Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, Indochina, Volume XIII, Part 1

711.5851G/12–853

Memorandum by the Director of the Office of Philippine and Southeast Asian Affairs (Bonsal) to the Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs (Robertson)¹

top secret

[Washington,] December 8, 1953.

Subject:

• General O’Daniel’s visit to Indochina, November 6–15, 1953.²

General O’Daniel’s mission was in Indochina from Friday afternoon, November 6, to Sunday morning, November 15. Of these nine days, three were spent in the Hanoi area and one each in Laos and Cambodia. A full account of the trip from the military point of view is contained in the mission’s report, prepared in Honolulu from November 17 to November 20. A copy of this document is attached with the original of this memorandum.³ It is recommended that you read General O’Daniel’s summary of his findings and recommendations.

Although I was with General O’Daniel most of the time, I had several long talks with Ambassador Heath with whom I stayed. I saw Bao Dai, Prime Minister Tam and his Foreign and Defense Ministers on the Vietnamese side as well as, on the French side, in addition to the military, Commissioner General Dejean, Raymond Offroy, his deputy, and other French officials in Saigon, Hanoi, Phnom Penh and Vientiane.

The purpose of this memorandum is to set down briefly my impressions and thoughts regarding current conditions and prospects in Indochina.

Background

It would be difficult to exaggerate what General Navarre has accomplished in the less than six months since he took command last May of an army whose reserves were practically exhausted and whose confidence in itself and its leaders was at a low ebb. The Viet Minh had seized and held the initiative throughout the campaign of 1952–1953. French successes had been defensive (defense of Nasan and of the major towns of Laos). And the achievement even of these results had practically exhausted all mobile reserves. The prospect for this campaign season appeared to be one in which the enemy, with his increased offensive potential, would be able to attack the widespread French Union forces at a point or points of his own choosing with the confidence that the ability of the French High Command to reinforce threatened points would soon be exhausted.

This difficult military situation was complicated by a growing weakness in the political support of the struggle in France. Pierre Mendes France failed of investiture as Prime Minister of France by only 13 votes out of a required total of 313 on a platform promising a cessation of the war in Indochina. The extravagances of the King of Cambodia had served to highlight the unsatisfactory nature of the relations between France and the Associated States and the necessity for clarifying the French Union concept in a manner to generate much needed increased support of the war effort by the peoples of the Associated States without detracting from the necessary support of that effort in France.

On the occasion of General O’Daniel’s visit to Indochina in late June and early July of this year, General Navarre developed his general concept of how to fight the war. That concept was adopted with only minor modifications by the French Government in July and August and, in August and September, the United States Government reached agreement with the French Government for increased support by us of the French effort in Indochina to be based upon the Navarre concept.

On July 3rd, the French Government made a declaration designed to improve political relations with the Associated States by inviting the latter to negotiate with France on a basis of sovereign equality within the French Union so as to “perfect” their independence.

General Navarre’s Achievements

The major achievements of General Navarre since last summer may be stated as follows:

(1) The development of a new offensive spirit which permeates the French military establishment in Indochina.

(2) The constitution of a mobile reserve or battle corps consisting at the present time of 13 Groupes Mobiles (a Group Mobile is an infantry regiment plus an artillery battalion) and other elements including an airborne force of division strength. There were only six such Groupes Mobiles last summer and they were, at that time, mostly tied down to specific defensive tasks. The number of Groupes Mobiles will be raised to twenty next summer. (This, incidentally, is the force which General Navarre’s predecessor, General Salan, estimated he would need in order to come to grips effectively with the enemy regular forces.)

(3) The arrival in Indochina of the equivalent of three additional regiments from France. The decision to send such troops represents a great, and to many, an unexpected, personal triumph for General Navarre.

