751G.00/6–2954: Telegram
The Chargé at Saigon (McClintock) to the Department of State
priority
2932. Repeated information Paris 1041, Geneva 271, Hanoi 559. I called today on Prime Minister designate Ngo Dinh Diem. He received me with his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu, who quite evidently serves as an informal co-Prime Minister. Both brothers were in deep despair at decision of French military to persist in evacuation of Phat Diem and Bui Chu provinces in Tonkin and by their lively fear that French are actually in process of negotiating a capitulatory peace with the Viet Minh.
[Page 1763]Diem said that he had urgently requested General Salan to refrain from evacuating Bui Chu and Phat Diem, at least until Vietnamese Government could be formed and the military situation could be in some wise redressed. However, Salan had this morning told Diem that he had received explicit instructions from Paris to continue evacuation.
Diem asked if US could lend diplomatic support to Vietnam in bringing pressure to bear on French Government to reverse this policy. Both brothers seemed not to expect armed intervention from US or anything more than diplomatic support at this time. In fact, their feeling of being abandoned is concerned solely with the French who they feel are dropping Vietnam in a cold-blooded manner.
I said that I could not promise that my government would undertake the representations they requested but that I would immediately transmit their request for the urgent consideration of my government.
Diem and his brother then discussed possibility of a mass evacuation of population from Tonkin in event French should sign an arrangement which in effect would leave Tonkin in Viet Minh hands. They said that rapid action would be imperative as Viet Minh would be able very quickly to scatter population and thus principal manpower resource of Vietnam would be irretrievably lost to Communists. I said I had already alerted Department (cf. Embassy telegrams 28071 and 2873)2 on possibility that evacuation of Tonkin inhabitants might be judged necessary and that requests for aid in this connection could be expected to be forthcoming. I was careful to add, however, that I had not received any indication of what Washington thought or possibility of US aid in this regard.
Diem and his brother said most emphatically that they would not form a government unless they were certain French would refrain from giving up Tonkin. They had no intention as loyal Vietnamese nationalists to come into office merely to sign a capitulatory peace.
Diem said he thought it practically certain that Bao Dai would not return to Vietnam. If, as he seems to fear, French do sign a ceasefire and armistice, which would involve partition, and thus he backs out of forming a government, we should probably have an even more disintegrating situation to confront us in that Vietnam will have neither a ruler nor a responsible government at time when it needs both badly.
Although I gave Diem no encouragement to think that US would lend Vietnam diplomatic support vis-à-vis French Government, he will most certainly expect some indication of our position and will ask to see me on his return from Hanoi and Hue Friday.3
[Page 1764]If Department has any views which could be conveyed to Diem at that time either on requested representation or on possibility of US aid in mass evacuation from Tonkin, prompt instructions would be appreciated.