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War & Society Volume 31, 2012 - Issue 2: Bringing Asia into Focus: Civilians and Combatants in the Line of Fire in China and Indochina
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Original Article

‘Be men!’: Fighting and Dying for the State of Vietnam (1951–54)

François GuillemotInstitut d’Asie OrientaleinFranceView further author information
Pages 184-210 | Published online: 12 Nov 2013

  • Général de Lattre, Appel à la Jeunesse Vietnamienne — A Call to Vietnamese Youth (Saigon: 1951), p. 12. Also see: Maréchal Jean de Lattre, La Ferveur et le Sacrifice. Indochine 1951 (Paris: Plon, 1988), pp. 281–91.
  • Hélie de Saint Marc, telephone conversation with the author, 26 January 2011.
  • Quoc-Gia Viet-Nam/Etat du Viet-Nam, Hanh-Chinh Phap-Dien (quyen I) — Code administratif (Tome I) (Saigon: Impr. des JO, 1953), pp. 45–46 (in Vietnamese), pp. 365–66 (in French). This agreement inaugurates the existence of the State of Vietnam which adopted in June 1948 a national flag and an anthem (Ordinance No. 5) with a Private High Council to organize Vietnamese political life (Ordinance No. 6). Nevertheless, it was not until 1 July 1949 that new legal decisions were approved on the organization and functioning of new public institutions (see pp. 377–84). For the Bao Dai regime June 1948 marks the official advent of the State of Vietnam.
  • Appel à la Jeunesse Vietnamienne, pp. 9, 25.
  • Appel à la Jeunesse Vietnamienne, p. 12.
  • Appel à la Jeunesse Vietnamienne, p. 15.
  • Appel à la Jeunesse Vietnamienne, p. 9.
  • Appel à la Jeunesse Vietnamienne, p. 13.
  • The author will explore the question of this army’s losses and its resurrection in the form of ARVN in another paper.
  • Nguyen Van Phai, ‘L’Armée Vietnamienne (1949–1957). Contribution à l’étude d’un cas de formation d’un armée nationale’, thèse d’histoire (Montpellier: Université Paul Valéry, 1980); Annie Roulet, ‘Un Aspect des Rapports Franco-Vietnamiens: La formation de l’armée nationale vietnamienne (1948–1954)’, thèse d’histoire (Strasbourg: Université Robert Schumann, 1988). See also the first South Vietnamese military history published in Saigon in 1972: Khoi Quan Su, Le Van Duong, Ton Tich Duc, Quan Luc Viet Nam trong giai doan hinh thanh: 1946–1955 [‘The gestation period of the Armed Forces of Vietnam: 1946–55’], 2nd edn (Glendale: Dai Nam, 1983).
  • On the experience of combat, see the engaging essay by Stéphane Audoin-Rouzeau, Combattre. Une anthropologie de la guerre moderne (XIXe-XXIe siècle) (Paris: Seuil, coll. Les livres du nouveau monde, 2008). Audoin-Rouzeau’s essay on the anthropology of war is heavily influenced by the works of such scholars as John Keegan and Paul Fussell, as well as the work on violence and civilization by Pierre Clastres, Nobert Elias, and Jacques Sémelin.
  • SHD, 10H 610, ‘Étude sur les Partis Nationalistes Vietnamiens (non inféodés au Viêt-Minh)’, 6 June 1951 (see section on the VNQDD). On 5 September 1952, Vu Hong Khanh, Secretary of State for Sports and Youth, announced the creation of the ‘Movement of nationalist youth’ bearing the motto ‘Strength to serve’: Viêt Nam, 35 (1 October 1952), 16–17; Viêt Nam, 36 (15 October 1952), p. 2.
  • This ‘Imperial army project’ was presented by Nguyen Ton Hoan to Bao Dai in the autumn of 1948 to organize the national army and counter-insurrection against Viet-Minh forces, see: François Guillemot, Dai Viêt, Indépendance et Révolution au Viet-Nam. L’échec de la troisième voie (1938–1955) (Paris: Les Indes Savantes, 2012), pp. 465–66.
