red, while those of Bao Dai were printed in green. In Vietnam, red is associated with good luck and prosperity, whereas green is often associated with a cuckold and bad luck.Diem's red ballots pictured him with youthful and modern-looking people, while Bao Dai's photo was placed in old fashioned robes, which he never wore. In addition, Bao Dai's portrait showed him to appear dazed and bloated, while Diem and those surrounding him were smiling and appeared to be energetic.The ballot claimed that a vote for Diem would be a vote for democracy, stating "I depose Bao Dai and recognise Ngo Dinh Diem as Head of State, charged with the commission of setting up a democratic regime".Bao Dai's ballot read "I do not depose Bao Dai and do not regard Ngo Dinh Diem as the Head of State charged with the commission of setting up a democratic regime". The voters would place the red or green ballot into the box, according to their preference, while discarding the other. This meant that the voting was actually not secret. The use of such methods undermined Diem's later attempts to portray his regime as being morally motivated.
Tall Caucasian man standing in profile at left in a white suit and tie shakes hands with a smaller black-haired Asian man in a white shirt, dark suit and tie.
Ngo Dinh Nhu (right), Diem's brother, supervised and rigged the referendum.

The logistics of the referendum were organised and supervised by Diem's brother and confidant Ngo Dinh Nhu, who was the leader of the family's secret Can Lao Party, which supplied the Ngos' electoral base. Reports of violence and intimidation were widespread. During the referendum, Nhu's staff told voters to throw away the green ballots. Those who disobeyed were often chased down and beaten, with pepper sauce and water sometimes being forced into their nostrils. The violations were particularly flagrant in central Vietnam, a region over which another of Diem's younger brothers, Ngo Dinh Can, ruled.Can was based in the former imperial capital city of Hue, which was the home of the Nguyen Dynasty and a source of sympathy towards Bao Dai.He stifled this support by ordering the police to arrest 1,200 people for political reasons in the week leading up to the vote. In the city of Hoi An, some people were killed in election violence on the day of the poll.




Counting and results

Diem's government formulated procedural regulations that were meant to ensure that results and ballots were correctly accounted for and to prevent election fraud.In reality however, the votes were counted without independent supervision, which resulted in Diem being credited with 98.2% of the vote. The prime minister tallied 605,025 votes in Saigon, although only 450,000 voters were registered in the capital. Diem's tally exceeded the registration numbers in other districts. French newspapers claimed that only half of the registered voters in Saigon had actually voted, and that the rest had boycotted the election, implying that more than 60% of the votes in the capital were not authentic. Defenders of Diem have speculated that this was due to recently arrived refugees from North Vietnam who voted without being enrolled, rather than large-scale ballot-stuffing.

The near unanimous voter turnout and support for Diem was replicated in highland and Mekong Delta swamp areas, which were not even under the control of the government and its Vietnamese National Army.In some districts of the Mekong Delta, overwhelming tallies for Diem in excess of 90% of the registered voters were recorded, even though the Hoa Hao warlord Ba Cut and his army had prevented voting.

The referendum was widely condemned for being fraudulent in a similar way to communist show elections. Chapman said that "Even Diem apologists like Anthony Trawick Bouscaren and American CIA officer Edward Lansdale concur with the prime minister's harshest critics on the conclusion that the South Vietnamese government was either incapable of or unwilling to hold a truly free, representative plebiscite". Many analysts regard the vote as the first notable demonstration of Diem's authoritarian streak.

A CIA report written in 1966 adjudged the poll to be the most heavily manipulated in the first 11 years of South Vietnam's history. The US government privately concluded that the monopoly that Diem had on the media and the election campaign was a greater factor in the victory than intimidation and the fact that the voting was effectively public. Reinhardt cabled Washington, saying that the "referendum proved [a] resounding success for [the] Diem government". He also indicated that the poll results were not necessarily a reflection of reality by adding that the result did not show that Diem had majority support but that he was able to control the country, effectively unchallenged. The US government was heartened by Diem's apparent ability to negate communist and other opposition.

