The National Liberation Front

Context:

Ho Chi Minh

The formation of the National Liberation Front in 1960 was the brainchild of Lao Dong, Vietnam’s Communist Party based in Hanoi. American troops came to call the NLF the Viet Cong, VC, or Charlie simply to demean them. Lao Dong officials commonly referred to as Hanoi by Americans who linked every move of the front to the communist Capitol, recognized the necessity of carrying out both a political and military struggle to achieve their ultimate goal of crushing the illegitimate Saigon regime. The front was therefore the political wing of the communists operating below the 17^th parallel. The Communist’s first attempt to liberate the south failed following six years of solely political actions. Hanoi thus created the military faction of the front, the Peoples Liberation Armed Forces (PLAF). Hanoi implemented the front technique in past conflicts with Japanese and French Imperialists with success. Communist front predecessors to the VC included: the Viet Minh, the Lien Viet, and the Fatherland Front. The front made several pivotal contributions for the eventual communist victory. The largest three contributions being: Negotiating with the U.S., Propaganda, and Foreign Relations.

There are several disputable events, decisions, and relationships regarding the National Liberation Front and its role in the Second Indo-China War or the Vietnam War, in the West. For example, was the NLF under direct control of Hanoi as U.S. administrations advertised? While it seems the Lao Dong viewed the NLF as their chief source of propaganda and comrades in the South. The U.S. repeatedly attempted to link the NLF to the communists in Hanoi. Several high-ranking NLF officials were indeed communists, some were not. Most experts in this area concur that a relationship directly linked the front to Northern communists, but not nearly at the level Americans like Dean Rusk and President Johnson assumed. One significant piece of evidence supports the thought of the front operating without complete Northern communist oversight. The fact being that Lao Dong and the NLF waged separate diplomatic offensives internationally. Specifically in July of 1964 amidst Political chaos in Saigon with the constant fear of another coup de tat, Lao Dong officials successfully whined and dined United Nations’ secretary general U Thant and French president Charles de Gaulle. Both Thant and de Gaulle agreed that diplomatic negotiations were the only way to end an escalating military conflict and suggested the reconvening of the Geneva Conference. Later the same month, the NLF’s president, Nguyen Huu Tho announced the front’s readiness for peaceful negotiations, Tho gained the support of: Peking, Moscow, and Hanoi prior to reading the declaration. A second debatable idea regarding the NLF involves a shift in party policy.

Shortly following its inception the National Liberation Front adopted a Neutralist platform, which in this juncture in history referred to nonalignment in the cold war. Many developing Asian and African nations adopted a similar policy. By far the most crucial Neutralist nation was the communists’ former nemesis, France. The NLF’s unbiased policy helped them achieve three important goals. These achievements were: distancing the front from Hanoi, forging international ties with nations and leaders abroad, and defacing the Saigon Regime.

Another communist action littered with question marks is the NLF’s reason for abandoning its neutralist policy. As early as 1963 following the coup which led to the overthrow and death of Ngo Dinh Diem, certain Lao Dong officials in the form of the Central Committee began questioning the front’s neutrality as to weak and Western. The Central Committee was essentially the cabinet of the Lao Dong, and its secretary general was Le Duan. Le Duan still strongly supported the idea of a neutral policy for the NLF. Duan could see the confusion and frustration it was causing Washington. While members of the Central Committee continued to call for an end to neutrality the policy wasn’t officially abandoned until 1965 when Lyndon Johnson ordered the start of bombing raids with Operation Rolling Thunder and the presence of U.S. ground troops for the first time in Vietnam.

Text:

Le Duan

Robert K. Brigham’s Guerilla Diplomacy: The NLF’s Foreign Relations and the Viet Nam War is an enlightening account of both military and diplomatic strategies implemented against the Saigon regimes and Americans in South Vietnam.

Brigham’s focal point is the examination of “the development and implementation of the NLF’s international strategy and assess its impact on the war”. Another key point Brigham addresses but does not come to a definitive answer on is the level of control Hanoi had over their southern liaisons, the NLF. Guerilla Diplomacy provides an intensely non-ethnocentric view of the Second Indo-China War. Brigham draws his research and evidence from mainly communist documents from Hanoi as well as some personal interviews. Brigham delves into specific NLF strategies such as Neutrality, a twin goal policy to introduce socialism in the North and to liberate the South, all while fighting and negotiating simultaneously.

