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Why Viet Nam?/Tại Sao Việt Nam
Hardback book with dust jacket titled WHY VIETNAM? Prelude to America's Albatross by Archimedes L.A.Patti. Published by University of California Press in 1980. Illustrated with decorated end-papers and frontispiece map. See my photographs (3) of this book on main listing page. Bookseller since 1995 (LL-Base2BS-12-bottom-L) rareviewbooks
- GenresHistory
868 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1981
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August 30, 2021
The surprise Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor alerted the US government to the fact that American intelligence services tragically needed improvement, so President Franklin Delano Roosevelt launched the OSS (Office of Strategic Services), which is better known as the predecessor of the CIA. The OSS was headed (and dominated) by William "Wild Bill" Donovan, a successful Wall Street businessman and lawyer, who enjoyed close ties to Roosevelt. The fledgling intelligence organization had to strive to gain Allied acceptance – not only French and Chinese, but also British. It was also charged with the task of providing cover to support national liberation movements to resist the Japanese in China and other Asian countries. In France, the OSS worked with the Free French to oppose Nazi occupation, but in Asia the situation was different.
In July 1942, when the forces of Imperial Japan occupied Southeast Asia, the OSS established a guerrilla base in India for operations in Southeast Asia and China; from 1943 to 1945, it trained KMT (Nationalist Party of China) troops in China and Burma. As Patti describes, there the OSS had to deal with the opposition of "Vinegar" Joe Stilwell, the commander of American forces in China, India, and Burma, as well as win over the support of Claire Chennault, who headed the Fourteenth US Air Force or "Flying Tiger" air group. To further complicate matters, after receiving a verbal agreement from President Roosevelt, Wild Bill Donovan entered into a pact with Chiang Kai-shek to create a joint secret service, the Sino-American Cooperative Organization (SACO), led by Chinese intelligence chief Dai Li and with US naval officer Milton Miles as deputy head. An OSS base was set up in Kunming in 1944.
Although the Free French and the American OSS cooperated effectively in the liberation of France, nothing was ever that simple in Indochina, where, from 1942-1943, clandestine US parties were operating. That is why by 1944, the OSS was already actively seeking the help of the Viet Minh in the anti-Japanese struggle. That the OSS had established a connection with the Viet Minh prior to Imperial Japan's surrender became clear when it was revealed that in 1944 agent Laurence Gordon had transferred a million Chinese dollars a month to the Viet Minh from the base in Kunming. This communication was known as the GBT network; it was coordinated by Chiang Kai-shek's operational director. Laurence Gordon had been trained by British SIS (Secret Intelligence Service), which recommended him to Wild Bill.
After the Japanese coup of March 9 1945, both the OSS and the Anglo-American GBT began seriously considering entering into an intelligence-sharing agreement with the Viet Minh. The Viet Minh was also eager to gain American support for its cause. Ho Chi Minh was especially determined to get the Allies to recognize his party. After his thirteen-month imprisonment by Chinese Nationalists, he immediately tried to contact the American high command in China in the face of Claire Chennault.
The initial idea of meeting with Ho Chi Minh was given by two members of the GBT group. In April 1945, they crossed the border into Vietnam with a Viet Minh escort and after hiking for a month, met Ho in the main Viet Minh guerrilla base in Tan Trao, an ethnic village located several hundred kilometers from Hanoi. The GBT-Viet Minh negotiations led to the arrival of the large, and important, OSS Deer Team. A group of OSS officers parachuted into the Tan Trao base for a meeting, and the following months Deer Team supplied the Viet Minh with considerable amounts of modern military equipment and began training the guerrilla fighters in combat tactics and weapons operations.
At this point, OSS operative Archimedes Patti stepped into the picture. He made direct contact with Ho Chi Minh at a remote village near Jingxi, China, and learned from him about the dire situation in northern Vietnam caused by the Great Famine. Ho showed him photographs to prove his claims. Patti's superiors in Washington urgently needed what he calls "hard intelligence," and for Patti, the Viet Minh network was just the right way to provide such. At the time, he believed that the Viet Minh's attempts to seek American support for their struggle for independent Vietnam did not conflict with American policy. Having seen the sorry remnants of the French colonial army, Patti did not have much faith in French resources and almost immediately hit a "sour note" with French intelligence chief Jean Sainteny.