The scholar Bernard B. Fall stated that "there is not the slightest doubt that this plebiscite was only a shade more fraudulent than most electoral tests under a dictatorship". The American journalist Stanley Karnow cited the dubious plebiscite as evidence of Diem's "mandarin mentality". Chapman said that "no amount of unilateral campaigning, anti-Bao Dai sentiment, or Confucian political restraint could explain Diem's 98 percent margin of victory in a politically heterogeneous South Vietnam. Corruption and intimidation must have played a significant role." Buttinger said that while the monarchy was "another rotten relic of Vietnam's past" and Bao Dai was "its last, unworthy representative", the fraud and intimidation was unnecessary as Diem was always going to win easily. The historian David Anderson said that the victory "was not a true representation of Diem's power or popularity. The emperor's weakness, the disarray of the political opposition, and other such factors explain his triumph",while Seth Jacobs said that "nothing demonstrated Diem's disinterest in democratic processes more vividly [than the flagrantly fraudulent referendum".
[edit] Reaction and aftermath

Three days after the vote, Diem proclaimed the creation of the Republic of Vietnam, naming himself as its president. Diem said "The October 23rd plebiscite in which [the people of South Vietnam] took such an enthusiastic part, constitutes an approval of the policies pursued thus far and at the same time augurs a whole new era for the future of our country."Diem again reiterated that he would not partake in national reunification elections, saying that they would be futile unless "true liberty" came about in the communist North Vietnam. This impressed American observers, who feared a total communist takeover.

Having claimed that the election was entirely without irregularities, the United States government hailed Diem as a new hero of the "free world". Archives of policy discussions show that the Americans were concerned more about the negative image created by Diem's autocratic and antidemocratic style among the international community, rather than the its possible effects on national cohesion.

Reaction to Diem's victory among the American press varied with geographic location. Newspapers in the Midwest hailed Diem's win as a triumph for democracy and extolled the new president as a champion of democracy. However, The New York Times said that the extreme margin of victory made "Diem's administrative control look more pervasive than is thought to be the case by a number of observers here."

Diem's victory was seen as a blow to French stature in Vietnam, as the former colonial power had helped to set up Bao Dai's State of Vietnam in 1949. They had also consistently opposed Diem and his policies, and had unsuccessfully tried to impede him. The American media regarded Diem's victory as a signal that the United States would be the only Western power in South Vietnam. Some felt that this would enable Diem to rule effectively without French hindrance, while others felt that this would leave too much of a burden on the American government.

The French media and diplomatic corps viewed the result as a humiliation. Before the poll, French officials had privately predicted that Diem would dissolve the French High Command and use a victory as justification for scrapping the national reunification elections. The French media viewed the poll as undemocratic and a plot by the Americans to sabotage any prospect of national reunification, However, France recognised the Republic of Vietnam soon after.

Diem severed economic relations with France and withdrew from the French Union after his victory. Neither the Soviet Union nor communist China overtly objected to Diem's actions in creating a new state in southern half of Vietnam. Nevertheless, by the time of Diem's deposal and assassination in 1963, France bought 46.3% of South Vietnam's exports and accounted for most of the foreign investment in the country.French cultural influences and the language remained prevalent.

In January 1956, with no legislature and constitution in place, Diem used his absolute power to dissolve the Revolutionary Council by launching police raids on the members, forcing those from the Hoa Hao and Cao Dai who had rallied to his side to go on the run. As a result, they turned against him.
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Battle of Saigon (1955)

The Battle for Saigon was a month-long battle between the Vietnamese National Army of the State of Vietnam (later to become the Army of the Republic of Vietnam of the Republic of Vietnam) and the private army of the Binh Xuyen organised crime syndicate. At the time, the Binh Xuyen was licensed with controlling the national police by Emperor Bao Dai, and Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem issued an ultimatum for them to surrender and come under state control. The battle started on April 27, 1955 and the VNA had largely crushed the Binh Xuyen within a week. Fighting was mostly concentrated in the inner city Chinese business district of Cholon. The densely crowded area saw some 500-1000 deaths and up to 20,000 civilians made homeless in the cross-fire. In the end, the Binh Xuyen were decisively defeated, their army disbanded and their vice operations collapsed.