The book opens with Lao Dong officials in Hanoi who strongly believe Vietnam was heavily shorted at the negotiation tables of the Geneva Conference. The reestablishment of the Diem regime revealed to the Lao Dong what they must accomplish. The Lao Dong congregated in 1960 forging the National Front for the Liberation of Vietnam, after the hated, Catholic Ngo Dinh Diem had regained his power in the South. Knowing the NLF would be under close watch by the French and United States they quickly decided to adopt a policy of neutrality. The adoption of this policy was the first of many that would aid Hanoi in discrediting and wearing down imperialism in Vietnam. Propaganda was also an incredibly useful tool the Front would utilize repeatedly.

When Washington decided direct American military intervention provided the best chance for victory in 1965, Operation Rolling Thunder and the addition of U.S. ground troops were the result. The front saw an opportunity to abandon their neutralist policy in favor of an anti-American one. This policy existed in twin goals: the development of Socialism at home, and the liberation of Southern Vietnam. Brigham also goes in depth addressing the success of the NLF’s implementation of foreign policy. Hanoi realized that making the Americans look bad in the media and to other world leaders was almost as important as defeating them on the battlefield. NLF leaders toured friendly countries separately from Lao Dong officials in an attempt to distance the Front from the Communists in Hanoi.

Brigham successfully illustrates the hoops that Hanoi and the NLF forced the administrations of: Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, and Ford to jump through. After the fall of Saigon it was clear that the Communists in the North and the NLF in the South had clearly, implemented far superior strategy and diplomacy to that of the Americans.

Subtexts:

Le Duc Tho

1. Fitzgerald, Frances (2002). Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam. Boston: Little, Brown and Company.

This popular text by Fitzgerald highlights several paradoxes that arise due to American involvement in Vietnam. Rural farming villages and crowded cities, Catholics and Buddhists, soldiers and monks, and especially Communists and non-communists are the main contrasts Fire in the Lake deals with. This novel explores the specific reasons of how and why American misinterpreted the people and nation of Vietnam.

2. Rotter, Andrew J. Light at the End of the Tunnel: A Vietnam War Anthology. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1991.

Rotter’s account focuses almost entirely on U.S. experiences during the war. Rotter clearly identifies differences in American and Vietnamese culture as well as methods of the communists. The book is broken down into three sections. The first of which deals with American involvement in the war chronologically. The second section depicts the war on the battlefield, guerilla tactics utilized by the VC early in the war and the formation of the NLF. The Third section of Light at the End of the Tunnel concentrates on reasons for U.S. involvement, including ideas such as the Domino Theory and decline of support at home.

3. George Katsiaficas. Vietnam Documents: American and Vietnamese Views of the War. Armonk, New York. M.E. Sharpe Inc., 1992.

Katsiaficas’ anthology differs from most of its kind in the fact that over a third of his resources include Vietnamese documents. Katsiaficas touches on key twists and turns of the Vietnam War. The Geneva Conference, the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, and American build-up are three of the eight points he focuses on. Katsiaficas, a grizzled antiwar veteran refuses to shy away from those ideals throughout this collection. Excerpts from: Ho Chin Minh, Henry Kissinger, Nixon, and Lyndon Johnson are some of the creators of documents Katsiaficas includes.

4. Duiker, William (1996), The Communist Road to Power in Vietnam. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press.

In The Communist Road to Power Duiker’s strongest argument arises when speaking about the North’s decision making processes and the adjustments and responses of the Communists to American policy. One major issue with this book is Duiker’s bias toward the communists. This bias has not as much to do with Duiker as it does with the material Duiker used for research. It is extremely difficult for any researcher that uses Communist documents as his or her main source of research due to the socialist bias inevitably contained in them. Duiker’s study focuses mainly on NLF strategy and tactics, both in diplomacy and military. Duiker however, neglects certain aspects of the NLF’s war such as propaganda.

5. Truong Nhu Tang, A Viet Cong Memoir. Assisted by David Chanoff and Doan Van Toai.

New York: Haracourt, Brace, Jovanovich. 1985. Pp. xiv, 350.

Tang’s A Viet Cong Memoir focuses around the author’s own experiences as both an executive of a Southern Vietnamese sugar corporation and an active member of the revolutionary government. Tang rose to the position of Minister of Justice in the newly founded Provisional Revolutionary Government in 1969. Tang’s story does not end with the fall of Saigon as Guerilla Diplomacy does. After the Communist takeover and American withdrawal the PRG was dismantled and replaced with the Saigon Military Management Committee, which was comprised of all Northern Communists. Hanoi and the NLF had made friendly with southern non-communists during the war and essentially abandoned amidst the formation of a self-determined Vietnam.