(4) In terms of actual operations, the French High Command took the initiative with the spectacular and successful parachute raid on Langson in July. Although the enemy has a high offensive potential and although it was generally believed at the outset of the present fighting season that he intended to use it, he has not as yet done so. To some extent this is due to various limited offensives conducted as a part of General Navarre’s strategic plan for this fighting season in the North. The most important of these operations (known as Mouette and conducted between October 15 and November 3) is believed by General Navarre to have cost the enemy in killed and wounded and in material losses about one-third of the effectives of one of his regular divisions (320). Operations conducted by French Union troops and local irregulars in the Thai country northwest of the Tonkin delta have obliged the enemy to divert to that area the equivalent of perhaps one-half of another division (316). The recent capture of the relatively important town of Dien Bien Phu with its airstrip is a part of this pattern. Other operations are in prospect. As a result of those already conducted, the offensive possibilities open to the enemy have been reduced and furthermore the ratio between the strength of the Franco-Vietnamese mobile forces and of the enemy’s regular units has moved in favor of General Navarre who is of course also adding daily to his battle corps while that of the enemy is not being increased, quantitatively at least (see below for a discussion of enemy possibilities and intentions).

These developments should be viewed within the framework of General Navarre’s over-all strategic concept. Stated very briefly, that concept involves two offensives, one in the South and the other in South Central Viet Nam, to begin in January, 1954 and to make it possible to concentrate all available mobile forces in North Annam and in Tonkin for the final campaign to be initiated in October 1954. The two offensives planned for this year will be of unequal importance and duration. The first is designed to clear the equivalent of perhaps half a dozen regular enemy battalions and supporting regional and people’s troops from the tip of South Viet Nam and thus to break the back of organized enemy resistance in this whole area. A single operation in considerable force is contemplated. The second operation involves clearing the enemy’s 15 or 16 regular battalions with supporting regional and people’s troops from the area of South Central Annam from Cape Varella to the vicinity of Tourane, a distance of some 200 miles. A campaign lasting from January to August, 1954, is involved. It will include a number of amphibious landings in conjunction with the use of troops from the mountain areas in order to surround the enemy and bring him to battle.

As a result of these two offensives, General Navarre hopes that the entire country up to about the 19th parallel will have been cleared of regular enemy opposition and that the final, decisive campaign can be undertaken when the rains cease in the north in October 1954. At that time, enemy strength will be concentrated in North Annam (Than Hoa, Vinh and Ha Tinh) and in and around the Delta. It is General Navarre’s expectation that he will then be in a position permanently to occupy areas which the enemy will either have to fight for under conditions unfavorable to him or abandon and retire to areas where he can no longer maintain himself as an organized force.

Enemy Capabilities and Intentions

The question of the effect upon the enemy’s morale and intentions of recent developments is both highly important and shrouded in mystery. There is an absence of hard information on the subject. Enemy propaganda shows no decrease in agressiveness or in confidence of ultimate victory. Yet certainly the transformation of French military thinking, the assumption of the initiative by the French High Command, the great increase in United States support for the Franco-Vietnamese war effort, the decreased probability of overt Chinese Communist support owing to the firm stand taken by the United States in Korea and in recent utterances by the President and the Secretary—all these developments must have had some impact on the Viet Minh thinking as to its plans and prospects. True, these developments have been in part counterbalanced by increasing evidence that the French people will not indefinitely support the war effort and by indications to be discussed below of the weakness of Vietnamese support for that effort.

In appraising enemy intentions, there would seem to be two main possible courses limiting the field of action within which he must make his decisions. The first would be to take the offensive energetically and to take maximum advantage of his still considerable offensive potential before General Navarre’s build-up of forces reduces his possibilities. It is interesting to note that there has been, according to French intelligence, no important increase in enemy trained manpower in the last two years although, of course, his armament has been steadily improved. His possibilities are therefore decreasing in relation to those of the Franco-Vietnamese forces and it would presumably be to his advantage to take the offensive sooner rather than later if he ever intends to do so. It should be noted that it is General O’Daniel’s opinion, as expressed in his report, that any all-out offensive at this time against the Delta would be disastrous for the enemy. Generals Navarre and Cogny expect, however, that the enemy will conduct offensive operations.

The second possibility from the enemy’s point of view would seem to be one of evading contact with the Franco-Vietnamese regular forces except under exceptionally favorable conditions and of frustrating by delaying tactics and merely partial engagements General Navarre’s endeavors to come to grips with them. The rationale for such a strategy would seem to be the thought that time is on the side of the Viet Minh, that political stamina in France and in Viet Nam in favor of pursuing the struggle is limited, that scepticism as to the possibility of forcing an end to the struggle is growing, and that the United States in the absence of concrete results may well be inclined to reconsider its present policy of massive material and financial assistance, especially in view of the amount of news coming out of Washington regarding great economies to be effected in U.S. foreign military and economic assistance programs.