Early skirmishes

On the midnight of 29-30 March, explosions rocked Saigon as the Binh Xuyen responded to Diem's removal of its police chief. 200 Binh Xuyen troops launched an attack on VNA headquarters. The clashes were inconclusive, with the VNA suffering six deaths to their opponents' 10, but by sunrise, the bodies of civilians littered the sidewalk.
[edit] Main battle

The final battle between Diem's VNA and the Binh Xuyen began on April 27 at mid-day. After initial small arms fire and mortar exchanges, the VNA resorted to the heaviest artillery in its arsenal. This coincided with growing calls from within the Eisenhower administration to oust him, who believed that he was unable to subdue the Binh Xuyen and unify the country. By evening, a large part of the inner city was engulfed with street to street fighting. By the morning of April 28, multiple explosions and house to house combat had driven thousands of civilians onto the streets. A square mile of the city, around the densely populated inner city Chinese district of Cholon where the Binh Xuyen had a stronghold, became a free fire zone. Artillery and mortars levelled the poor districts of the city, killing five hundred civilians and leaving twenty thousand homeless. Observers described that fighting from both sides as lacking strategy and relying on brute force attrition tactics. One of the few manoeuvres that were considered tactical was an attempt by the VNA to cut off Binh Xuyen reinforcements by demolishing the bridge across the Saigon-Cholon canal. This was made moot when the Binh Xuyen threw pontoon bridges across the canal. It appeared that the conflict would be determined by the side which was able to absorb the greater number of losses. Approximately 300 combatants were killed in the first day of fighting.

On the morning of April 28, John Foster Dulles, the US Secretary of State phoned J. Lawton Collins to suspend moves aimed at replacing Diem. Eisenhower had determined that these were to be put on hold pending the outcome of the VNA operation. Collins and Dulles clashed in the National Security Council meeting, with Collins vehemently calling for Diem to be removed. Collins continued to argue that the attempt to destroy the Binh Xuyen by force wourld produce a civil war. The NSC endorsed Dulles' position.
[edit] Conclusion

After 48 hours of combat, the VNA began to gain the upper hand. Le Grande Monde, previously Bay Vien's largest gambling establishment, and temporarily serving as a Binh Xuyen citadel, was overrun by Diem's paratroopers after a struggle which caused heavy losses on both sides. The VNA then stormed one of the Binh Xuyen's most heavily fortified strongholds, the Petrus Ky High School in Cholon. By the time Collins had arrived back in South Vietnam on May 2, the battle was almost won. The Binh Xuyen forces were broken and in retreat and their command posts were levelled. Bay Vien's headquarters was battered and his tigers, pythons and crocodiles inside had been killed by mortar attacks and shelling.

Bay Vien escaped to Paris to live out his life on the profits of his criminal ventures, and the VNA pursued the Binh Xuyen remnanats into the Mekong Delta near the Cambodian border.

Jubilant crowds gathered outside Diem's residence shouting "Da Dao Bao Dai" (meaning "Down with Bao Dai").
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Geneva Conference (1954)

The Geneva Conference (April 26 – July 21, 1954) was a conference with "two tasks. The first [was] to try to find a way to unify Vietnam. The second task [was] to discuss the possibility of restoring peace in Indochina.". The USSR, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, and the People's Republic of China were participants throughout the whole conference while different countries concerned with the two questions were also represented during the discussion of their respective questions , which included the countries that sent troops through the UN to the Korean War and the various countries that ended the French Indochina War between France and the Vietminh. The part of the conference on the Korean question ended without adopting any decelerations or proposals. Some participants and analysts blame the U.S. for obstructing movements towards unification. On Indochina, the conference produced a set of documents known as the Geneva Accords. These agreements separated Vietnam into two zones, a northern zone to be governed by the Vietminh, and a southern zone to be governed by the State of Vietnam, then headed by former emperor Bao Dai. A "Conference Final Declaration," issued by the British chairman of the conference, provided that a "general election" be held by July 1956 to create a unified Vietnamese state. Although presented as a consensus view, this document was not accepted by the delegates of either South Vietnam or the United States. In addition, three separate ceasefire accords, covering Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam, were signed at the conference.