  • The project was not discarded until the fall of the Republic of Viet-Nam in 1975.
  • ANOM, HCI 121/375, ‘Mémoires de Mr Yokoyama’, Saigon, 21 November 1946, pp. 79–80.
  • SHD, 10H 529, CSFFEO, EM-2B, No. 2454/2, ‘Objet: Demande de renseignements’, Saigon, 10 May 1946 (see: Statistics of military forces). See also: Ralph B. Smith, ‘The Work of the Provisional Government of Vietnam, August–December 1945’, Modern Asian Studies, 12·4 (1978), 602–04, 608.
  • On the question of the army in 1946, see Stein Tonnesson, Vietnam 1946. How the War Began (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010), pp. 219–20. The ‘Tu Ve’ (self-defence forces), infiltrated and influenced by the radical discourse of the VNQDD, were a problem for Vo Nguyen Giap (see pp. 223–26).
  • In the south, ‘Quan Doi Quoc Gia Viet Nam’ was a title claimed equally by the Viet-Minh resistance as well as other political military formations of the Dai Viet party (TNBQD and An Thanh Nationalist Forces), inaugurating this growing war for legitimacy festering between communists and nationalists.
  • SHD, 10H 4199, HCF-IC, Sûreté Fédérale en Cochinchine, Subdivision 1, Secret [BR] No. 7336s, ‘Activités nationalistes: Dai Viet Quoc Dan Dang’, Saigon, 28 April 1949.
  • SHD, 10H 240, EM/FAEO, Défense nationale, No. 2·247/FAEO/DEFNAT, ‘Notice sur l’Organisation Générale des Forces Armées des Etats Associés, Forces des Minorités Ethniques, Forces Para-Militaires’, 25 November 1949, p. 3 (quoted hereafter as ‘Notice sur l’Organisation Générale des Forces Armées’).
  • On 2 April 1951, General de Lattre appointed General Spillmann to head the MMF, see: Georges Spillmann, Souvenirs d’un Colonialiste (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1968), p. 234.
  • Conventions d’Application: Accords franco-vietnamiens du 8 mars 1949 (Saigon: IDEO, [1950]), see in particular: ‘Convention militaire franco-vietnamienne’, pp. 13–20 [signed by Léon Pignon, Bao Dai, Nguyen Van Xuan, and Nguyen Phan Long].
  • SHD, 10H 240, dossier: Armées Associés, Documents constitutifs officiels, secret; Pham Van Lieu, Tra ta song nui (Hoi ky I) [‘Give us back our land’ (Memoirs I)] (Houston: Van Hoa, 2002), p. 237.
  • SHD, 10H 215, Etat du Viet-Nam, Sa Majesté Bao Dai, No. 9, ‘Ordonnance portant organisation des Forces Armées du Viêt-Nam’, 16 May 1954 [signed by Bao Dai and Buu Loc].
  • See also Viêt Nam, 76 (1 June 1954), 10–11 (‘L’effort militaire du Viêt Nam’).
  • For further details and descriptions, see Chapter III (‘Composition’) of Nguyen Van Phai, pp. 34–60.
  • ‘Notice sur l’Organisation Générale des Forces Armées’, p. 3.
  • ‘Notice sur l’Organisation Générale des Forces Armées’, pp. 4–7.
  • ‘Notice sur l’Organisation Générale des Forces Armées’, p. 20.
  • ‘Notice sur l’Organisation Générale des Forces Armées’, p. 24.
  • ‘Notice sur l’Organisation Générale des Forces Armées’, see Annex I: ‘Les forces armées vietnamiennes en 1949’.
  • ‘Notice sur l’Organisation Générale des Forces Armées’, p. 20.
  • Spillmann, p. 241.
  • For this topic, see Bui Tin’s account (about the 30–31st mn) in: ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’, documentary by Alain de Sédouy in collaboration with Eric Deroo, series ‘L’Histoire Oubliée’, France 3, GMT Production, 1992, broadcast in the programme Traverses (hereafter cited as ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’).
  • Lieutenant-Colonel Claude Franc, ‘L’Armée Nationale Vietnamienne et le Recours aux Forces Supplétives’, Cahier de la Recherche Doctrinale, 9 July 2009, p. 58 (cited hereafter as ‘L’ANV’).
