Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam

by Fredrik Logevall

The real problem for the government, in terms of managing opinion on Indochina in 1947, was not at home but abroad. Neither the Soviet Union nor Great Britain nor the United States had tried hard to prevent the outbreak of war in late 1946; in 1947, all three continued to tread warily, a reality that worked to the general advantage of France. To the relief of Paris leaders—and to Ho Chi Minh’s intense disappointment—Joseph Stalin remained primarily concerned with keeping Soviet relations with France on a smooth plane, and he avoided expressing any open support for the DRV. The British too could be counted on to continue to affirm French sovereignty over Indochina; London officials might urge restraint, might recommend that Paris avoid undue provocations and work toward a “political solution,” but they would not do more, concerned as they were with maintaining dominion over their own colonial holdings. They indeed faced growing turmoil of their own in the region: In Malaya, postwar economic and political dislocation had generated labor unrest and a deep sense of alienation among the Chinese community. The United States was another story. French mistrust of American intentions ran deep, both among colons and among officials in the metropole. There was the suspicion, expressed in the March parliamentary debate and in the press, that Washington sought to displace France and incorporate Indochina within its growing economic empire. There was the persistent fear that the U.S. mi...