Background
Korea

The armistice signed at the end of the Korean War required a political conference within 3 months - a timeline which was not met - "to settle through negotiation the questions of the withdrawal of all foreign forces from Korea, the peaceful settlement of the Korean question, etc."
Indochina
Main article: First Indochina War
Geneva Conference

After the defeat of the Japanese Empire in 1945, the Provisional Government of the French Republic restored colonial rule in French Indochina. Nationalist and communist popular movements in Vietnam led to the First Indochina War in 1946. This colonial war between the French Union's Expeditionary Corps and Ho Chi Minh's Viet Minh guerrillas turned into a Cold War crisis in January 1950.The communist Viet Minh received support from the newly proclaimed People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union, while France and the newly created Vietnamese National Army received support from the United States.

The Battle of Dien Bien Phu started in March 13 and continued during the conference. Its issue became a strategic turnover as both sides wanted to emerge as the victor and forge a favorable position for the planned negotiations about "the Indochinese problem". After fighting for 55 days the besieged French garrison was overrun and all French central positions were captured by the Viet Minh.

This war was significant in that it starkly demonstrated the reality that a western colonial power could be defeated by an indigenous revolutionary force; the French previously pacified a similar uprising in the Madagascar colony in March, 1947. A few months after the fall of Dien Bien Phu, troops were deployed in Algeria and a second guerrilla-warfare-based war of independence started in November 1954. Growing distrust and defiance among the army's Chief of Staff toward the Fourth French Republic after the contested defeat of the First Indochina War led to two military coups d'état in March 1958 and April 1961. Most of the rebel Generals were Indochina veterans including their leader, Raoul Salan.



 On the Korean Question

The South Korean representative proposed that the South Korean government was the only legal government in Korea, that UN-supervised elections should be held in the North, that Chinese forces should withdraw, and that UN forces - a belligerent party to the war - should remain as a police force. The North Korean representative suggested that elections be held throughout all of Korea, that all foreign forces leave beforehand, that the elections be run by an All-Korean Commission that is made-up of equal parts from North and South Korea, and to generally increase relations economically and culturally between the North and the South. The Chinese delegation proposed an amendment to have a group of "neutral nations" supervise the elections, which the North accepted. The U.S. supported the South Korean position and saying that the USSR wanted to turn North Korea into a puppet state. Most allies remained silent and at least one, Britain, thought that the U.S.-South Korean proposal would be deemed unreasonable. The South Korean representative then made a new proposal where there would be all-Korea elections but that they would be held according to South Korean constitutional procedures and still under UN-supervision. June 15th, the last day of the conference on the Korean question, the USSR and China both submitted declarations in support of a unified, democratic, independent Korea, and that negotiations to that end should resume at an appropriate time. The Belgium and the British delegation said that they said that while they weren't going to accept "the Soviet and Chinese proposals, that did not mean a rejection of the ideas they contained." In the end, however, no deceleration was adopted. Some participants and analysts suggest that the U.S. obstructed efforts towards a peace agreement.Korean remains divided to this day.




The Geneva Accords
Students demonstration in Saigon, July 1964, observing the tenth anniversary of the July 1954 Geneva Agreements

On April 27, 1954, the Conference produced a declaration which supported the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Indochina thereby granting its independence from France. In addition, the Conference declaration agreed upon the cessation of hostilities and foreign involvement (or troops) in internal Indochina affairs. Northern and southern zones were drawn into which opposing troops were to withdraw, to facilitate the cessation of hostilities between the Vietnamese forces and those that had supported the French. Viet Minh units, having advanced to the far south while fighting the French, retreated from these positions, in accordance with the Agreement, to north of the ceasefire line, awaiting unification on the basis of internationally supervised free elections to be held in July 1956. Most of the French Union forces evacuated Vietnam, although much of the regional governmental infrastructure in the South was the same as it had been under the French administration. An International Control Commission was set up to oversee the implementation of the Geneva Accords, but it was essentially powerless to ensure compliance. It was to consist of India, Canada, and Poland.

The agreement was among Cambodia, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, France, Laos, the People's Republic of China, the State of Vietnam, the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom. The United States took note and acknowledged that the agreement existed, but refused to sign the agreement, to avoid being legally bound to it.




