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I offer sincere thanks to Stephen Streeter, Kees Boterbloem, and the two peer reviewers of The Historian for their helpful comments on this article. I am grateful for the assistance extended by archivists at the National Library, Hanoi (Thu Vien Quoc Gia), in accessing the Vietnamese language newspaper Nhan Dan and the historical journal Nghien Cuu Lich Su (Historical Research), and the archivists at the U.S. National Archives at College Park, Maryland, for guiding me to the records of the Paris Peace Talks. I would like to thank Thuan Huu, the Editor‐in‐Chief of Nhan Dan, and Pham Song Ha, the Head of Nahn Dan Online in Hanoi, for permitting me to use the artworks that accompany this article. I also thank Quynh Le Tran, Senior Producer at the British Broadcasting Corporation (Vietnamese Language Section in London), for his comments on my translations of Vietnamese artworks.
Notes
I offer sincere thanks to Stephen Streeter, Kees Boterbloem, and the two peer reviewers of The Historian for their helpful comments on this article. I am grateful for the assistance extended by archivists at the National Library, Hanoi (Thu Vien Quoc Gia), in accessing the Vietnamese language newspaper Nhan Dan and the historical journal Nghien Cuu Lich Su (Historical Research), and the archivists at the U.S. National Archives at College Park, Maryland, for guiding me to the records of the Paris Peace Talks. I would like to thank Thuan Huu, the Editor‐in‐Chief of Nhan Dan, and Pham Song Ha, the Head of Nahn Dan Online in Hanoi, for permitting me to use the artworks that accompany this article. I also thank Quynh Le Tran, Senior Producer at the British Broadcasting Corporation (Vietnamese Language Section in London), for his comments on my translations of Vietnamese artworks.
1. Memorandum of Conversation [from here: Memcon], Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, at Villa, Avenue du General Leclerc, Gif sur Yvette, 91 Essonne, France, 10 October 1972 (Nixon Presidential Materials Project [NPMP], National Security Council [NSC] Files, Henry A. Kissinger [HAK] Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 122, National Archives and Records Administration [NARA], College Park, MD).
2. CIA Intelligence Memo, “Vietnamese Communist views on the US negotiating position,” 3 October 1966, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, NVN leadership attitudes, 3L[3], 11/68–1/69, Box 86, Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library [LBJ Library], Austin, Texas.
3. Pierre Asselin, A Bitter Peace: Washington, Hanoi, and the Making of the Paris Agreement, Chapel Hill, NC: Taylor & Francis, 2002), 3–4.
4. James Clay Thompson, Rolling Thunder: Understanding Policy and Program Failure, Chapel Hill, NC: Taylor & Francis, 1980, 40–41; and Ronald B. Frankum, Like Rolling Thunder: The Air War in Vietnam, 1964–1975, Lanham, MD: Taylor & Francis, 2005, 20.
5. Daniel C. Hallin, The “Uncensored War”: The Media and Vietnam, Berkeley, CA: Taylor & Francis, 1989, 93.
6. Mary Hershberger, Traveling to Vietnam: American Peace Activists and the War, Syracuse, NY: Taylor & Francis, 1998, 75, 77.
7. Luu Van Loi, Fifty Years of Vietnamese Diplomacy, 1945–1995, Hanoi: Taylor & Francis, 2006, 183; and “A Brief Chronology of the Communist Party of Vietnam,” in 75 Years of the Communist Party of Vietnam, 1930–2005: A Selection of Documents from Nine Party Congresses, Hanoi: Taylor & Francis, 2005, 1281.
8. See Luu Van Loi, Fifty Years, 183–184. Loi's views are significant because of his long association with DRV diplomacy. He served as an assistant to the Vietnamese foreign minister from 1970–78, as a member of the DRV delegation to the Paris Peace Talks in 1972–73, and as deputy head of the DRV military delegation in the four‐party joint commission (including the DRV, the United States, the Republic of Vietnam, and the Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Vietnam) in Saigon in 1973.
9. See “Document: Comrade B on the Plot of the Reactionary Chinese Clique against Vietnam,” in edited by Priscilla Roberts, ed., Behind the Bamboo Curtain: China, Vietnam, and the World beyond Asia, Washington, DC: Taylor & Francis, 2006, 477.
10. Discussion between Zhou Enlai and Ayub Khan, 2 April 1965, “The Vietnam (Indochina) War(s),” Cold War International History Project, Virtual Archive, available at: http://www.wilsoncenter.org/digital‐archive, accessed 10 December 2008.
