Hanoi III Week II

Hanoi III: Week # II June 15-19, 2009 by Desaix Anderson
Academically, we covered the brief period of US cooperation with Ho Chi Minh in 1943-45, when an Office of Strategic Services (OSS - CIA predecessor) and a Defense Deer Team worked closely and productively with Ho Chi Minh and his Viet Minh. Ho Chi Minh hoped this cooperation foreshadowed US support for Vietnam’s independence from France, but the US official position remained neutral and then shifted to support France’s re-imposition of French rule and the First Indochina War ensued, reversing the position of President Roosevelt who thought a UN Trusteeship should be installed until Vietnam could become fully independent. Ho Chi Minh wrote President Truman and Secretary of State Cordell Hull at least eleven letters seeking US support. We also examined the Geneva Accords in 1954 which offered another opportunity for a settlement in Vietnam after the French were defeated at Dienbienphu, but America and the newly-installed Prime Minister of Vietnam, Ngo Dinh Diem, “Understood” but did not support the Geneva Accords.
Reflecting Soviet take-over of Eastern Europe, Mao’s victory In China, the North Korean invasion of South Korea, supported by Moscow and Beijing, and the hysteria incited by Senator Joe McCarthy , heightened fears of Communist takeover of Vietnam was essentially emplaced in the Cold War Context.
We traced the policies and their impact on Vietnam of Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson. We then looked at the escalation, militarization, Americanization of the Vietnam War by President Johnson. We also looked at the policies of South Vietnam Prime Minister and later President Ngo Dinh Diem’s policies, the Buddhist crisis and the crisis this led to crisis in South Vietnam’s relations with the US.
Princeton Professor David Leheny delivered a masterful discussion of the rising resistance movement and sympathies in the US and around the globe. I discussed the “American military man,” drawing on writers like James Webb’s and Tim O’Brian’s terrific books on Vietnam.
This week-end, despite numerous logistical fiascos, we had a great time in Hue and Hoi An, in central Vietnam. The magic, cultural, and intellectual life of Hue came to life for us, as well as the history of the Imperial Palace and Citadel and a visit to the late nineteenth Century Emperor Thu Duc’s tomb. Hoi An provided a mad search for pink, purple, and pink sport shoes (male choices) , jackets, and other assorted purchases by the students, evidently thinking ahead for Christmas. We also explored this seventeenth Century trading port, Hot An, with Japan, China, Holland, and India and the wonderful restoration of the village by UNESCO.
A handful of the intrepid took a swimming visit to Hoi An’s China Beach before we departed for our flight back to Hanoi.