|
Vietnam The Aftermath of Geneva
The Geneva Agreements were viewed with doubt and
dissatisfaction on all sides. Concern over possible United States
intervention, should the Geneva talks fail, was probably a major
factor in Hanoi's decision to accept the compromise agreement.
The United States had dissociated itself from the final
declaration, although it had stated that it would refrain from
the threat or use of force to disturb the agreements. President
Dwight D. Eisenhower wrote to the new Prime Minister of the Bao
Dai government, Ngo Dinh Diem, in September 1954 promising United
States support for a noncommunist Vietnam. Direct United States
aid to South Vietnam began in January 1955, and American advisors
began arriving the following month to train South Vietnamese army
troops. By early 1955, Diem had consolidated his control by
moving against lawless elements in the Saigon area and by
suppressing the religious sects in the Mekong Delta. He also
launched a "denounce the communists" campaign, in which,
according to communist accounts, 25,000 communist sympathizers
were arrested and more than 1,000 killed. In August 1955, Diem
issued a statement formally refusing to participate in
consultations with the DRV, which had been called for by the
Geneva Agreement to prepare for national elections. In October,
he easily defeated Bao Dai in a seriously tainted referendum and
became president of the new Republic of Vietnam.
Despite the growing likelihood that national elections would
not be held, the communist leadership in Hanoi decided for the
time being to continue to concentrate its efforts on the
political struggle. Several factors led to this decision,
including the weakness of the party apparatus in the South, the
need to concentrate on strengthening the war-weakened North, and
pressure from the communist leadership of the Soviet Union,
which, under General Secretary Nikita Khrushchev, had inaugurated
its policy of peaceful coexistence with the West. By 1957,
however, a shift to a more militant approach to the reunification
of the country was apparent. Partly in response to Diem's
anticommunist campaign, the Party stepped up terrorist activities
in the South, assassinating several hundred officials of the Diem
government. This led to the arrest of another 65,000 suspected
Communists and the killing of more than 2,000 by the Saigon
government in 1957. Repression by the Diem regime led to the rise
of armed rebel self-defense units in various parts of the South,
with the units often operating on their own without any party
direction. Observing that a potential revolutionary situation had
been created by popular resentment of the Diem government and
fearing that the government's anticommunist policy would destroy
or weaken party organization in the South, the VWP leadership
determined that the time had come to resort to violent struggle.
Data as of December 1987
|
