"PEOPLES DIPLOMACY": THE DIPLOMATIC FRONT OF NORTH VIETNAM DURING THE WAR AGAINST THE UNITED STATES, 1965-1972 By HARISH C. MEHTA, B.A., M.A. A Thesis Submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy McMaster University © Copyright by Harish C. 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While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires aient inclus dans in the document page count, their la pagination, il n'y aura aucun contenu removal does not represent any loss manquant. of content from the thesis. 1+1 Canada DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (2009) McMaster University (History) Hamilton, Ontario TITLE: "People's Diplomacy": The Diplomatic Front of North Vietnam During the War Against the United States, 1965-1972 AUTHOR: Harish C. Mehta, B.A. (Lucknow University), M.A. (McMaster University) SUPERVISOR: Dr. Stephen M. Streeter NUMBER OF PAGES: ix, 301 n ABSTRACT This doctoral dissertation investigates how the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV, or North Vietnam), under the leadership of President Ho Chi Minh, created a "diplomatic front" to implement "people's diplomacy." The main focus is on the period from 1965-1972 when the DRV needed these strategies to win worldwide support and sympathy for the Vietnamese Revolution. The diplomatic front consisted of Vietnamese writers, cartoonists, workers, woraen, students, artistic performers, filmmakers, architects, medical doctors and nurses, academics, lawyers, and sportspersons. Research in Vietnamese, American, and Canadian archives reveals that the front forged important links with antiwar activists abroad, thus lending greater credibility to their efforts to portray North Vietnam in a positive light. People's diplomacy made it difficult for the United States to prolong the war because the North Vietnamese, together with the peace movment abroad, brought popular pressure on U.S. President Lyndon Johnson to end the war. People's diplomacy was much more effective than traditional DRV diplomacy in gaining the support and sympathy of Westerners who were averse to communism. People's diplomacy damaged the reputation of the United States by exposing U.S. war crimes and casting North Vietnam as a victim of American imperialism. As a result, many of America's Western allies did not send troops or provide aid to South Vietnam. People's diplomacy also helped North Vietnam gain crucial economic, military, and diplomatic support from the Soviet Union, China, Eastern Europe, Cuba and North Korea. in I dedicate this dissertation to the memory of my parents, Kanta and Daulat Ram Mehta, who lived in, and loved, colonial and postcolonial India IV ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I owe several debts of gratitude to persons and institutions that helped see this project through. My dissertation supervisor Dr. Stephen Streeter encouraged me to conduct archival research in Vietnam, and provided valuable insights on the manuscript. Dissertation committee members Dr. David Barrett and Dr. Virginia Aksan offered significant comments and guidance. External examiner Dr. Andrew Johns, and internal examiner Dr. James Benn, gave useful suggestions. Funds for multi-archival research in Vietnam and the United States came from a Richard Fuller Memorial Scholarship, and a Mildred Armstrong Award from McMaster University, and two Samuel Flagg Bemis research grants from the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations. Mr. Do Kien of the Institute of Vietnamese Studies and Development Sciences in Hanoi was most helpful in obtaining permission to access the archives. Mr. Nguyen Tien Dinh, manager of access and reference at National Archives Center Number 3 in Hanoi, and the archive's staff welcomed me. Vietnamese graduate students Ms. Nguyen Binh Minh, Mr. Vu Minh, and Mr. Vu Duong Luan helped me work through documents in Hanoi. Ms. Bui Thi Hue and Mr. Pham Xuan Thao helped locate documents at National Archives Center Number 2 in Ho Chi Minh City. Prof. Nguyen Huu Nguyen of the Social Sciences and Humanities Center in Ho Chi Minh City explained the Vietnamese perspective on the war. I was fortunate to have excellent Vietnamese language instructors in Ms. Nguyen Tuyet Hang, Ms. Dang Thanh Chuc, Ms. Diana Leisk, and Ms. Nguyen Thu Thuy with whom I studied in Bangkok in 2001-2002, and Ms. Kim Ha in Toronto in 2006. In Austin, Texas, Mr. John Wilson and Ms. Regina Greenwell, archivists at the Lyndon Johnson Library, and Dr. Carl Spadoni and Dr. Ken Blackwell at the Bertrand Russell Archive at McMaster University, led me to important papers. Dr. Pierre Asselin shared important North Vietnamese communist party documents with me, and Dr. Mrinal Chandra Sen Gupta's guidance was helpful. I was initially inspired to study the Vietnam War as a graduate student of Dr. Michael Hunt, and Chinese history under Prof. Sidney Rittenberg and Dr. David Barrett. My research interest in Vietnam goes back to 1991 when my editors in Singapore Mr. Mano Sabnani, Mr. Patrick Daniel, and Ms. Margaret Thomas encouraged me to travel to Vietnam in order to specialize in the country. At the time, my meetings with Vietnamese government ministers were arranged by Foreign Press Center senior officials Mr. Nguyen Cong Quang and Mr. Do Cong Minh in Hanoi, and Mr. Nguyen Van Niem in Ho Chi Minh City. My wife Julie's encouragement and criticism made this project both rewarding and challenging. I acknowledge the support of my family: my brother Vinod and his wife Sumita; my sister Anjna, and nephews Sanjay and Rajat (and their wives Ipsita and Shailaja); my brother Ashok, who inspired my interest in conflict studies; as well as my caring and supportive parents-in-laws Tarun and v Anima Banerjee, whose home in Calcutta was a rest and recuperation haven after my research trips to Vietnam. I thank my brother- and sister-in-law, Ranjan and Carmen Banerjee, for welcoming me into their home in idyllic Potomac Falls, Virginia, for an extended stay when I was doing research at the U.S. National Archives at College Park, Maryland. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page List of Abbreviations vai Introduction Locating "People" in the Diplomacy of the Vietnam War Chapter One Constructing the Diplomatic Front: 15 "Peeling the Colonial Tangerine" Chapter Two Forging Links with the "Western Alliance": 69 "They are Winning the Propaganda War Against Us" Chapter Three Coordinating Diplomatic Strategy 114 with "Non-Aligned" Countries: "We, too, have Husbands and Children" Chapter Four Communist Camaraderie: 160 Sustaining the Resistance War with "Sympathy" and "Symphony" Chapter Five Conducting Informal Diplomacy 209 with Bertrand Russell: "We Sympathize with North Vietnam, but we are not Hanoi's Propagandists" Conclusion Recognizing the Diplomatic Front 275 in the History of the Vietnam War Bibliography 283 vu Abbreviations ACFTU All-China Federation of Trade Unions ARVN Army of the Republic of Vietnam BRA Bertrand Russell Archive BRPF Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation CCP Chinese Communist Party CIA Central Intelligence Agency COINTELPRO Counter Intelligence Program COSVN Central Office of South Vietnam (Trung Uong Cuc Mien Nam) CPSU Communist Party of the Soviet Union CWIHP Cold War International History Project DRV Democratic Republic of Vietnam FBIS Foreign Broadcast Information Service FCP French Communist Party FRUS Foreign Relations of the United States GDR German Democratic Republic IADL International Association of Democratic Lawyers ICP Indochinese Communist Party IUS International Union of Students, rwcT International War Crimes Tribunal LBJ Lyndon Baines Johnson MACV Military Assistance Command, Vietnam NARA National Archives and Records Administration NCLS Nghien Cuu Lich Su (Historical Research) NCQT Nghien Cuu Quoc Te (International Studies) ND Nhan Dan (People 's Daily) NLF National Liberation Front (Mat Tran Giai Phong Mien Nam) NVN North Vietnam