When something has happened, it seems rather easy to see what are the factors which have necessarily turned the mere possibilities into realities. We are inclined to say simply: “It was bound to happen this way, it couldn’t have been otherwise.”
In fact, in the social field, in the struggle between conscious human beings, every change is the result of an often very complex process of evolution. The revolutionary leader must find out the general and particular laws of events in a maze of phenomena in which the false is hardly distinguishable from the true, and where there are innumerable and entangled relations, all moving and developing unceasingly. The accurate, scientific forecast of trends, of how major situations are likely to develop in the future, is of the utmost importance in revolutionary work. Such predictions will be severely tested by realities and time and a true forecast is the work of geniuses.
Late in 1939, the Second World War started. The German fascist troops overran many European countries. They devoured France within a few weeks. England was devastated by the bombings of aircraft carrying the sign of the swastika. In Asia, the Japanese fascists had occupied a large part of the immense Chinese mainland. It was just when fascism had reached its apogee that Uncle Ho and our Party predicted its defeat and saw the opportunity for Viet Nam to win back independence. Uncle Ho decided to return home.
In the spring of 1941, in the damp cave of Pac Bo, the 8th Conference of the Party Central Committee was held under his chairmanship. The Conference noted: “If the previous imperialist war gave birth to the Soviet Union, a socialist country, then this one will give birth to many other socialist countries; now the revolution will succeed in many countries.”
The Central Committee and Uncle Ho put forward national liberation as an urgent revolutionary task. The Central Committee pointed out the favourable objective conditions for a successful insurrection, among them the possible invasion of Indochina by Allied troops, and affirmed: “To prepare for an insurrection is the central task of our Party and people in the present period.”
In the summer of that year, the German fascists launched a surprise attack on the Soviet Union. It was like a hurricane. Within a few weeks, they advanced hundreds of kilometres into the land of the October Revolution.
In the winter, the Japanese fascists launched massive attacks in the Pacific. In China, the Red Army had to fight on two fronts, against the Japanese as aggressors and the traitor Chiang Kai-shek’s Kuomintang troops. The rising sun had been hoisted over French Indochina, British-owned Hongkong, Burma and Malaya, and the “US-protected” Philippines. In those cold nights when he was trying to escape from the searches by local police in the Pac Bo area, Uncle Ho predicted the victory of the revolution:
“It will be accomplished in 1945.”
So said the last line of Viet Nam’s History in Verse, written by him in those days and then lithographed. Revolutionary Museum cadres recently discovered a copy of it hidden inside a bamboo section in a house on stilts in Pac Bo. The owner of the house had been a member of a National Salvation organization in pre-revolutionary days.
Uncle Ho never mentioned this line. For our part we have been too busy to ask him how he was able to make such a prediction. This has become one of the things which have never been thoroughly understood about his personality and his great revolutionary life — almost sixty years of revolutionary activities.
Today, looking through the Party’s documents in this historic period, we find other prophecies.
As early as the end of 1941 and the beginning of 1942, many of the Party’s communiques and directives had begun to point out tactics to be adopted towards the “British, Americans and Chinese” and the advantages and difficulties arising from the eventual entry of Allied troops.
In February 1943, the Standing Bureau of the Party Central Committee had called for an “urgent preparation for an insurrection” so that “when the opportunity arises, the masses can be mobilized for the fight.”
On a spring night of 1945, the Japanese staged a coup against the French. The eighty-year hold of the French colonialists on Indochina was shattered overnight. The French were caught napping by what our Party had foreseen one year before. The February 15, 1944 issue of Co Giai Phong (Liberation Flag) had carried the following statement: “The Japanese will act to topple the French”, they will “stage a coup d’etat and will arrest the French and the Vietnamese traitors in their pays.”
Three days after the coup, the Standing Bureau of the Party Central Committee in its directive entitled “The Japanese-French Clash and Our Action”, had pointed out that the opportunity would arise for a general uprising when Allied troops entered Indochina and that “even before any Allied landing, a general insurrection could break out and be successful.”
The resolution of the Bac Ky Revolutionary Military Conference held in mid-April had pointed out that the entry of Allied troops into Indochina was inevitable, while stressing the utmost importance of military tasks and laying down concrete guide lines for the preparation of the general uprising.
Our Party had defined its diplomatic line as one of “turning to account the contradictions between the Chinese and the Americans and between the British and the Gaullist French.” In the meantime, internally, “we should actively build up our strength, and should not rely on others.”
