WW2 & Japanese Occupation of Vietnam

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WW2 and Japanese Occupation of Vietnam

In September 1940, the Japanese invaded Vietnam and the French surrendered. Japanese leaders, driven by militarism and

profit, dreamed of creating a ‘Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere’: an economic

coalition of Asian nations aiming to expel Western imperialists and

capitalists, then share trade, resources and commodities between themselves

Japanese

forces took only a week to secure a foothold in Vietnam, with minimal losses.

By October there were around 10,000 Japanese soldiers stationed there. For most of their occupation the Japanese

left the French colonial government in place – though its authority was greatly

diminished. Japan could not spare the men for a full-scale occupation of

Vietnam.

The

Japanese presence in Vietnam also attracted foreign attention, particularly

that of the United States. In 1940 America was not yet at war with Japan, but

it was nevertheless seeking to restrict Japanese expansion.

Washington

had backed the French colonial regime in Vietnam, hoping it would resist

Japanese overtures. But when the French

caved in to Japanese demands, the US changed tack. By 1943 president Roosevelt

was openly talking of Vietnamese independence. By 1944, Washington was much

more interested in Indochina.

By the start of 1945 the war

was going poorly for Japan. In March 1945 the Japanese occupation force, alleging that French

colonials were assisting the Allies, withdrew their backing. The French were

removed from power; every French colonial official or military officer was

arrested and locked up; all French soldiers were disarmed.

But

shutting down colonial authority in Indochina only benefited the Viet Minh,

which flourished without pressure from French troops. The Japanese invited

emperor Bao Dai to declare Vietnamese independence and gave him the reins of

power, though both were only nominal. From March 1945, Vietnam was a member-state of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity

Sphere, in effect a

Japanese colony run by a puppet government.

The

growing Viet Minh

A

communist revolutionary, Ho Chi Minh, formed an army (the Vietminh) and began a

guerrilla campaign against the Japanese.

The US

worked with Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Minh, who supplied the US military with

information about Japanese troop numbers and movements. This was more of a working

relationship than an alliance, however it gave Ho Chi Minh some hope that

Washington might support their claim to independence when the war ended.

Ho Chi

Minh declared the Japanese to be the “number one enemy” but resisted calls for

a major Viet Minh campaign against them. Knowing the Japanese were in retreat

and that a major Allied attack was imminent, Ho preferred to wait.

By June 1945 he felt strong enough to establish a Viet

Minh-controlled zone in north-western Vietnam. Since this region was remote and

had no strategic significance to the Japanese, they did not launch any major

campaigns against it. Through the middle of 1945, the Viet Minh busied itself

with organisation, propaganda and recruiting.

In early August 1945 the US

dropped atomic weapons on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which

eventually led to the Japanese surrender. When the Japanese surrendered at the

end of World War 2, Ho believed he would be able to set up an independent

Vietnam.

Ho Chi Mihn

The defeat of the Japanese in August 1945

created a power vacuum in Vietnam, so Ho quickly attempted to create an

independent state, free from foreign control.

At the

beginning of September 1945 Ho Chi Minh presented a Vietnamese declaration of

independence and

sought

international recognition for the newly independent Vietnam, but these

overtures were ignored by all major leaders, including US president Harry

Truman.

Meanwhile,

continued violence and

unrest in Vietnam gave the French a pretext to move large numbers of troops

back into its former colony. This triggered the First Indochina War, with Ho leading the Viet Minh against

the French, refusing several offers of a negotiated peace.

After

Vietnam was divided at the Geneva

conference in 1954, Ho and the

Viet Minh established themselves in the north. There he redistributed land to peasants

and encouraged the interrogation, torture and execution of former landlords.

When it

became apparent that South Vietnam would not participate in elections for the

reunification of Vietnam, Ho and his ministers began planning to overthrow the

South.

This

strategy led to American military intervention and the unfolding of the Vietnam

War (1964-75).

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