  • I am greatly indebted to Shawn MacHale for his useful remarks on the causes of the intrinsic weakness in the foundation of the Vietnamese national army under the Bao Dai regime.
  • See, for example: SHD 10H 240, Etat du Viêt-Nam, Ministère de la Défense nationale, Etat-Major général, 1er Bureau, No. 1121/TTM/I/I/TS, Très secret, ‘Etude relative au plan de développement de l’armée vietnamienne en 1953’ [31 December 1952].
  • See: François Gérin-Roze, ‘La ‘Vietnamisation’: La Participation des Autochtones à la Guerre d’Indochine (1945–1954)’, in L’Armée Française dans la Guerre d’Indochine (1946–1954); Adaptation or Inadaptation ?, ed. by Maurice Vaïsse (Bruxelles: Editions Complexe, 2000), p. 145; ‘L’ANV’, p. 57.
  • SHD 10H 240, ‘Les armées des Etats Associés’, 30 December 1952, Secret/Confidentiel.
  • SM Bao Dai, Le Dragon d’Annam (Paris: Plon, 1980), p. 251.
  • SHD 10H 240, ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 2. Bao Dai probably used this document for these data (Bao Dai, p. 251).
  • SHD 10H 240, ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 2.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 2. See also: Bao Dai, p. 251.
  • The key principles were: the national character of the Vietnamese army; French financial and technical assistance in the training of this army; an assurance on bases and troops for forces of the French Union; the creation of a Permanent Military Committee in peace time and a mixed military staff in times of war; the subordination of the Vietnamese army to a French General in times of war; and the announcement of a military agreement (‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 3); Bao Dai, p. 251.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 4.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 4; Bao Dai, p. 251.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 5.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 5; Spillmann, p. 241 (Spillmann gives the date of 20 December).
  • Bao Dai, p. 250.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 6; Bao Dai, pp. 251–52. See also: General Yves Gras, ‘L’Autre Armée Vietnamienne. L’Engagement des Vietnamiens dans la Guerre d’Indochine’, in Indochine, Alerte à the Histoire (Paris: Académie des sciences d’Outre-Mer, 1985), p. 275 (cited hereafter as ‘L’Autre Armée Vietnamienne’).
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 7. Spillmann mentions the words of a colonel whom he approached for his opinion on the Vietnamese army. This colonel replied to him very frankly: ‘The Vietnamese army does not exist’. He argued: ‘Does it have Generals, military staff, large organic units, departments? No, you see. So it is not an army!’ (Spillmann, p. 243).
  • Inside the government of the State of Vietnam, Phan Huy Quat held the portfolio of defence minister twice, under the Nguyen Phan Long government (January–April 1950) and under the Buu Loc government (January–June 1954). These were two key periods in the history of this war.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 7.
  • The end of the war stopped a continuous evolution which would have brought the strength up to 350,000 men.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 7. On the construction of a new military society backed by the Bao Dai regime see the excellent Chapter VIII (‘Société militaire vietnamienne’) of Nguyen Van Phai’s thesis, pp. 134–54.
  • In reality, the decision to constitute four divisions had been taken at Dalat on 4 November by Minister Letourneau and Bao Dai before the new Commander in Chief took charge.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 8.
  • SHD 10H 240, HCF-IC, No. de diffusion 3944/CAS: Télégramme arrivée, Hanoi, 29 October 1951. De Haussaire en déplacement pour Haussaire Saigon, Extrême urgent, No. 20308–20309, pour SPDN.
  • SHD 10H 216, HCF-IC & Commandement en chef en Extrême-Orient, Le Général, Secret/Confidentiel, No. 1·545 EMIFT/I, ‘Décision’, Saigon, 2 July1951.
  • SHD 10H 216, HCF-IC & Commandement en chef en Extrême-Orient, Le Général, Secret/Confidentiel, No. 1·546 EMIFT/I, ‘Décision’, Saigon, 2 July1951.
