Nationalist Response

Nationalist resistance has a long tradition in Vietnam, especially between the 1st and 10th centuries

Peasant world was able to survive mostly intact from the Chinese occupation - retained much
autonomy

The peasant world was massively disrupted by the French occupation who penetrate the village
for taxes and political control and western education

French undermine the traditional village notables and attack village traditions

From 1862-1900 most resistance was decentralized and largely ineffective; it was also ruthlessly
suppressed by the French

After 1900, resistance shifts to mandarin-intellectuals who look to Japan and China for inspiration:

Phan Boi Chau - operated in China, arrested from 1925 until his death in 1940
Phan Chau Trinh - advocate of democracy; arrested from 1908-1925; death in 1926 sparks
demonstrations

The mandarin-intellectuals wanted a constitutional monarchy and sought change through education of a
new Vietnamese elite; their influence ends by 1916 when restoration of the monarchy dies as a form of
resistance.

The combination of Vietnamese young being educated in China after 1911 and the 100,000 Vietnamese who participated in World War I in France radicalizes the nationalist resistance

Some nationalists, including Ho Chi Minh, were initially inspired by the rhetoric of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, who talked generally about the idea of self-determination

When these hopes proved unfounded, many turned away from Western liberalism to Russian communism.

Drawing Vietnamese to communism were:

1) the rigid French determination to hold Vietnam and ruthless repression of all nationalist sentiments
2) the rhetoric of communism which condemned imperialism
3) the revolutionary activity in China by the communists in the 1920s and 1930s

The Viet Nam Quoc Dan Dang (VNQDD) or Vietnamese Nationalist Party founded in Hanoi 1927

VNQDD was non-communist and modeled after the Kuomintang (KMT) in China and
contained many urban middle class radicals ready to use terrorism against the French
VNQDD launched a general uprising in 1930 based in Vietnamese troops in the French army in
Vietnam: the Yen Bay Revolt
The French quickly suppress the uprising and destroy the VNQDD

The Communists and Ho Chi Minh

Ho was born in 1890 to a low mandarin scholar revolutionary family
Leaves Vietnam in 1913
Attempts to petition the Versailles Peace Conference for Vietnamese self-determination
Drawn into the French Communist Party and is sent to Russia in 1923
Between 1924-1927 Ho trains Vietnamese revolutionaries in Canton
In 1930 in Hong Kong, Ho helps to found the Indochina Communist Party (1,500 members plus approximately 100,000 peasants organized in Vietnam)
In 1930, along with the VNQDD, the communists organized a revolt which was also suppressed by
the French
In 1931, Ho was arrested by the British in Hong Kong; he disappears from sight from 1933 - 1941

The ruthlessness of French retaliation for the revolts led to increased support for independence in
Vietnam, made for more converts to radicalism, and even led to protests in France. In 1936, the French
Popular Front government recognized the Vietnamese communists and released them from jail.