Neither of the courses described is probably feasible in its entirety. The enemy cannot mount, in the opinion of General O’Daniel, a decisive offensive in the Delta. Nor will it be possible for him entirely to evade the attacks of General Navarre’s growing battle corps unless he wishes to throw in the sponge. And there are no signs of such a desire.

In determining what the enemy is apt to do, there are two other factors which might be considered. In the first place, there is every evidence that Chinese Communist assistance to the Viet Minh is stable at a level indicating a definite intention on the part of Peking to continue its engagement in the struggle. Until fairly recently, that assistance consisted of a number of critical items of weapons and ammunition. It has now been broadened to include a large number of basic and even luxury items for the Viet Minh army. The deduction of the French intelligence people is that this indicates a decision to establish and develop the Viet Minh army as a modern, stable force.

In the second place, there is the perhaps significant fact that the enemy of recent months has made a minimum use of his possibilities for terrorism and sabotage particularly in Hanoi and Saigon. There is a belief among some French officials—I believe that General Navarre shares it to a certain extent—that the Viet Minh may well be preparing some sort of very widespread action in areas where a considerable degree of peace and security has recently prevailed. Such action would involve an intensification of guerrilla tactics coupled with widespread terroristic attacks on a given day on French citizens and on Vietnamese personalities who have worked for Franco-Vietnamese cooperation.

We may therefore look for the enemy to evade offensive action in force by General Navarre to the extent possible (his success or lack of it here is perhaps the key to the current effort) to seize upon any weak points for attacks by his regular forces, to create opportunities for such attacks by infiltration and by creating a maximum of guerrilla and other disturbances. The strategy resulting from this combination of tactics would seem to be designed especially for the Tonkin area where it might be particularly effective and in fact disrupt General Navarre’s current time-table described above. General Navarre has told General Cogny that the delta must be held this campaign season with the forces already there, that Cogny is to request no reinforcements. If the enemy can cause this policy to be reversed and make it necessary, as was the case last year for mobile troops from other areas to be sent into the area, to permit the Franco-Vietnamese troops to hold their position there, the effect would be to delay General Navarre’s planned offensives in the South and Center.

The Training, Morale and Command Control of the Vietnamese Army

The purpose of the above discussion is to underline General Navarre’s problems in the military field. He is also confronted with a serious problem in what might be termed the politico-military field. It relates to the training, the morale and the command control of the Vietnamese army.

In order to understand the problem, it must be remembered that there are currently about 428,000 Vietnamese soldiers fighting on our side. Of these perhaps 200,000 are in the Vietnamese regular army, 50,000 are Vietnamese army suppletifs, or special contract soldiers, 78,000 belong to local militia and police forces and 100,000 are in the French regular army (50,000 regulars and 50,000 suppletifs). The Vietnamese army is being trained by the French army which has devoted 900 officers and 4500 noncommissioned officers to the purpose in various ways, i.e., some of these French officers and noncommissioned officers are operating training schools while others are leading Vietnamese units.

Leadership in the Vietnamese army is the major problem. The main source of such leadership is the group of Vietnamese officers, noncommissioned officers and soldiers who have had careers in the regular French military establishment. These people are primarily professional soldiers. Many of them have been projected into positions much higher than those for which their previous experience qualifies them. They are perhaps abnormally inclined to vanity, pretentiousness, and personal rivalries. They are on the whole good fighters and they recognize the opportunity for glory and advancement which the present war offers them. But they are not inspired with the patriotic spirit and the spirit of sacrifice which produces General Washingtons or Syngman Rhees.

We must reconcile ourselves to the fact that the French professional army in Viet Nam is creating, in its own image so far as professional qualities are concerned, a strictly professional armed force. It is a force which has already produced some excellent regular army units up to the level of regimental combat teams. More such units will be produced. In fact, General Navarre estimates by the middle of 1955 half of his battle corps will consist of Vietnamese army mobile groups and that they will be organized on a divisional basis. But the brunt of the offensive fighting against the enemy will, for the immediate future, be borne by the French expeditionary corps. The major role of the Vietnamese will be in what the French call “Guerre en Surface”. That is a most important role since upon it depend the security and the morale of the inhabitants on our side and the safeguarding of communications and vital installations of all kinds.