With the war against Japan coming to an end, the Viet Minh convened the so-called National People's Congress, which the OSS Deer Team attended. It was during this congress that Ho Chi Minh learned about the American bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Japanese surrender. According to Patti, the new leader of the Deer Team, Major Allison Thomas, accompanied the Viet Minh and helped to plan an attack on the Japanese at Thai Nguyen. Her illogical action, which defied orders from above, deepened US involvement with the Viet Minh.
As the revolutionaries seized power in Hanoi immediately after Japan's capitulation and launched an anti-French campaign in Hanoi, destroying all symbols of colonial power, Jean Sainteny, enraged by US complicity with the Viet Minh, poured scorn on Patti's group. He was furious at American representatives' refusal to occupy the Vinh camp where many French were detained by the Viet Minh. On top of that, American officers had parachuted into Laos in order to disarm French troops under the pretext that international accords did not allow France to occupy its pre-war colony directly. In October 1945, the French embassy in Washington was instructed to inform the American State Department that Indochina was “outside of the American zone of action and that French opinion was very disturbed by the actions of certain American representatives.” According to French high commisioner in Indochina, Thierry d'Argenlieu, the American representatives were "naively anti-colonial, often manifesting without measure or nuance their ideological sympathies as spokespersons convinced of the right of the Annamite people." This description did not suit Archimedes Patti. While he did attend a Viet Minh flag-raising ceremony, he criticized the party for its immaturity and communist inclinations. He also showed deference to Emperor Bao Dai, who, he suspected, had been forced to abdicate. Although Patti was evidently pleased to see the French driven out of Hanoi, in his reports to the OSS base in Kunming he expressed his concerns over the Viet Minh's plans to nationalise the Bank of Indochina.
The French, who had succeeded to reestablish their colonial government in Saigon, meanwhile actively sought US recognition of their claims. The end of the wartime cooperation between the two superpowers, the USA and the Soviet Union, and the beginning of the Cold War signified a shift in France's fortunes. France was playing a key role in American plans of workable political and economic revival of Europe. The major stumbling block was Charles de Gaulle.
"Truman's antagonism toward the man surpassed Roosevelt's irritation and reflected the official American attitude toward France. The President viewed de Gaulle as petulant, arrogant, and politically unreliable," comments Patti. De Gaulle wanted France to be the leader of post-war Western Europe and was strongly against the economic revival of Germany. He resented the refusal of the United States to treat his country as seriously as it treated Britain and the Soviet Union. With this unpleasant start for post-war Franco-American relations, Vietnam suddenly became the last thing on the American government's agenda.
Ho Chi Minh kept desperately trying to align his government with the demands of the West. He dissolved the ICP (Indochinese Communist Party) and underscored that he was first and foremost a nationalist, not a communist. His efforts were in vain. American policy was dictated by American interests, explains Patti. While during World War II, it was shaped by the need of intelligence (this is the answer to the "Why Viet Nam?" question), now it has shifted because of the potential political and economic usefulness the United States saw in France.
Abandoned by his American allies and ignored by the communists, who mistrusted his half-nationalist, half-internationalist stance, Ho Chi Minh could only watch in despair as the French forces occupied Hanoi on March 18 1946. In Washington, all references to Ho were now labeled "communist." Secretary of State Dean Acheson warned the chief of Southwest Pacific Affairs, Abbet Low Moffat, in a telegram that Ho was an "...agent of international communism" despite the fact that Kremlin-directed conspiracies had been discovered in virtually all countries except Vietnam.
All Ho Chi Minh's attempts to negotiate notwithstanding, soon the First Indochina War broke out. The US government made the "logical" decision to assist the French in the form of military aid. Why was it logical? If you are familiar with the decision-making process of Cold Warriors, the answer becomes simple and obvious: it was the anti-communist one.
