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

by Fredrik Logevall

The French had made sporadic efforts in this direction since 1948; even now their commitment to it was fitful at best. Smart French planners knew that what worked in the Sahara—where there were obligatory watering points that could be occupied and denied to the rebels—might not work so easily in Indochina. They understood that the oil-spot approach is usually an expensive, time-consuming, chancy proposition, especially for a foreign power—it is always hard for a local population to feel that an army of occupation is its friend. Success is often temporary and tends to come only in areas where revolutionary forces are not already entrenched. Still, the gains, however modest, were a source of concern to Viet Minh officers, one of whom candidly confided to a French counterpart that he had no enemy more dangerous than a doctor who treated the villagers without regard to their political allegiance.41