Last February, the Franco-Vietnamese Defense Council took some resolutions which we heartily approved at the time. In accordance with those resolutions the autonomy of the Vietnamese army so far as administration, supply and training were concerned were greatly broadened. Similarly, it was stated that the French would turn over to the Vietnamese military authorities areas which those authorities believed could be controlled and safeguarded by the Vietnamese army. In fact a number of such areas were turned over in the South. In them the Vietnamese army has full operational control.

Last August, the French Military Command cleared the Province of Bui-chu in the Tonkin Delta of Viet Minh elements (Operation Tarentaise). This province was surrounded by areas in which the Viet Minh regular forces were strongly infiltrated and where they moved about with a certain amount of freedom. Nevertheless, General Hinh requested that Bui-chu be turned over to him. In spite of the misgivings of General Cogny and of the Vietnamese Governor of North Vietnam this was done. General Hinh took over the area with 13 of the new light battalions, some of which had had less than two months unit training and some of which were composed of former prisoners of war captured from the enemy. (It is also rumored that some of these troops were rather roughly conscripted.) The enemy promptly took advantage of this situation. He inflicted two or three catastrophic defeats upon these light battalions, captured a great deal of equipment and apparently induced about one-half of one of the battalions to desert to him.

As a result, and with the consent of General Hinh, General Cogny again took over the operational command of the area and the situation is generally under control although a further clearing operation, a repetition of the one which took place as recently as last August, will eventually have to be envisaged. This repetition of the labor and losses inherent in clearing operations is particularly galling to the French officers responsible for the area.

General Navarre has decided in view of the Bui-chu experience and of the general situation as it affects the training of Vietnamese units, that the steps which were taken last February must be modified. He is seeking agreement to do this at the next meeting of the Franco-Vietnamese Defense Committee. He has secured the agreement of Bao Dai and Tam and Defense Minister Quat as well as of General Hinh and the matter will undoubtedly go through in a generally face-saving manner. The result will be to restore unity of operational command and to give General Navarre more control over the training and administration of the Vietnamese army.

On the one hand it is satisfying to report that this adjustment is about to be achieved without any particular difficulty. On the other hand that absence of difficulty illustrates also the absence of a strong political sentiment on the Vietnamese side. Neither the Vietnamese army, nor the Vietnamese Government, nor the Franco-Vietnamese cause in the fight against the Viet Minh inspire anywhere near an ideal degree of popular support.

Political Conditions

In the political field there is little progress to report since the first visit of the O’Daniel mission, at least so far as support for the war effort is concerned. There has been no marked increase in that support as a result of the French Government’s declaration of July 3rd inviting the Vietnamese Government (and the Governments of Cambodia and Laos) to write their own tickets in the matter of their relations with France. The negotiations between France and Viet Nam have not yet started although five months have elapsed since the declaration. The only major development has been the resolution of the Vietnamese National Congress against adherence to the French Union “in its present form”—a resolution which lowered the already precariously low level of French public and parliamentary support for the war effort in Indochina. Conversely, the violent French reaction to what many Vietnamese political leaders regarded as a minimum statement of their position, while it may have produced an increased awareness of the realities involved in the pursuit of the current struggle, hardly stimulated Vietnamese enthusiasm or confidence. President Auriol’s statement at the time of the meeting of the High Council of the French Union regarding the basic equality of the members of the Union has been helpful.

We must face the fact that Vietnamese public support for the Vietnamese Government and for the war effort continues far below what would be desirable in spite of the fact that over 400,000 Vietnamese are bearing arms on the Franco-Vietnamese side in the struggle. Such support might be somewhat increased if Bao Dai reorganizes and strengthens his Government, replacing the able, hard-hitting but French identified Tam with a man of undoubted nationalist complexion and background such as Tri or Quat. Such a change now appears imminent. Favorable developments in Franco-Vietnamese relations might help to a moderate extent in the same direction. But short of real military progress, I can see no way in which political support—a factor which would be admittedly most useful in the winning of the war—can be anticipated or produced.