11. Excellent accounts of the negotiations in Paris leading to the signing of the peace agreement include, Asselin, A Bitter Peace; Gareth Porter, A Peace Denied: The United States, Vietnam, and the Peace Agreement, Bloomington, IN: Taylor & Francis, 1975; Larry Berman, No Peace, No Honor: Nixon, Kissinger, and Betrayal in Vietnam, New York: Taylor & Francis, 2002; Henry Kissinger, Ending the Vietnam War: A History of America's Involvement in and Extrication from the Vietnam War, New York: Taylor & Francis, 2003; Ang Cheng Guan, The Vietnam War from the Other Side: The Vietnamese Communists' Perspective, London: Taylor & Francis, 2002; Ang Cheng Guan, Ending the War: The Vietnamese Communists' Perspective, London: Taylor & Francis, 2004; Allan E. Goodman, The Lost Peace: America's Search for a Negotiated Settlement of the Vietnam War, Stanford, CA: Taylor & Francis, 1978; and Nguyen Phu Duc, The Viet‐Nam Peace Negotiations: Saigon's Side of the Story, Christiansburg, VA: Taylor & Francis, 2005.
12. Marvin Kalb and Bernard Kalb, Kissinger, Boston, MA: Taylor & Francis, 1974, 396; and Berman, No Peace.
13. See Robert Dallek, Nixon and Kissinger: Partners in Power, New York: Taylor & Francis, 2007, 188. Dallek depicts how DRV negotiator Le Duc Tho laughed at Kissinger's jokes, but Dallek does not examine humor as a strategy. See as well Henry Kissinger, White House Years, Boston, MA: Taylor & Francis, 1979), 442; Jeremi Suri, Henry Kissinger and the American Century Cambridge, MA: Taylor & Francis, 2007, 229; Jussi Hanhimaki, The Flawed Architect: Henry Kissinger and American Foreign Policy, Oxford: Taylor & Francis, 2004; Seymour M. Hersh, The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1983; and Walter Isaacson, Kissinger, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1992.
14. See Robert D. Schulzinger, Henry Kissinger: Doctor of Diplomacy, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1989, 30.
15. Harish C. Mehta, “Soviet Biscuit Factories and Chinese Financial Grants: North Vietnam's Economic Diplomacy in 1967 and 1968,” Diplomatic History 2, 2012, 301–335.
16. See Sandra Swart, “‘The Terrible Laughter of the Afrikaner'—Towards a Social History of Humor,” Journal of Social History 4, 2009, 889–917; Melvin E. Page, “‘With Jannie in the Jungle’: European Humor in an East African Campaign,” The International Journal of African Historical Studies 3, 1981, 466–481; and Christina Kotchemidova, “From Good Cheer to ‘Drive‐By Smiling': A Social History of Cheerfulness,” Journal of Social History 1, 2005), 5–37.
17. Manfred Pfister, “Introduction: A History of English Laughter,” in edited by Manfred Pfister, ed. A History of English Laughter: Laughter from Beowulf to Beckett and Beyond, Amsterdam: Taylor & Francis, 2002, v–x: vi–vii.
18. Virginia Richter, “Laughter and Aggression: Desire and Derision in a Postcolonial Context,” in edited by Susanne Reichl et al., eds, Cheeky Fictions: Laughter and the Postcolonial, Amsterdam: Taylor & Francis, 2005, 61–72: 63.
19. Daniel Wickberg, The Senses of Humor: Self and Laughter in Modern America, Ithaca, NY: Taylor & Francis, 1998, 114.
20. Antonin Obrdlik, “Gallows Humor—A Sociological Phenomenon,” American Journal of Sociology 5, 1941, 709–716.
21. Gary Alan Fine, “Sociological Approaches to the Study of Humor,” in edited by Paul E. Mcghee et al., eds, Handbook of Humor Research, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1983, 159–181: 174.
22. See John Morreall, Taking Laughter Seriously, Albany, NY: Taylor & Francis, 1983, 4, 15, 20; and Simon Critchley, On Humour, London: Taylor & Francis, 2002, 3.
23. See John Morreall, Comic Relief: A Comprehensive Philosophy of Humor, Malden, MA: Taylor & Francis, 2009, 56; and Nicholas Garland, “Political Cartooning,” in edited by John Durant et al., eds, Laughing Matters: A Serious Look at Humour, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1988, 75–89: 76.
24. As noted in Anthony Corbeill, Controlling Laughter: Political Humor in the Late Roman Republic, Princeton, NJ: Taylor & Francis, 1996, 4–5.