  • SHD 10H 216, Commandement en chef des FTANI, Etat-Major Interarmées et des Forces Terrestres, 1er Bureau/1ère Section, 4e Bureau/1ère Section, No. 1247/EMIFT/I, No. 3351/EMIFT/4/I/SC., Secret/Confidentiel, Note de service, Objet: ‘Mise sur pied du 2e Bataillon de Parachutistes Vietnamiens’, Saigon, 20 June 1952 [For General Salan, signed by Colonel Gracieux]; Etat du Viêt Nam, Ministère de la Défense nationale, EM général, 1er et 4e Bureaux, No. 639 (TTM/I/I/SC et TTM/4/SC), Secret/Confidentiel, Note de service, Objet: ‘Création du 3e Bataillon de Parachutistes Vietnamiens (3e Région Militaire) pour transfert du 10e BPCP (FTEO)’ [signed by General Nguyen Van Hinh, General de Linarès].
  • Spillmann, p. 259. See also the account of General Pierre de Haynin-Bry in ‘Les parachutistes indochinois’ (about the 20–22nd mn on the creation of the Indochinese parachutist company and Foreign Paratroopers Battalions and also 40th mn). One generally considers a jump is possible only from 40 kg.
  • Colonel Maurice Rives, ‘Le ‘jaunissement’ à partir de 1946’, in Les Combattants Indochinois du Corps Expéditionnaire, available at: <http://www.anai-asso.org/NET/document/le_temps_de_la_guerre/la_guerre_ dindochine/les_combattants_indochinois_du_corps_expeditionnaire_francais_en_extremeorient/le jaunissement a_partir_de_1946_/index.htm> [accessed 5 December 2011].
  • See the astonishing account on enlisted Khmer origin volunteers in the delta: Général Paul Simonin, Les Bérets Blancs de la Légion en Indochine (Paris: Albin Michel, 2002).
  • For American funding, see the detailed study by Hugues Tertrais, La Piastre and le Fusil. Le Coût de la Guerre d’Indochine, 1945–1954 (Paris: Comité pour the histoire économique and financière de la France, 2002), Chapter VII: ‘II. Le poids financier de la guerre’, pp. 356–66 and annex 24.
  • In his memoirs General Spillmann expresses open disappointment (Spillmann, pp. 277–78).
  • Gras, ‘L’Autre Armée Vietnamienne’, p. 276.
  • Gras, ‘L’Autre Armée Vietnamienne’, p. 277.
  • Bao Dai, p. 252.
  • Spillmann, p. 267.
  • A weakness mentioned in monthly reports on the FAVN, see: SHD, 10H 523, ‘Rapport mensuel sur la situation des forces armées vietnamiennes. Mois de mai 1953’, p. 18 and ‘Rapport mensuel sur la situation des forces armées vietnamiennes. Mois de juin 1953’, p. 22.
  • Hélie de Saint Marc, Interview in Lyon with the author, Thursday 10 February 2011. The yellowing of the army consisted of inducting 20 per cent of Indochinese members in all French military units. As Shawn McHale argues, it is difficult to understand these refusals. He rightly points out that many units which fought in the Indochina War had few French in them and this limited French rank and file participation in the war is reflected in the war dead. It is possible that if the French retained complete control over their own ‘supplétifs’, they were afraid of losing control to the new Vietnamese recruits, still regarded with some suspicion as potential rivals capable of exerting influence over other ethnic groups.
  • Jules Roy, La Bataille dans la Rizière (Paris: Gallimard, 1953), p. 185.
  • Marcel Georges, Mon ami Sinh… Les aventures d’un pilote parachutiste (Paris: Editions France Empire, 1963), p. 271. The term ‘Viets’ which simply means ‘Vietnamese’, was used by French soldiers in a peculiar way to refer only to those Vietnamese who followed the Viet Minh.
  • Hélie de Saint Marc, Mémoires. Les champs de braises (Paris: Perrin, 1995), p. 118.
  • Pham Van Lieu is a typical example of this development (Pham Van Lieu, pp. 205–06 and Chapter VI). See also the Memoirs of Ly Tong Ba: Hoi ky 25 nam khoi lua [‘Memoirs of 25 years of fire’], Chapters I and II, Las Vegas, Nevada: The Author, (2005), 6th edn.