In his memoir, Archimedes L.A. Patti offers a detailed, compelling account of the first phase of US involvement in Vietnam as seen through the eyes of an insider. His writing is sharp and witty, his conclusions insightful. This book is both an important and an entertaining read. Recommendable.
In July 1942, when the forces of Imperial Japan occupied Southeast Asia, the OSS established a guerrilla base in India for operations in Southeast Asia and China; from 1943 to 1945, it trained KMT (Nationalist Party of China) troops in China and Burma. As Patti describes, there the OSS had to deal with the opposition of "Vinegar" Joe Stilwell, the commander of American forces in China, India, and Burma, as well as win over the support of Claire Chennault, who headed the Fourteenth US Air Force or "Flying Tiger" air group. To further complicate matters, after receiving a verbal agreement from President Roosevelt, Wild Bill Donovan entered into a pact with Chiang Kai-shek to create a joint secret service, the Sino-American Cooperative Organization (SACO), led by Chinese intelligence chief Dai Li and with US naval officer Milton Miles as deputy head. An OSS base was set up in Kunming in 1944.
Although the Free French and the American OSS cooperated effectively in the liberation of France, nothing was ever that simple in Indochina, where, from 1942-1943, clandestine US parties were operating. That is why by 1944, the OSS was already actively seeking the help of the Viet Minh in the anti-Japanese struggle. That the OSS had established a connection with the Viet Minh prior to Imperial Japan's surrender became clear when it was revealed that in 1944 agent Laurence Gordon had transferred a million Chinese dollars a month to the Viet Minh from the base in Kunming. This communication was known as the GBT network; it was coordinated by Chiang Kai-shek's operational director. Laurence Gordon had been trained by British SIS (Secret Intelligence Service), which recommended him to Wild Bill.
After the Japanese coup of March 9 1945, both the OSS and the Anglo-American GBT began seriously considering entering into an intelligence-sharing agreement with the Viet Minh. The Viet Minh was also eager to gain American support for its cause. Ho Chi Minh was especially determined to get the Allies to recognize his party. After his thirteen-month imprisonment by Chinese Nationalists, he immediately tried to contact the American high command in China in the face of Claire Chennault.
The initial idea of meeting with Ho Chi Minh was given by two members of the GBT group. In April 1945, they crossed the border into Vietnam with a Viet Minh escort and after hiking for a month, met Ho in the main Viet Minh guerrilla base in Tan Trao, an ethnic village located several hundred kilometers from Hanoi. The GBT-Viet Minh negotiations led to the arrival of the large, and important, OSS Deer Team. A group of OSS officers parachuted into the Tan Trao base for a meeting, and the following months Deer Team supplied the Viet Minh with considerable amounts of modern military equipment and began training the guerrilla fighters in combat tactics and weapons operations.
At this point, OSS operative Archimedes Patti stepped into the picture. He made direct contact with Ho Chi Minh at a remote village near Jingxi, China, and learned from him about the dire situation in northern Vietnam caused by the Great Famine. Ho showed him photographs to prove his claims. Patti's superiors in Washington urgently needed what he calls "hard intelligence," and for Patti, the Viet Minh network was just the right way to provide such. At the time, he believed that the Viet Minh's attempts to seek American support for their struggle for independent Vietnam did not conflict with American policy. Having seen the sorry remnants of the French colonial army, Patti did not have much faith in French resources and almost immediately hit a "sour note" with French intelligence chief Jean Sainteny.
With the war against Japan coming to an end, the Viet Minh convened the so-called National People's Congress, which the OSS Deer Team attended. It was during this congress that Ho Chi Minh learned about the American bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Japanese surrender. According to Patti, the new leader of the Deer Team, Major Allison Thomas, accompanied the Viet Minh and helped to plan an attack on the Japanese at Thai Nguyen. Her illogical action, which defied orders from above, deepened US involvement with the Viet Minh.