The impact of world developments on thinking in Viet Nam must not be overlooked. When we point to the fact that in the past 15 years Communism has enslaved some six hundred million people, the effect is undoubtedly in the case of most Americans to produce a determination to halt the advance of Communism and to support policies that give promise of doing so. In the case of a Vietnamese, however, surveying the prospects for his wartorn country of 24 million inhabitants, bordering on a new aggressive Communist China, the effect of recent Communist progress is to restrain him from engaging himself wholeheartedly on the side of the free world. Fence-sitting becomes an attractive posture coupled with a doctrinaire advocacy of complete theoretical independence. It is only when victory for our side and a definite check to Communist expansion appear clear probabilities that these people can be expected to abandon their present unsatisfactory position.

It should also be stated at this point that thinking of the war in terms of the East-West ideological struggle, in spite of the propaganda efforts of both sides, is not widespread outside of small intellectual circles. But doubt as to the outcome of the war which all can see and feel does exercise a widespread influence on the thinking of very considerable elements of the population and produces a real reluctance to become identified with our side among people whose support would be most valuable.

The armistice in Korea has also had an unsettling effect on the minds and will of our friends in Viet Nam as well as in France. It is argued that if the United States, the leader of the free world can stop short of complete victory and through a process of concession and compromise secure an end to hostilities in Korea, why should not the French and the Vietnamese do likewise, without any sort of moral blame, in order to terminate an exhausting struggle now in its eighth year. The thought that the United States negotiated from a position of considerably greater strength than that which the Franco-Vietnamese have as yet achieved since the United Nations troops in fact had forced the enemy back beyond his original point of departure, is not taken into account by those who look to compromise with Ho as a way out. Nor does the impossibility of defining the terms of any honorable or even secure compromise under present conditions prevent this sort of wishful thinking.

Conclusions

My conclusions may be very briefly summarized as follows:

(1) The carrying out of the Navarre concept affords a probability of Franco-Vietnamese military victory over the organized enemy forces. We must therefore continue and if possible intensify our support of the Franco-Vietnamese military effort.

(2) Political support of the war effort in France and Viet Nam is below a safe or desirable level. Such support will rise as the military situation improves. We must convince the French leaders that their choice is between (a) the dishonorable abandonment of a seven-year military effort with certain adverse reactions on the whole French position in North Africa and in Western Europe or (b) holding on for a few more months at which time the honorable disengagement of a large part of France’s present commitment from Indochina is almost certain, provided the Navarre concept is successfully carried out.

(3) There is no possibility of devising satisfactory conditions for a cease fire or for negotiations until and unless the military potential of the organized enemy forces is radically reduced. A cease fire today would mean sooner or later—probably sooner—a Communist takeover of the entire area.

(4) If the French decide to pull out, a situation will probably not exist in which we can replace them. Vietnamese public opinion as a whole would not in my judgment support enthusiastically the taking up by the United States of the fight abandoned by the French against their fellow Vietnamese however Communist they may be.⁴ We would have no more support than the French have had and would presumably have to rely on the same elements. Furthermore, the probability is that, if it becomes apparent either that the French are about to abandon the struggle or that the prospect continues to be one of a military stalemate, a political situation will develop in Viet Nam as a result of which the people of that country will achieve a pseudoneutralist solution of the present conflict. Such a solution would not permit an American intervention. (The question of the support of the United States public opinion for such an intervention is obviously beyond my competence; it is a most important factor.)

(5) No workable alternative to the success of the present Franco-Vietnamese effort which would obtain what we want in Indochina, i.e., the preservation of the area for the free world, appears in sight. Therefore, while we are justified in studying the situation which would exist if the present effort fails, we should concentrate our time and energies upon seeing to what extent we can improve, intensify, speed up and if necessary expand our present support of the Franco-Vietnamese effort.

1. The following handwritten notation by Everett F. Drumright, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs, appears at the top of the source text: “Seen by WSR [Robertson] on 12–12–53. A very well put memo.”
2. For the major findings of the O’Daniel Mission, see telegram from General O’Daniel to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Nov. 19, p. 879.
3. See footnote 2, ibid.
4. The following marginal notation by Drumright appears at this point on the source text: “But we might have to take the gamble.”