25. Barry Sanders, Sudden Glory: Laughter as Subversive History, Boston, MA: Taylor & Francis, 1995, xi.
26. Ibid., 2–6.
27. Ibid., 81.
28. Dr. Carlos Gonzales, University of Arizona, in delivering a native Indian blessing at a memorial service on 12 January 2011, honoring the victims of the Tucson, AZ, shooting that killed six people as well as wounding thirteen others including Congresswoman Gabrielle Gifford on 8 January of that year.
29. Wickberg, Senses of Humor, 199, 204.
30. John Biesanz and Mavis Biesanz, Modern Society: An Introduction to Social Science, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1954, 620.
31. For communist‐bloc humor, see John Kolasky, compiler, Look Comrade—The People are Laughing: Underground Wit, Satire, and Humour from Behind the Iron Curtain, Toronto: Taylor & Francis, 1972; and Algis Ruksenas, Is That You Laughing Comrade: The World's Best Russian (Underground Jokes), Secaucus, NJ: Taylor & Francis, 1986.
32. Also see C. Banc and Alan Dundes, compilers, You Call This Living: A Collection of East European Political Jokes, Athens, GA: Taylor & Francis, 1990); and Ben Lewis, compiler, Hammer & Tickle: The History of Communism Told Through Communist Jokes, London: Taylor & Francis, 2008.
33. See for instance William Nelson, Out of the Crocodile's Mouth: Russian Cartoons about the United States from “Krokodil,” Moscow's Humor Magazine, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1949.
34. Don Luce, “Popular Art and Society in Vietnam: Art and Revolution,” edited by Michael Klein, ed., The Vietnam Era: Media and Popular Culture in the US and Vietnam, London: Taylor & Francis, 1990, 163–190: 163–5.
35. William J. Duiker, Ho Chi Minh, New York: Taylor & Francis, 2000, 79.
36. Luce, “Popular Art,” 168.
37. Vu Trong Phung, The Industry of Marrying Europeans, trans. Thuy Tranviet, Ithaca, NY: Taylor & Francis, 2006, 9.
38. Ibid., 25.
39. Joseph Dorinson and Joseph Boskin, “Racial and Ethnic Humor,” in edited by Lawrence E. Mintz, ed., Humor in America: A Research Guide to Genres and Topics, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1988, 163–193: 179.
40. Bao Ninh, The Sorrow of War: A Novel of North Vietnam, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1993, 9. For other examples of humor, see ibid., 11, 62, 98, 147, 167, 169, and 199.
41. Duong Thu Huong, Novel Without a Name, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1995, 162. For other examples of humor, see ibid., 32, 74, 160, 165, 173, 175, 196, 199, 215, 217, 241, 243, and 274.
42. Duong Thu Huong, Paradise of the Blind, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1993, 156. For other examples of humor, see ibid., 17, 66, 153, and 194.
43. Ibid., 160.
44. Kissinger, White House Years, 977.
45. Ibid., 1035.
46. Henry Kissinger, Years of Renewal, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1999, 469.
47. Henry Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, Boston, MA: Taylor & Francis, 1982, 24.
48. Berman, No Peace, 63.
49. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 21 February 21, 1970, North Vietnamese Residence in Paris, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 121, NARA.
50. Asselin, Bitter Peace, 22.
51. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 21 February 1970, North Vietnamese Residence in Paris, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 121, NARA.
52. Ibid.
53. Berman, No Peace, 73.
54. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 21 February 1970, North Vietnamese Residence in Paris, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 121, NARA.
55. Ibid.
56. Asselin, Bitter Peace, 2–25.
57. Berman, No Peace, 69–70.
58. Ibid.
59. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 16 March 1970, North Vietnamese Residence in Paris, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 121, NARA.
60. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 4 April 1970, North Vietnamese Residence in Paris, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 121, NARA.
61. Ibid.
62. Ibid.
63. Ibid.
64. Asselin, Bitter Peace, 23.
65. Ibid, 26–27.
66. Ibid, 27.
67. Ibid, 27.
68. Berman, No Peace, 85.
69. Ibid, 126–127.
70. Ibid.
71. Asselin, Bitter Peace, 59.
72. Ibid, 64.
73. Ibid, 79.
74. Ibid, 79.
75. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 8 October 1972, Villa, Avenue du General Leclerc, Gif sur Yvette, 91 Essonne, France, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 122, NARA.
76. Ibid.
77. Ibid.
78. Ibid.
79. Ibid.
80. Ibid.
81. Ibid.
82. Ibid.
83. Ibid.
84. Ibid.
85. Ibid.
86. Ibid.
87. Ibid.
88. Ibid.
89. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 9 October 1972, Villa, Avenue du General Leclerc, Gif sur Yvette, 91 Essonne, France, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 122, NARA.