As the revolutionaries seized power in Hanoi immediately after Japan's capitulation and launched an anti-French campaign in Hanoi, destroying all symbols of colonial power, Jean Sainteny, enraged by US complicity with the Viet Minh, poured scorn on Patti's group. He was furious at American representatives' refusal to occupy the Vinh camp where many French were detained by the Viet Minh. On top of that, American officers had parachuted into Laos in order to disarm French troops under the pretext that international accords did not allow France to occupy its pre-war colony directly. In October 1945, the French embassy in Washington was instructed to inform the American State Department that Indochina was “outside of the American zone of action and that French opinion was very disturbed by the actions of certain American representatives.” According to French high commisioner in Indochina, Thierry d'Argenlieu, the American representatives were "naively anti-colonial, often manifesting without measure or nuance their ideological sympathies as spokespersons convinced of the right of the Annamite people." This description did not suit Archimedes Patti. While he did attend a Viet Minh flag-raising ceremony, he criticized the party for its immaturity and communist inclinations. He also showed deference to Emperor Bao Dai, who, he suspected, had been forced to abdicate. Although Patti was evidently pleased to see the French driven out of Hanoi, in his reports to the OSS base in Kunming he expressed his concerns over the Viet Minh's plans to nationalise the Bank of Indochina.
The French, who had succeeded to reestablish their colonial government in Saigon, meanwhile actively sought US recognition of their claims. The end of the wartime cooperation between the two superpowers, the USA and the Soviet Union, and the beginning of the Cold War signified a shift in France's fortunes. France was playing a key role in American plans of workable political and economic revival of Europe. The major stumbling block was Charles de Gaulle.
"Truman's antagonism toward the man surpassed Roosevelt's irritation and reflected the official American attitude toward France. The President viewed de Gaulle as petulant, arrogant, and politically unreliable," comments Patti. De Gaulle wanted France to be the leader of post-war Western Europe and was strongly against the economic revival of Germany. He resented the refusal of the United States to treat his country as seriously as it treated Britain and the Soviet Union. With this unpleasant start for post-war Franco-American relations, Vietnam suddenly became the last thing on the American government's agenda.
Ho Chi Minh kept desperately trying to align his government with the demands of the West. He dissolved the ICP (Indochinese Communist Party) and underscored that he was first and foremost a nationalist, not a communist. His efforts were in vain. American policy was dictated by American interests, explains Patti. While during World War II, it was shaped by the need of intelligence (this is the answer to the "Why Viet Nam?" question), now it has shifted because of the potential political and economic usefulness the United States saw in France.
Abandoned by his American allies and ignored by the communists, who mistrusted his half-nationalist, half-internationalist stance, Ho Chi Minh could only watch in despair as the French forces occupied Hanoi on March 18 1946. In Washington, all references to Ho were now labeled "communist." Secretary of State Dean Acheson warned the chief of Southwest Pacific Affairs, Abbet Low Moffat, in a telegram that Ho was an "...agent of international communism" despite the fact that Kremlin-directed conspiracies had been discovered in virtually all countries except Vietnam.
All Ho Chi Minh's attempts to negotiate notwithstanding, soon the First Indochina War broke out. The US government made the "logical" decision to assist the French in the form of military aid. Why was it logical? If you are familiar with the decision-making process of Cold Warriors, the answer becomes simple and obvious: it was the anti-communist one.
In his memoir, Archimedes L.A. Patti offers a detailed, compelling account of the first phase of US involvement in Vietnam as seen through the eyes of an insider. His writing is sharp and witty, his conclusions insightful. This book is both an important and an entertaining read. Recommendable.
October 16, 2025
As a Viet Nam veteran I can say this book is the best and most comprehensive book ever written on the prelude to the war and the ultimate end of this debacle. I knew little about VN. I volunteered to go because I believed it to be the right thing to do. When I stumbled upon Mr Patti’s book my eyes opened wide. All of this mess began to make sense. Anyone interested in the VN war must add this book to their collection
August 19, 2015
Simply a must read to understand how the CIA worked with Ho Chi Minh until the surrender of Japan in World War II.
March 1, 2010
A must read for anyone inteersted in America's involvement in Vietnam. This book describes the French colonial era, resistance, Japanese occupation, early OSS interventions, America's support for Ho Chi Ming, through the mistakes of the 1950's which ultimately led America into Vietnam.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews