Ho chi minh and USA through the OSS (premise of CIA

1 The Impact of OSS on Vietminh: A reconsideration of events between 1944-1945 Circumstances giving rise to empowering of Vietminh resulted in the August Revolution After its foundation in 1941, Vietminh gradually seized power taking the advantage of a number of events Ho Chi Minh’s distinctive character significantly contributed to this result It is the focus of this essay on the relationship between US, namely OSS (Office of Strategic Services) and Ho Chi Minh before and just after the proclamation of Vietnamese independence in August 1945 Brief Chronology of the events before March 1945, Japanese Coup Vietnam was a French colony in the beginning of World War II, since the second half of the 19th century After the onset of the war, France was partially conquered by Germany within a couple of months and Japan sent troops to Indochina without formally conquering it In appearance, the French rule continued in the region; at that time a collaborator Vichy regime was in administration in France The arrival of first Japanese troops Indochina rapidly drew the attention of USA to that region This attention subsided with the acute and unexpected entry of USA to the war in 1941, however, with the feeling of an imminent victory in 1943, a renewed interest in terms of post war peace plans of Roosevelt was evident The anti-French and anti-colonialist attitude of President Roosevelt was evident and the trusteeship formula on his agenda for Indochina was well known This led to an increased Michael H Hunt.,Lyndon Johnson’s War: America’s Cold War Crusade in Vietnam, 1945-1968, (New York: Hill and Wang, 1996), pp 5-6 R Harris Smith, OSS: The Secret History of America’s First Central Intelligence Agency, (California: California University Press, 1972), p 327 R Harris Smith is an academician, journalist He worked for CIA for a brief period and resigned in 1969 2 need of intelligence about Indochina OSS, which was founded by William Donovan after the entrance of US into the Second World War, established a base at Kunming in 1942 In mid August 1942, Price was appointed as the chief for secret intelligence, Far East divison of OSS.3 From a China base OSS officers could launch missions Korea, Thailand, Philippines, Indochina and Japan.4 Although the importance of Indochina probably ranked last by the end of 1942 this situation had changed Chinese, American and British Intelligence services began to deal seriously with obtaining accurate information about what was going on there Naturally, there was a functioning French administration and a French intelligence in that territory; however, as goals of Allies diverged towards the oncoming war, an urgent need for an independent first hand intelligence emerged Thus, Donovan forced to look for a man for this purpose who was capable of holding good relationships with Tai Li and Chiang Kai-Shek The person chosen for this job was U.S Naval Captain Milton Miles Tai Li was the head of Chiang Kai-Shek’s secret service organizations Miles was interested in Chinese culture and history and managed to learn a bit of both Cantonese and Mandarin.Miles and Tai Li quickly developed good relationships and Li permitted Miles to pursue his intelligence goals Miles was appointed chief of the OSS for Far East in December 1942 His initial studies about North Vietnam revealed that there were noteworthy activities in terms of intelligence in that territory For organization of an intelligence mission in Indochina, Miles selected Robert Meynier, a young French Naval Officer to run the operation with the assistance of his Eurasian wife, a Vietnamese from maternal side Despite the anticipated advantages because of his wife’s connections, Meynier’s operations were almost dominated by French agents Maochun Yu, OSS in China: Prelude to Cold War, (London: Yale University Press, 1996), p.19 R Harris Smith, OSS: The Secret History of America’s First Central Intelligence Agency, p 243 Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, The OSS and Ho Chi Minh: Unexpected Allies in the War Against Japan , (University of Kansas Press, 2006), p 69 Mark Philip Bradley, Imagining Vietnam and America: The Making of Postcolonial Vietnam, 1919- 1950, (Chapel Hill: University of North Caroline Press, 2000), pp 94-95 3 However, because of the tensions between Miles and OSS headquarters, and French intervention this enterprise proved short-lived Miles was dismissed of his position as the chief of OSS China in December, 1943 Consequently, Meynier network collapsed in a short time.7 Yet again, Meynier’s group was not the only one performing intelligence activities in Vietnam There were some other independent groups as well Among these, most influential was the GBT group Being one of the most remarkable groups in the history of Intelligence, GBT was made up of the initials of surnames of three exceptional individuals: Laurence Gordon, Harry Bernard and Frank Tan Gordon was a British subject born in Canada with a home in California After selling his coffee plantation in Kenya he dealt with various businesses In 1938 he was in Haiphong, French Indochina, directing oil operations for Cal Texaco Corporation.8 After the Japanese occupied the area, Gordon and his family settled in California However, in 1941, he was encouraged by the company to return to South East Asia He initially confined his activities to maintaining a company presence among the former employees of Cal Texaco Later, under the guise of free lancing oil agent he travelled through Tonkin, Annam and Cochinchina, renewing old contacts, regrouping loyal Frenchmen and Vietnamese, while at the same time organizing a network of informers What at first may have been a casual arrangement soon converted to an amateur intelligence organization In a short time, utilizing British funds, radios and equipment and Chinese personnel, Gordon was joined by two American associates One was Frank Tan, a Bostonian of Chinese extraction who had known Gordon in Haiphong, and the other was Harry Bernard, a former Cal-Texaco R Harris Smith, OSS: The Secret History of America’s First Central Intelligence Agency, pp 323-24 Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 64 Archimedes L.A Patti, Why Viet Nam ? : Prelude to America’s Albatross, (California: University of California Press, 1980, p 44 Archimedes Patti was an OSS officer Later, he became a critical actor in relations with Viethmin and Ho Chi Minh 4 employee in Saigon This organization, by the end of 1943 became invaluable for Chinese and Chennault’s 14th Air Force in Kunming.10 Although OSS clearly knew about GBT, it was not until Miles’s dismissal from OSS and the subsequent collapse of all hopes for the Meynier network that they began to seriously investigate Gordon, Bernard and Tan and the information web they had created The network involved a wide array of agents, including both French and Vietnamese personnel Although, there is no concrete evidence about a bond between GBT and Vietminh, Cecil Currey claimed that, since 1942, Vietminh cadres had provided helpful information to GBT group.11 The man tasked to establish a relationship with GBT was Major Austin Glass He moved to Vietnam in his early twenties, worked for Standart Oil Company for 25 years, married a Vietnamese woman and retired in 1937 In his report to OSS, Glass stated that without doubt the GBT was the best equipped both in and outside of French Indochina to obtain information.12 Resultantly, OSS assigned Lieutenant Charles Fenn as a liaison between OSS and GBT For the last three months of 1944, Charles Fenn was the only OSS officer working with and reporting on GBT activities Fenn was born in 1909 in UK In his early twenties he emigrated to U.S and settled in California In 1941 he became war correspondant and photographer for Associated Press and he joined OSS in 1943 Through the end of the 1944 he was accepted to accompany the GBT group in return for fund and equipment support from OSS In a short time he was able to hold good relationships with the members of GBT 13 From the beginning of his work with GBT, Fenn continuously considered using Vietnamese groups for intelligence GBT members expressed their attitudes against working with 10 ibid., p 45 11 Cecil B Currey, Victory at Any Cost: The Genius of Viet Nam’s Gen Vo Nguyen Giap, (Washington, DC: Brassey, 1997), p 84, qouted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 88 12 NARA document, RG 226, Entry 92A, Box 26, Folder 391 Untitled document regarding Austin Glass, quoted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 89 13 Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, pp 94-100 5 Indochinese, but Fenn also queried Chinese General Chen for the reason behind the Chinese objection to using Vietnamese agents Chen’s response was decisive: “They aren’t to be trusted… They are not really interested in the war against Chinese It’s true they are antiJapanese, but they are equally anti-French To a lesser degree they are anti-Chinese… I suppose you are already heard that they profess to be pro-American This is because they hope you will help them to gain independence when the war is over and we kick the Japanese out You may be approached by a group known as the Vietminh, which is more or less communist although they pretend to be strictly nationalist.” Additionally Chen remarked that offending France for the sake of helping an insignificant group never amount to anything He also added that they have a big sales talk but nothing much to sell.14 One of the tasks of GBT was to rescue the pilots which were downed Gordon established a complex system for this purpose Through the end of the 1944, they heard news about the rescue of a downed American pilot by Vietminh guerillas On November 11, 1944 a U.S plane piloted by Lieutenant Rudolph Shaw encountered engine trouble while flying over the Sino-Vietnamese frontier and parachuted safely Although French authorities saw this and dispatched to locate him, members of a local Vietminh unit were first to reach him and immediately brought him to Ho Chi Minh Ho Chi Minh greeted him effusively colloquial English “How you Pilot? Where are you from?” Shaw was reportedly so excited that he hugged Ho and later said to him “When I heard your voice, I felt as if I were hearing the voice of my father in the United States.”15 Fenn gave an account of this event from the Vietminh point of view: “It so happened that while he was on his way through Caobang, one of his guerilla units rescued an American pilot Lieutenant Shaw, who had parachuted into the jungle 14 Charles Fenn, Memoirs, unpublished diary, quoted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, pp 105-6 Bartholomew-Feis quoted from the Memoirs by the courtesy of Fenn 15Rudolph Shaw, The Real Indochina, unpublished paper, quoted in William Duiker, Ho Chi Minh: A Life, (New York: Hyperion,2000), p 188 6 when his plane had been shot by the Japanese The French and Japans actively searched for him but the revolutionary masses protected him and brought him to Pham Van Dong’s office… Ho instructed a team to take Shaw over the border and deliver him safely into American’s hands He could hardly have guessed that this action would prove a magic key to open doors otherwise impregnable”.16 Ho accompanied Shaw and took him to American base at Kunming He refused the offered reward and requested only to meet General Chennault; however he was politely shown the door U.S was not ready to operate inside Vietnam with its own teams; and following the new Truman directive, it did not wish at this stage to quarrel with the French by backing the natives Nevertheless, Fenn called this rescue operation as the first “ace” of Ho Chi Minh.17 The second one was just on the way The Japanese Coup On of March, suddenly, Japanese sent an ultimatum to French governor with the request that French should join to the Japanese in the defense of Indochina in the event of an Allied incursion and all the French military and Police forces be placed under the command and control of Japanese military authorities The time limit was specified as hours The answer was asking for more time for a consultation with the French government However, at the end of two hours, Japanese military was ordered to seizing posts and taking over the administration.18 This was a shocking and unexpected event that changed all the dynamics in Indochina Now, this territory converted to land under direct administration of the enemy All the French civil and military elements were eliminated Roosevelt’s first directives as follows: 16 Charles Fenn: Ho Chi Minh, A Biographical Introduction by Charles Fenn, (New York: Charles Scriber’s Sons, 1973), p 73 17 ibid., p 74-75 18 Archimedes L.A Patti, Why Viet Nam? ,p 72-73 7 “No equipment of arms will be given French Indochina under any circumstances Food and medical supplies may be furnished on humanitarian grounds but it was not indicated that we should supply those OSS may as much as they can in French Indochina for intelligence purposes only and may only take in such equipment and arms as necessary for teams’ own protection, no sabotage work to be done.19 First Official Contact with Ho Chi Minh Most of the foreign citizens inside Indochina were now placed under arrest or removed from their positions and the GBT group fled to South China Faced with the loss of their chief source of intelligence in Indochina, U.S officials began to seek new channels of information, even from anti-French Vietnamese resistance groups 20 Fenn described the situation as follows: “… the Japanese coup of March 9, silenced the GBT and all existing networks This meant no information coming in about targets, air defenses and Japanese troop movements, and no weather reports to headquarters therefore directed me to replace our lost French agents with a Vietnamese network.”21 Fenn had just heard about a Vietnamese connected to a large political group who rescued a pilot When he asked how he might meet him, it was said that he was still in Kunming and occasionally could be found at the American Office of War Information, where he read everything from Time magazine to the Encyclopedia Americana The meeting was arranged for 17 March, only days after the Japanese coup Fenn wrote his diary in that date: “Ho was not what I expected… It seems that he had already met Hall, Glass 19 NARA document, Memo from Colonel Bird to Colonel Heppner, April 25, 1945, RG 226, Entry 154, Box 199, Folder 3373, quoted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 131 This was General Wedemeyer’s directive based on his interview with FDR in March 20 William Duiker, Ho Chi Minh: A Life, (New York: Hyperion, 2000), p 288 21 Charles Fenn: Ho Chi Minh ,p 76 8 and Sibour (OSS officers), but go nowhere with any of them I asked him what he had wanted of them He said only recognition of his group… I told him about our work and asked whether he would like to help us He said they might be able to but had no radio operators nor of course any equipment We discussed taking in a radio and generator and a radio operator… I asked him what he would want in return for helping us Arms and medicines, he said… It was agreed we should have a further meeting.22 After this meeting Bernard and Tan agreed that it would be helpful to work with this group and we decided that one of our Chinese radio operators Mac Shin and Tan would go to Vietnam with Ho In the second meeting everything went well and they agreed on everything Although Ho asked for high explosives Fenn promised only about light weapons, medicines and further radio sets However, Ho had one more request He wanted to meet Chennault whom he admired and could not be able to meet previously Fenn accepted this as long as he agreed not to ask him for anything: neither supplies nor promises for support.23 The meeting came in 29 of March and took place in a formal, graceful manner At the end of the meeting, Ho requested a photo of Chennault and after obtaining it requested him to sign it Chennault signed it and wrote: “Yours Sincerely, Claire L Chennault” Just before the voyage to the base of Vietminh with Tan and the Chinese radio operator Ho asked Fenn for a last favor, six new Colt 45 automatic pistols in their original wrappings Fenn accepted this last request as well 24 The group set out in 15th of April for Bac Bo, Ho’s base Americans at Vietminh’s Base 22 ibid 23 ibid, p 77 24 ibid, p 78-79 9 After arriving the Vietminh headquarters at Bac Bo at the end of April, Tan wrote his initial impression: “The country where I am is very poor They could not afford to pay taxes and still exist As near as I can judge, this league is quite powerful and has several hundred followers.”25 Mac Shin quickly began to teach some of them radio technique Tan also gave an account of the weapons they brought with them: Two riffles, three carbines, a Bren gun and a few six shooters.26 Ho quickly sent a his first intelligence report to Patti in Kunming, with some details about the Japanese 37th Division, their location, units and names of theis officers Patti considered this as a good start 27 As Frank Tan and Mac Shin settled into a routine in the Vietminh base camp, the GBT intelligence network began to take shape Charles Fenn and Harry Bernard received the reports in Kunming and passed information to AGAS (Air Ground Aid Service) an aid organization of the 14th Air Force Training of Vietminh cadres was not confined to Bac Bo.28 A number of personnel was sent to Kunming to be educated by the OSS officers In a letter to Fenn Ho wrote: “I will be very much obliged to you of taking care of our boys I wish they can learn radio and other thing necessary in our common fight against Japs.”29 Probably this group consisted of few man and they were trained largely for intelligence purposes The first couriers from the Bac Bo brought a wealth of information from inside Indochina including letters, maps, documents, Japanese leaflets and other morale operation material During their months together, Ho, Tan and Shin developed a close friendship He recalled: “As my relationship with Ho became closer, I began to see him as the 25 NARA document, GBT Indochina Inteeligence report from Frank Tan, May 10, 1945 and, May 12, 1945, RG 226, Entry 140, Box 40, Folder 314, quoted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, pp 163-4 26 ibid 27 Archimedes L.A Patti, Why Viet Nam? ,p 102 Archimedes Patti was appointed as Secret Intelligence chief of the Indochina desk arrived at Kunming on April 13 He was a proponent of using Vietnamese agents for intelligence purposes 28 Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 165 29 Charles Fenn: Ho Chi Minh ,p 76 10 man he was –a man who dedicated his life to win freedom for his people” 30 During these days Fenn heard an interesting event from one of the couriers of Ho The courier told him the event as follows: “Since Ho was away so long there were rumors he had died Others said he had gone to America… When he arrived at the base he had with him this Chinese American as well as a radio operator and all sorts of weapons, better than anything either the French and Japanese had… he invited all the top leaders to an conference, not his own people but rivals working for the other groups, who had used his absence to push themselves forward Ho told them he had now secured the help of the Americans including Chennault At first nobody believed him Then he produced the photograph of Chennault signed “Yours sincerely” After this he sent for the automatic and gave one to each of the leaders as a present The leaders considered Chennault had sent these presents personally After this conference there was never any more talk about was the top leader.” 31 Fenn adds: “Soon after we dropped in a load of supplies; radio sets, medicines, gadgets, weapons According to Tan, this drop caused a sensation and Ho’s stock went up another ten points.32 Although Vietminh seemed to be a powerful organization in mid 1945, the beginning of its armed propaganda was new The nucleus of Vietminh, ICP had declared in 1941 that the “watchword of the party is to liberate the Indochinese people from the Japanese and French yoke For three years Vietminh engaged in little more than an empty rhetoric Foundation of the first Armed Propaganda Brigade for liberation took place in 1944 Despite this fact, popularity of the organization seemed indisputable namely in the north Its attitude against famine gained the hearts of people When ICP perceived that famine could be used as a means to stir up the hatred against French and Japanese, the slogan “destroy the granaries, solve the 30 Full Transcript of 1997 OSS/Vietminh Meeting, p 21, quoted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 169 Bartholomew-Feis make this quotation from Duiker by the courtesy ho him 31 Charles Fenn: Ho Chi Minh , p 81 32 ibid 11 danger of hunger” was created Vietminh cadres in North and northern central Vietnam organized and led peasants in destroying hundreds of granaries The front coupled an appeal to well to people to help out the hungry with an appeal to join the Vietminh Vietminh led attacks on the Japanese rice transport and granaries Although there were a number of resistance organizations like Vietnamese National Party (V.N.Q.D.D), none of them was popular and widespread as Vietminh in the beginning of 1945 33 The leadership of Ho Chi Minh was hardly disputable He was well known in the country and in the communist movement As early as February 1930, Ho was the chairmen in the conference held for reconciliation of various revolutionary groups.34 It is highly probable that the assumption of a concrete alliance with Americans might have peaked the prestige him among groups However, it will be sound not to exaggerate this fact While small scale training in the Vietminh base was going on, the routine in Kunming had become tedious for the energetic Fenn With a burning desire to escape his desk Fenn planned to join Tan and Shin at the Vietminh headquarters His request was quickly rejected, but instead another agent Lieutenant Dan Phelan was parachuted to Vietminh’s base in mid-June Upon landing he was met by Tan who took him to Ho, Giap and other Vietminh people.35 In the OSS/Vietminh meeting held in 1997, Tan recollected, “Dan Phelan was looked upon by the Vietminh as a most sympathetic friend and a good person.” 36 Soon like the other, Phelan began to see the Vietminh in a new light He wrote one of his wires: “You are 33 Huyn Kim Kanh, “The Vietnamese August Revolution Reinterpreted”, Journal of Asian Studies, v.30, no.4, (1971), p.770, 777 34 ibid 35Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 182-3 36 Full Transcript of 1997 OSS/Vietminh Meeting, p 51, quoted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p.359 12 misunderstanding Vietminh attitude, they are not anti-French merely patriots deserve full trust and support 37 As Americans there were only Tan and Phelan in the Vietminh base However, on May 16 Major Allison Thomas received an order to commence work as Special Operations Team Number 13, code-named “Deer” His primary mission was to interdict Japanese lines of communication, specifically the railroad and French colonial highways in the Hanoi- Ningming area His secondary mission were to work with guerillas and indicate targets of opportunity for the Air Force.38 Thomas’s second command was Lieutenant Rene Defourneaux In addition to Thomas and Defourneaux, the Deer Team consisted of Private First Class Henry Prunier, Sergeant Alan Squires, the team photographer; Private First Class Paul Hoagland, the medic; Sergeant William Zielski, the radio operator; and Sergeant Lawrence Vogt, a weapon instructor.39 Before the beginning of the mission of Deer Team, Patti was instructed to negotiate and conciliate with the French Because the discussions came to a dead end and Patti decided to set out 40 However, he accepted three French envoys to accompany them On July 16, Thomas parachuted to Indochina with two American members Prunnier and Zielski They noticed that Vietminh guerillas were armed with French riffles, a few Brens, a few tommies, a few carbines and a few stens Accompanying them were French Officer Lieutenant Montford and two representatives of the French army Sergeant Logos and Sergenat Phac.41 Whereas the Americans were treated royally, enmity of Vietminh to French was evident Thomas soon weighed up the odds and decided to return French and work with 37 Charles Fenn: Ho Chi Minh , p 81 38 NARA document, Special Operations branch APO 627, “Letter of Instructions” to Major Thomas”, May 16, 1945, RG 226, Entry 154, Box 199, Folder 3377, quoted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 188 39 Archimedes L.A Patti, Why Viet Nam? ,p 124-5 40 ibid, p 125-26 41 ibid,p 127 13 Ho.42 While the uncertainty of the mission of Deer team was continuing, the news of first Vietminh attack came on July 16 Vietminh had attacked the Japanese garrison at Tam Tao, a tiny hill station manned by perhaps as few as nine Japanese soldiers 43 Its now the turn of Thomas Allison to be impressed by Ho and Vietminh In the Deer Team’s first official report to Kunming, written only one day after his arrival, Thomas stated flatly: Forget the Communist Bogy, Viet Minh League is not Communist Stands for freedom and reforms from French harshness.”44 With the approval of his chiefs, Allison called to rest of the team On July 29 the rest of the team parachuted to Indochina Over the next few days the men prepared to begin their training mission, stowing their supplies, selecting sites for their training ground and living headquarters and briefly touring the surrounding villages, in which they were warmly welcomed As the last month of the war began, the Americans in Vietnam, unaware that Japan’s defeat was imminent, settled into life with the Vietminh 45 For the first six days in August the Vietnamese and the Americans worked together building the training camp The instruction in American drill and in the use of American weapons began on August 9, the bombing day of Nagasaki and days after the bombing of Hiroshima Unaware of what was going on, the training on guerilla warfare against Japanese began On August 15 it was heard that the Japan accepted the surrender Although instructed to “sit tight until further orders, on August 16, the Deer Team and the Vietnamese-American Force left Tan Trao to attack the Japanese at Thai Nguyen, which was the first town to be freed from enemy’s hands The relationship among Giap, Ho and Thomas Allison was extraordinarily warm, and the members of the Deer team felt disturbed about that They thought that their leaders was under full control of Giap Giap sent an ultimatum to Japanese for their surrender, after Japanese 42 Charles Fenn, Memoirs, unpublished diary, p 227, quoted in Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 196 43 Dixee R Bartholomew-Feis, p 200 44 ibid, p 202 45 ibid, p 206-7 14 rejected this Thai Nguyen war began This was a low scale war, largely a symbolic struggle Historian Tonneson wrote: “French Services in China had received information that the Vietminh intended to launch an attack on Japanese position in order to give the United States a pretext for helping them.” During the battle Thomas Allison was not with his Deer Team, he was rather with Vietminh giving the impression that he was conducting the attack Defourneaux, a member of Deer Team wrote that: “The war is over Why take a chance on getting bumped off now?”46 On August 25, cease fire was accepted by both sides without an official surrender of Japanese In the meantime, some Vietminh forces were on the way of Hanoi On August 19, Giap was instructed to leave some forces in Thai Nguyen and walk to Hanoi, as well Vietminh forces were greeted with great ceremony in Hanoi On September 2, Ho Chi Minh in a public ceremony proclaimed independence of Vietnam Although not on the stage, OSS officials were present at the ceremony There were also two American P-38 Lightnings “swooped down low over the crowd This event was described by historian Marr as “immediately declared and believed by the people to represent a coordinated U.S salute to the fledgling Vietnamese government.” The pilots, however, would have known nothing about Vietnam’s Independence Day and were most probably conducting simple observations Bartholomew-Feis claims that more than two decades later, Americans writing about Vietnam also misinterpreted that event.47 Comment It is not possible to talk about an official relationship between Vietminh and OSS before the Japanese coup in March, 1945 Although, there some contacts between them, none 46 ibid, p 216-220 47 ibid, p 226-47, 377 15 of these were efficient and conclusive Even the unexpected pilot rescue operation of Vietminh and their accompanying to the pilot for the American base did not seem to impress U.S officials However, as the circumstances changed with the Japanese coup, Vietminh was suddenly recognized as an alternative intelligence mechanism in Indochina The first official meeting was on March 17, just eight days after the coup between OSS officer Charles Fenn and Ho Chi Minh Appearance of first Americans in the base of Vietminh was at the end of April The training was about radio operation techniques A few Vietnamese were trained in Kunming as well; however, there is no reason to believe that there was a large scale military training there The real fully equipped team with aim of training guerillas for military purposes went to Indochina in mid-June The arrangements for training took several days and military training began on August after the atomic bombs When we take into account that the Deer Team set out Tan Trao for Thai Nguyen on August 16, it became clear that the military training lasted only for seven days It is obvious that the contribution of U.S./OSS to Vietminh in terms of supplying weapons and military training was minimal If the propaganda of alliance with U.S added some to the prestige of Ho Chi Minh, this was very short lived In fact, if Ho owed his reputation and prestige to the very fact that he had warm relationships with U.S officers, then one should expect a discontent towards Ho Chi Minh when the great expectations about U.S collapsed Most of the OSS officers who worked with Vietminh became sympathizers of Ho, Giap and the independence goal of Vietminh In fact, official U.S policy was also closer to this idea When the state policy changed abruptly because of the international political dynamics, the situation changed The success of Vietminh in North, and later the success of Vietcong in south depends upon so many variables that these were also changed over the time period of 30 years However, there was something that did not changed over time This was 16 the warm relation between OSS and Vietminh’s high rank cadres This friendship continued despite the devastating war and in 1995 and 1997 OSS/Vietminh meetings were held BIBLIOGRAPHY Bartholomew-Feis, Dixee R., The OSS and Ho Chi Minh: Unexpected Allies in the War Against Japan , (University of Kansas Press, 2006) Bradley, Mark Philip, Imagining Vietnam and America: The Making of Postcolonial Vietnam, 19191950, (Chapel Hill: University of North Caroline Press, 2000) Duiker, William, Ho Chi Minh: A Life, (New York: Hyperion, 2000) Fenn, Charles, Ho Chi Minh: A Biographical Introduction by Charles Fenn, (New York: Charles Scriber’s Sons, 1973) Hunt, Michael H., Lyndon Johnson’s War: America’s Cold War Crusade in Vietnam, 1945-1968, (New York: Hill and Wang, 1996) Kanh, Huyn Kim, “The Vietnamese August Revolution Reinterpreted”, Journal of Asian Studies, v.30, no.4, (1971) Maochun Yu, OSS in China: Prelude to Cold War, (London: Yale University Press, 1996) Smith, R Harris, OSS: The Secret History of America’s First Central Intelligence Agency, (California: California University Press, 1972) Patti, Archimedes L.A., Why Viet Nam ? : Prelude to America’s Albatross, (California: University of California Press, 1980) Some comments of my own: There were limited sources on the issue of OSS-Vietminh relationship The leading source is the amazing research of Bartholomew-Feis It is unique for many reasons For example he obtained many primary sources which were unpublished He made many personal communications with the leading actors of the issue He used abundant NARA documents which were not published before For this reason in footnotes I refer to the original sources adding “quoted from Bartholomew-Feis” I used two primary sources; one is Charles Fenn’s book about Ho Chi Minh, the other is Archimedes Patti’s book (thanks to google books-full text online!) 17 ... U.S officers, then one should expect a discontent towards Ho Chi Minh when the great expectations about U.S collapsed Most of the OSS officers who worked with Vietminh became sympathizers of Ho, ... March 17, just eight days after the coup between OSS officer Charles Fenn and Ho Chi Minh Appearance of first Americans in the base of Vietminh was at the end of April The training was about radio... the request that French should join to the Japanese in the defense of Indochina in the event of an Allied incursion and all the French military and Police forces be placed under the command and