The resolution of the National Conference of the Indochinese Communist Party held at Tan Trao on the 14th and 15th of August, 1945 had affirmed: “A very good opportunity has arisen for us to win back our independence.”
On the question of “the coming entry of Allied troops in our country,” the Party Central Committee decided “to oppose the French design of restoring their former position in Indochina and the Chinese militarists’ design of occupying our country.”
Our Party had further emphasized the necessity of making the most of the contradictions between the two Allied groups — the British-French on the one hand and the American-Chiang on the other — on the Indochinese question, but had also pointed out that “the contradiction between the British-French-American group on the one hand and the Soviet Union on the other might lead the Anglo-Americans to compromise with the French and let the French come back to Indochina.”
The Party’s line had been to try to avoid having to cope singlehanded with several Allied forces invading Indochina at one time, and repeated that “in any case, only our own strength can settle the issue between us and the Allies.”
Lenin said: “History in general and the history of revolutions in particular always take place in a richer, more varied, more diversified, more vivid and cleverer way than can be imagined by the best political parties.” The revolution in our country occurred in exactly that way. Today we are proud of the fact that our Party was able to foresee the basic trend of the situation’s development. The timely assessments and judicious policies of the Party took the August General Insurrection to victory, and led the newly-born Democratic Republic of Viet Nam through the great difficulties of the early stage. In the South, the “quick fight, quick victory” plan of the French colonialists and British interventionists had failed from the very beginning. In Bac Bo and Trung Bo, the Chiang Kai-shek militarists and their handful of followers, with US-equipped forces tens of times stronger than our own, had been unable to overthrow the young revolutionary power as they had expected.
However, there were still many difficulties and dangers. Before we seized power, the only foreign army on our soil had been the sixty thousand troops of the Japanese. No sooner had we won back independence than nearly two hundred thousand Chiang troops poured in while some five thousand Anglo-Indian troops landed in the South. They were followed by tens of thousands of French expeditionary troops while the thousands of defeated French colonial troops in Indochina were being reequipped and those who had fled to China were also returning. The Japanese troops were still there and constituted another threat. Japan had surrendered, but the Japanese army in Indochina had not suffered heavy losses. As for the Chiang, French and British armies, in any event, they represented the victorious Allies.
Toward the end of November, the Party Central Committee made an assessment of the situation and took decisions for the coming period. It issued the directive entitled “Resistance and Reconstruction” dated November 25, 1945, in which it was stated that “...The easier it has been to seize power, the more difficult it will be to preserve it. The newly-established democratic republican Government is faced with an extremely complex situation.”
The Party Central Committee pointed out that the internal tasks at the time were “to consolidate power, to oppose the French colonialists, to eliminate internal foes, to improve the people’s living conditions.”
In the utterly confused state of things in the country, when external and internal enemies were all around us, it was of the utmost importance to determine who the main enemy was. The Party analysed the positions of the various enemies. The Americans, in spite of statements of neutrality in the Indochinese problem, secretly helped the French by lending them troop-carriers. In their relations with the French, the Anglo-Americans were faced with a dilemma: on the one hand, they wanted to further their own interests in Indochina and South-East Asia, while on the other hand they wanted to reach a compromise with a view to a united front against the Soviet Union. The Chiang clique sent their troops into our country with the initial intention of overthrowing the power established by our Party and replacing it by puppet government in their pay. But seeing that our entire people were united in supporting the Government, they had to enter into relations with us. They were afraid of our Communism and feared that “the alliance of Indochinese Communists and Chinese Communists would result in the communization of Southern China”, therefore they planned to obtain a reorganization of the Provisional Government and introduce their own agents into it.
The Party Central Committee put forward a new judgement: “... Sooner or later, Chungking will agree to return Indochina to the French, provided that the latter concede major interests to the Chinese.”
From the above analyses and judgements, the tasks of the proletariat and the nation were defined, and the main objective of the revolution was pointed out clearly:
“The slogans continue to be ‘The Nation above All’, ‘The Fatherland above All’. Our main enemy at present is the French colonialist aggressors. The struggle should be spearheaded against them.”
The tasks set by the Party were: “To mobilize the forces of the whole people to carry on the resistance perseveringly, to organize and lead protracted resistance and to combine guerilla warfare with total non-cooperation.”
The situation was developing rapidly in a very complex way.