History to 1949

From 110 BC to 938 AD (with the exception of brief periods), much of present-day Vietnam was part of China. After gaining independence, Vietnam went through a long period of resisting outside aggression. In 1789, one of the most celebrated feats of arms in Vietnamese history occurred, when Quang Trung launched a surprise attack against the Chinese garrison of Hanoi during the Tet celebrations. By 1802, centuries of internal feuding between the Trinh and Nguyen lords ended when Emperor Gia Long unified what is now modern Vietnam under the Nguyen dynasty. The French gained control of Indochina (French Indochina included Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam) during a series of colonial wars, from 1859 to 1885. At the Versailles Conference in 1919, Hồ Chí Minh (a pseudonym meaning the Enlightener) requested that a Vietnamese delegation be present to work toward independence for Vietnam. He hoped that U.S. President Woodrow Wilson would support the effort. But he was sorely disappointed and Indochina's status remained unchanged.

During the Second World War, the puppet government of Vichy France cooperated with Imperial Japanese forces. Vietnam was under de facto Japanese control, although the French continued to serve as the day to day administrators.

In 1941, the Communist-dominated national resistance group called the "League for the Independence of Vietnam" (better known as the Viet Minh) was formed. Ho Chi Minh returned to Vietnam and quickly assumed the leadership. He had been a Comintern agent since the 1920s, but as the leader of an independent Vietnamese communist party, Ho freed himself from Moscow's control. He maintained good relations with the Soviets, however. The Viet Minh began to craft a strategy to seize control of the country at the end of the war. Ho appointed Vo Nguyen Giap as his military commander.

Ho Chi Minh's guerrillas were given funding and training by the United States Office of Strategic Services (the precursor of the Central Intelligence Agency). These teams worked behind enemy lines in Indochina, giving support to indigenous resistance groups. The Viet Minh provided valuable intelligence on Japanese troop movements and rescued downed American pilots. The Pentagon, however, viewed Indochina as a sideshow to the more important theatre of the Pacific. In 1944, the Japanese overthrew the Vichy French administration and humiliated its colonial officials in front of the Vietnamese population. The Japanese began to encourage nationalism and granted Vietnam nominal independence. On March 11, 1945, Emperor Bao Dai declared the independence within the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.

Following the Japanese surrender, Vietnamese nationalists, communists, and other groups hoped to take control of the country. The Japanese army transferred power to the Viet Minh. Emperor Bao Dai abdicated. On 2 September 1945, Hồ Chí Minh declared independence from France, in what became known as the August Revolution. U.S. Army officers stood beside him on the podium. In an exultant speech, before a huge audience in Hanoi, Ho cited the U.S. Declaration of Independence. Hồ hoped that America would ally itself with a Vietnamese nationalist movement, communist or otherwise. He based this hope in part on speeches by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt opposing a revival of European colonialism. As well, he was counting on a long series of anti-colonial U.S. pronouncements, stretching back to the American War of Independence. Indeed, Ho Chi Minh told an OSS officer that he would welcome "a million American soldiers … but no French." Power politics, however, intervened. The U.S. changed its position. It was recognized that France would play a crucial role in deterring communist ambitions in continental Europe. Thus, its colonial aspirations could not be ignored.

The new government only lasted a few days. At the Potsdam Conference the allies decided that Vietnam would be occupied jointly by China and Britain, who would supervise the disarmament and repatriation of Japanese forces. The Chinese army arrived a few days after Hồ's declaration of independence. Ho Chi Minh's government effectively ceased to exist. The Chinese took control of the area north of the 16th parallel. British forces arrived in the south in October. The French prevailed upon them to turn over control.

French officials immediately sought to reassert control. They negotiated with the Chinese. By agreeing to give up its concessions in China, the French persuaded the Chinese to allow them to return to the north and negotiate with the Viet Minh. In the meantime, Hồ took advantage of the negotiations to kill competing nationalist groups. He was anxious for the Chinese to leave. "The last time the Chinese came," he remarked, "they stayed one thousand years … I prefer to smell French shit for five years, rather than eat Chinese dung for the rest of my life." After negotiations collapsed over the formation of a government within the new French Union, the French bombarded Haiphong. In December 1946, they re-occupied Hanoi. Several telegrams were sent by Ho Chi Minh to President Truman asking for U.S. support. But they were ignored. Ho and the Việt Minh fled into the mountains to start an insurgency, marking the beginning of the First Indochina War. After the defeat of the Nationalist Chinese by the Communists in the Chinese Civil War, Chairman Mao Zedong provided direct military assistance to the Viet Minh. On the eve of the war, Ho Chi Minh had warned a French official that "you can kill ten of my men for every one I kill of yours, but even at those odds, you will lose and I will win." A long and bloody struggle ensued, with French military casualties exceeding those of the U.S. during its involvement.

The Pentagon Papers characterize the U.S. position at the time as ambivalent. On the one hand, the U.S. wished to persuade France to consider decolonization, while ultimately leaving the timetable up to them. During the war, Roosevelt had consistently stalled French demands for U.S. help in recolonizing Indochina. "France has milked it for one hundred years," he wrote. "The people of IndoChina are entitled to something better than that." After the war, the French argued that it was consistent with the principles of the new United Nations that some degree of autonomy should be granted to Indochina. France, however, claimed that it could do so only after it regained control.

Much hinged on the perception of Hồ's allegiances. In the wake of WWII, it was recognized that the Soviet Union would henceforth be a serious competitor to the West. America viewed the Soviet Union and its allies as a bloc. As far as Washington was concerned, the entire communist world was controlled by Moscow. In spite of Hồ's eloquent pleas for U.S. recognition, the U.S. gradually came to the conclusion that he was under Moscow's control. This perception suited the French. As Secretary of State, Dean Acheson noted, "the U.S. came to the aid of the French … because we needed their support for our policies in regard to NATO … The French blackmailed us. At every meeting … they brought up Indochina … but refused to tell me what they hoped to accomplish or how. Perhaps they didn't know."