90. Ibid.
91. Ibid.
92. Ibid.
93. Ibid.
94. Ibid.
95. Ibid.
96. Ibid.
97. Ibid.
98. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 10 October 1972, Villa, Avenue du General Leclerc, Gif sur Yvette, 91 Essonne, France, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 122, NARA.
99. Ibid.
100. Ibid.
101. Ibid.
102. Ibid.
103. Ibid.
104. Ibid.
105. Memcon, Le Duc Tho and Henry Kissinger, 11 October 1972, Villa, Avenue du General Leclerc, Gif sur Yvette, 91 Essonne, France, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 122, NARA.
106. Ibid.
107. Asselin, Bitter Peace, 86.
108. Ibid., 87.
109. Memcon, Xuan Thuy, Henry Kissinger, William Sullivan, 17 October 1972, Villa, Avenue du General Leclerc, Gif sur Yvette, 91 Essonne, France, NPMP, NSC Files, HAK Office Files, Country Files—Far East—Vietnam, Box 122, NARA.
110. Ibid.
111. Asselin, Bitter Peace, 79–126.
112. Ibid.
113. See James H. Willbanks, Abandoning Vietnam: How America Left and South Vietnam Lost its War, Lawrence, Taylor & Francis, 2004, 180; and Asselin, Bitter Peace, 145.
114. Ang Cheng Guan, Ending the Vietnam War, 116.
115. Porter, Peace Denied, 165.
116. Asselin, Bitter Peace, 164–165.
117. Kissinger, White House Years, 1466.
118. Ibid.
119. David G. Marr, “A Passion for Modernity: Intellectuals and the Media,” in edited by Hy V. Luong, ed., Postwar Vietnam: Dynamics of a Transforming Society, Lanham, MD: Taylor & Francis, 2003, 257–295: 261–2.
120. Kim N.B. Ninh, A World Transformed: The Politics of Culture in Revolutionary Vietnam, 1945–1965, Ann Arbor, MI: Taylor & Francis, 2002, 27.
121. Ibid, 85.
122. Trien Lam Tranh Da Kich Nich‐Xon, Nhan Dan, 25 February 1972, trang 4, So 6516, Thu Vien Quoc Gia (TVQG), Hanoi. [Artworks on Nixon's War, Nhan Dan, 25 February 1972, 4, Number 6516, National Library, Hanoi].
123. See Jeffrey Kimball, “The Nixon Doctrine: A Saga of Misunderstanding,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 1, 2006, 59–74; Jussi M. Hanhimaki, “An Elusive Grand Design,” in edited by Fredrik Logevall and Andrew Preston, eds, Nixon in the World: American Foreign Relations, 1969–1977, New York: Taylor & Francis, 2008, 25–44: 26; Noam Chomsky, “Introduction,” in edited by Virginia Brodine and Mark Selden, eds, Open Secret: The Kissinger‐Nixon Doctrine in Asia, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1972, 3–15: 6; and John Dower, “Asia and the Nixon Doctrine: The New Face of Empire,” in edited by Brodine and Selden, eds, Open Secret, 134–165: 136. Also see the essays in Lloyd C. Gardner, ed. The Great Nixon Turn‐Around: America's New Foreign Policy in the Post‐Liberal Era, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1973.
124. See Kimball, “The Nixon Doctrine.”
125. Dower, “Asia,” 136.
126. Mark Philip Bradley, Imagining Vietnam and America: The Making of Postcolonial Vietnam, 1919–1950, Chapel Hill, NC: Taylor & Francis, 2000, 17.
127. Garland, “Political Cartooning,” 76.
128. Nhan Dan, So Tet Nham Ty, trang 6, TVQG.
129. Nhan Dan, 31 January 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
130. Nhan Dan, 23 January 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
131. Bui Dinh Thanh, “Xet Lai Khong Thanh Cong Chu Nghia Thuc Dan Moi Cua My O Viet‐Nam,” [“Reviewing the process of the failure of American neocolonialism in Vietnam”], Nghien Cuu Lich Su [from here: NCLS] 171, November–December 1976, 1–15 (Pho Trang Thi, Thu Vien Quoc Gia, Hanoi).
132. Bui Dinh Thanh, “Khoi Lien Hiep Quan Su—Cong Nghiep My Va Cuoc Chien Tranh Xam Luoc Viet‐Nam,” [“The United States Military Industrial Complex and the Aggressive War in Vietnam”], NCLS 146, September–October 1972, 41–52.