Geneva Agreements and response

The Geneva Agreements carefully worded the division of northern and southern Vietnam as a "provisional military demarcation line", "on either side of which the forces of the two parties shall be regrouped after their withdrawal". To specifically put aside any notion that it was a partition, they further stated, in the Final Declaration, Article 6: "The Conference recognizes that the essential purpose of the agreement relating to Vietnam is to settle military questions with a view to ending hostilities and that the military demarcation line is provisional and should not in any way be interpreted as constituting a political or territorial boundary"

Then U.S. Under-Secretary of State Walter Bedell Smith said, "In connection with the statement in the Declaration concerning free elections in Vietnam, my government wishes to make clear its position which it has expressed in a Declaration made in Washington on June 29th, 1954, as follows: 'In the case of nations now divided against their will, we shall continue to seek unity through free elections, supervised by the United Nations to ensure they are conducted fairly'"
[edit] Post declaration events
Main articles: Operation Passage to Freedom and 1955 State of Vietnam referendum
Anticommunist Vietnamese refugees moving from a French LSM landing ship to the USS Montague during Operation Passage to Freedom in August 1954

Communist forces had been instrumental in the defeat of the French; the ideology of communism and nationalism were linked. Many viewed the South Vietnamese leadership as a French colonial and later an American puppet regime. Ho Chi Minh's Democratic Republic of Vietnam looked forward to being fairly comfortably elected in the elections.

After the cessation of hostilities, a large migration took place. 450,000 North Vietnamese, mostly Catholic, moved to south of the Accords-mandated ceasefire line during Operation Passage to Freedom. The CIA attempted to further influence Catholic Vietnamese with slogans such as 'the Virgin Mary is moving South'. At the same time, 52,000 people from the south went north. Communist supporters were urged to remain in the south to vote in the coming elections.

The U.S. replaced the French as a political backup for Ngo Dinh Diem, then Prime Minister of the State of Vietnam and he asserted his power in the south. A referendum rigged by his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu saw Diem gain 98% of the vote, with 133% in Saigon. American advisors had suggested that he win by a lesser margin since it was felt that he would be able to win any fair poll against Emperor Bao Dai. Diem refused to hold the national elections, noting that the State of Vietnam never signed the Geneva Accords and went about attempting to crush communist opposition. The prospect of democratic elections dwindling led South Vietnamese who opposed Diem to form the National Liberation Front[citation needed] better known as the Vietcong, which engaged in guerrilla attacks against the RVN government and desired the reunification of Vietnam under Communist rule. The Việt Cộng were supported by the Vietnam People's Army (VPA) of the North.

Both sides violated provisions of the Accords, with both regimes engaging in military buildups contrary to them. Guerrilla activity in the South escalated, while U.S. military advisors continued to support the Army of the Republic of Vietnam, which was created as a replacement for the Vietnamese National Army. The result was the Second Indochina War, more commonly known as the Vietnam War.



Sino-British relations

The British and Communist Chinese delegations reached agreement on the sidelines of the Conference to upgrade their diplomatic relations.
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Etymology of the Vietnam War

Various names have been applied what is known as the Vietnam War. These have shifted over time, although Vietnam War is the most commonly used title in English. It has been variously called the Second Indochina War, the Vietnam Conflict, the Vietnam War, and, in Vietnamese, Chiến tranh Việt Nam (The Vietnam War) or Kháng chiến chống Mỹ (Resistance War against America).

Second Indochina War

The name "Second Indochina War" places the conflict into context with other distinct, but related, and contiguous conflicts in Southeast Asia. Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia are seen as the battlegrounds of a larger Indochinese conflict that began at the end of World War II and lasted until communist victory in 1975. This conflict can be viewed in terms of the demise of colonialism and its after-effects during the Cold War.



Vietnam Conflict

The term "Vietnam Conflict" is largely a U.S. designation, it acknowledges that the United States Congress never declared war on North Vietnam. Legally, the President used his constitutional discretion—supplemented by supportive resolutions in Congress—to conduct what was said to be a “police action”.



Vietnam War

"Vietnam War" is the most commonly used designation in English and is growing increasingly common in Vietnam, where it generally known as “Chiến tranh Việt Nam” ("Vietnam War").


Resistance War against the American Empire to Save the Nation (Chiến tranh giữ nước chống Đế quốc Mỹ)

"Resistance War against the American Empire to Save the Nation" is the term favored by North Vietnam; it is more of a saying than a name, and its meaning is self-evident. Its usage has been reduced in recent years. The common name for the war is “Chiến tranh Việt Nam” ("Vietnam War").

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