Conference files, lot 60 D 627, CF 331
Memorandum of a Meeting Between Ambassador Donald R. Heath and the Chief of State of Vietnam (Bao Dai) at Cannes, France, June 28, 19541
The following is an account of my conversation with Bao Dai at Cannes, the evening of June 28. My schedule was so rushed in Paris, I did not have the time to report it telegraphically from there.
Bao Dai was a rather craven spectacle. There was no question of “fighting to the end” against the Viet Minh as Bao Dai assured me two months ago he and “his army” were prepared to do. He probably is an ill man now, and at my hotel in Cannes I found a letter from his physician urging me to urge Bao Dai to take six weeks of complete rest, including a cure at Vittel. Whether ill or not, there is no question but that he personally has “capitulated” unless we intervene militarily to pull his chestnuts out of the fire.
After deploring the sudden turn for the worse his health had taken, and the necessity of a “rest” and a “cure”, he asked me what I thought would be the result of the Geneva Conference. I told him I thought the Viet Minh were expecting a partition of the country, with their getting the country north of Dong Hoi except for an enclave around Haiphong and possible special “protective measures” for the bishoprics of Buy Chu and Phat Diem. Bao Dai said that his information was that the Viet Minh would not ask for partition, but would instead insist on coalition arrangements between the two regimes. They might even accept him, nominally, as Chief of State but would ask for key ministries, such as that of the Interior. He had understood that some such sort of an arrangement, with nationwide elections to be held within a year after cease-fire, had been proposed by Chou En Lai and accepted by Mendes-France at Bern. Bao Dai then said if such a request were made with assurances of safe withdrawal of the French Expeditionary Corps, how could France refuse it—how could America refuse it? The southern Vietnamese would accept it, first because they knew little about Communism and secondly because they would rather have “peace” than fight. The Vietnamese National Army, which a few weeks ago Bao Dai had praised, now was described by the latter as completely unsure. The Viet Minh were already organized in Saigon, he said, and could stage an uprising, peaceful or violent, at any moment.
I said it was possible that the Viet Minh might propose a coalition government—that was one of the cheapest and surest Communist tricks,—witness Czechoslovakia and Poland. I asked Bao Dai whether [Page 1760] he thought it was conceivable that Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem might arouse a national spirit of resistance. Bao Dai said, cynically, he had really never understood why Ngo Dinh Diem had accepted to head the government. He had asked Diem what would be his policy, negotiate with the Viet Minh? Diem had replied he would not negotiate with the Viet Minh and he would count on the aid of America. Bao Dai then allowed that if America were ready to intervene militarily that the Viet Minh would back down since they were “dreadfully afraid” of American participation. With American intervention, the National Army could be strengthened decisively to defeat the Viet Minh.
But, Bao Dai said, it was useless to speculate what might happen since Mendes-France had already made up his mind to “drop” Viet-Nam, and there was nothing he or anyone else could do to prevent it. I answered that, while I was without instructions from my government and that I would neither urge him to oppose Mendes-France’s views or accept them, Viet-Nam was a sovereign nation and its attitude certainly had to be taken into account by Mendes-France. The latter had said that he would not sign a “capitulation” to the Viet Minh, and I felt that he would not make a firm agreement with the Viet Minh without consulting the Vietnamese and American governments.
He again raised the question of American military intervention, to which I avoided replying directly, but quoted to him a remark made by the Secretary to Dinh, former Vietnamese Foreign Minister, during the early days of the Geneva Conference, to the effect that if a country were really determined to resist attack against its integrity that it would find friends and allies, but if no such determination were present no support would be forthcoming. Bao Dai shrugged that off.
Although he had already told me that he would have to remain in France to take a cure at Vittel, I asked him again whether he was not considering returning to Viet-Nam, and whether such action on his part would not have a strengthening effect on Vietnamese public opinion. He shrugged that off too.
I, accordingly, took leave of him and made no reference to seeing him again. Throughout the conversation Bao Dai was ill at ease, as indeed he should have been. It was more than clear that he has no intention of doing anything so risky as returning to Viet-Nam under present conditions and that he would accept with only pro forma remonstrance, if that, any deal Mendes-France might make with Viet Minh. Thanks to the complicity of the French exchange control he has gotten a very sizeable fortune outside of Viet-Nam.
The following day in Paris I saw Ngo Dinh Luyen, who is functioning as “Ambassador at large”, of his brother, the new Vietnamese Prime Minister Designate. Luyen confirmed to me that Bao Dai would [Page 1761] not return to Viet-Nam unless American intervention occurred and made it safe for him to do so. Luyen, in fact, did not want Bao Dai to return at this time, since his return would be accompanied by intrigue and complicate a difficult, and if indeed not impossible, task of trying to awaken the spirit of national unity and resistance. Luyen said that the Cao Daist and Hoa Hao sects, General Hinh, Chief of Staff of the Viet-Nam National Army, and the Vietnamese Security Police were all against his brother’s efforts to form a government of national unity, and the French would give him no support. Nevertheless, he thought his brother, because of his spirit and courage, would somehow succeed, particularly if he could be given at least “moral support” of America at this time. He asked if it were not possible for the American government to make some public declaration of support of his brother. I told him I would discuss the matter in Washington.
- Drafted by Ambassador Heath in Washington on June 30.↩