133. Nhan Dan, 3 August 1969, trang 4, TVQG.
134. Nhan Dan, 24 July 1969, trang 4, TVQG.
135. Quynh Cu, “Vai Tro Cua Doi Ngu Si Quan Nguy Trong Chinh Sach Thuc Dan Moi Cua My O Mien Nam Viet‐Nam,” [“The Role of Puppet Officer Corps in the United States Neocolonial Policy in South Vietnam”], NCLS 171, November–December, 1976, 45–58.
136. Robert J. Mcmahon, The Limits of Empire: The United States and Southeast Asia Since World War II, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1999, 134.
137. Nhan Dan, 21 May 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
138. See Robert K. Brigham, ARVN: Life and Death in the South Vietnamese Army, Lawrence, KS: Taylor & Francis, 2006; Andrew A. Wiest, Vietnam's Forgotten Army: Heroism and Betrayal in the ARVN, New York: Taylor & Francis, 2007); Willbanks, Abandoning Vietnam; and Scott Sigmund Gartner, “Differing Evaluations of Vietnamization,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 29, 1998, 243–262.
139. John Dower, “Asia and the Nixon Doctrine: The New Face of Empire,” 162.
140. Ibid., 132.
141. David Greenberg, “Nixon as Statesman: The Failed Campaign,” in edited by Logevall and Andrew preston, eds, Nixon in the World, 45–66: 53; and Howard B. Schaffer, Ellsworth Bunker: Global Troubleshooter, Vietnam Hawk, Chapel Hill, NC: Taylor & Francis, 2003.
142. Dower, “Asia,” 132.
143. Nhan Dan, 26 February 1972, trang 3, TVQG.
144. Nhan Dan, 10 April 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
145. Nhan Dan, 3 March 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
146. Nhan Dan, 14 March 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
147. Nhan Dan, 11 November 1968, trang 4, TVQG.
148. Nhan Dan, 14 November 1968, trang 4, TVQG.
149. Nhan Dan, 29 January 1968, trang 4, TVQG.
150. Nhan Dan, 16 August 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
151. Pham Quang Toan, “Hau Qua 20 Nam ‘Binh Dinh’ Tan Bao Va Tham Doc Cua My‐Nguy Doi Voi Nong Thon Mien Nam Viet‐Nam,” [“Consequences of the Pacification Policy of the American Puppet Regime in the rural areas of South Vietnam”], NCLS 171, November–December 1976: 45–58.
152. Le Van Hao, “Xa Hoi Van Hoa Thanh Thi Mien Nam Viet‐Nam Duoi Su Thong Tri Cua Chu Nghia Thuc Dan Moi Hoa‐Ky” [“Society and Culture in the Cities of South Vietnam Under the Administration of United States Neocolonialism”], NCLS 119, 1969: 23–36.
153. Nguyen Hoai, “Tu Mat Tran Dan Toc Giai Phong Den Chinh Phu Cach Mang Lam Thoi Cong Hoa Mien Nam Viet‐Nam” [“From the National Liberation Front to the Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Vietnam”], NCLS 153, November–December 1973: 1–14.
154. Nhan Dan, 3 January 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
155. Nhan Dan, 23 May 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
156. Nhan Dan, 8 January 1973, trang 4, TVQG.
157. Nhan Dan, 3 January 1972, trang 4, TVQG.
158. Nhan Dan, 14 November 1973, trang 4, TVQG.
159. Nhan Dan, 12 November 1973, trang 4, TVQG.
160. Nhan Dan, 8 November 1973, trang 4, TVQG.
161. Nhan Dan, 31 October 1973, trang 4, TVQG.
162. Nhan Dan, 20 November 1973, trang 4, TVQG; and Bui Dinh Thanh, “Khoi Lien Hiep Quan Su—Cong Nghiep My Va Cuoc Chien Tranh Xam Luoc Viet‐Nam,” [“The US Military‐Industrial Complex, and the Aggressive War in Vietnam”], NCLS 146, September–October 1972: 41–52.
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Harish C. Mehta
Harish C. Mehta (PhD, McMaster University, 2009) has taught World/Global History, Southeast Asian History, the Vietnam Wars, and U.S. Foreign Relations History at University of Toronto, Trent University, and McMaster. His articles on Vietnam have appeared in Diplomatic History and Peace & Change in 2012, and his articles and book chapters on Cambodia have appeared in Media Asia, Southeast Asian Affairs 1996, and Regional Outlook: Southeast Asia 1998–99. A new edition of his biography of Hun Sen (co‐author Julie Mehta) entitled Strongman Hun: From Pagoda Boy to Prime Minister is being published in 2013.