  • Like Joseph Nguyen in ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’ (about the 46th mn).
  • de Saint Marc, Mémoires, p. 114.
  • de Saint Marc, Mémoires, p. 100 (de Saint Marc quotes cases of the Nungs).
  • Examples in ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’.
  • Dominique de La Motte, De l’Autre Côté de l’Eau. Indochine 1950–1952 (Paris: Tallandier, 2009), Chapter I (‘Les partisans’). De La Motte, officer of the French army, commanded ‘partisans’ who were under the pay of a French plantation owner. This account of the war does not refer to the ‘national army’ but it is used as an illustration of French military conduct of war and motivations of local soldiers in the Mekong delta. This kind of situation also existed in the national army.
  • de Saint Marc, Interview in Lyon.
  • de Saint Marc, Mémoires, p. 119.
  • See, for example, the cover illustrations of Viêt Nam, 17 (1 January 1952): ‘La mobilisation au Viet-Nam, Clé de voûte de la défense de tout le Sud-Est asiatique’; Viêt Nam, 19 (1 February 1952): ‘Face au monde communiste’.
  • Reference to the title of the brochure published on the occasion of the sixth session of the UNO General Assembly: Vietnam, Vieille nation, Etat jeune, December 1951.
  • Claude Mercadié, ‘Courage ailé’, Indochine Sud-Est Asiatique, 14 (January 1953), photograph on p. 39.
  • See Ordonnance No. 3 du 2 juin 1948 in Quoc-Gia Viet-Nam/Etat du Viet-Nam, pp. 31–43 (in Vietnamese), pp. 351–63 (in French).
  • While the first officers’ promotion is called the Bao Dai Promotion (1948–49), the second refers to the national hero Quang Trung (promotion 1949–50), the third refers to the illustrious General Tran Hung Dao (promotion 1950–51), and the fourth was dedicated to General Ly Thuong Kiet (promotion 1951–52) and so on, see: ‘L’Ecole Inter-Armes de Dalat forme les officiers de l’armée vietnamienne’, Viêt Nam, 5 (1 July1951), 7; ‘Baptême de la troisième promotion d’officiers vietnamiens’, Viêt Nam, 6 (15 July 1951), 7; ‘Actualité militaire’, Viêt Nam, 16 (15 December 1951), 6; Viêt Nam, 17 (1 January 1952), 19.
  • See: Viet-Nam Presse, Bulletin No. 152, morning edition, Monday 16 July 1951, p. 2 (in SHD, 10H 2001); ‘Mobilisation au Viet-Nam’, Viêt Nam, 7 (1 August 1951), 6–7; ‘Mobilisation au Viet-Nam’, Viêt Nam, 17 (1 January 1952), 17. For more details, see: Nguyen Van Phai, pp. 98–109.
  • See: ‘Les arrêtés de mobilisation au Viêt-Nam’, Viêt Nam, 8 (15 August 1951), 6.
  • Nghiem Van Tri, ‘L’armée Viet-Namienne’, Orient-Occident, 5 (November 1952), 15.
  • ‘Actualité militaire’, Viêt Nam, 11 (1 October 1951), 17.
  • Viêt Nam, 17 (1 January 1952), 19. In reality, as two nation states coexist (the RDV and the State of Vietnam), the national limits for the two armies are not truly national or even Vietnamese. Thanks to Christopher Goscha for this important remark.
  • Joseph Nguyen in ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’, (about the 41st mn).
  • ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’ (about the 4–6th mn).
  • Roy, pp. 186–87.
  • Comments taken from General Pierre de Haynin-Bry, in ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’ (about the 23rd mn).
  • Gérin-Roze, ‘La Vietnamisation’, p. 145.
  • For an example, see the cover of the review Viet-Nam, 53 (June 1953), which shows a portrait of a Vietnamese soldier sub-titled: ‘L’Armée: Force de la Nation’.
  • Guy Lebrun, Le Lieutenant aux Pieds Nus. Cochinchine 1952–1954 (Paris: France Empire, 1999), p. 154.
  • Lebrun, Le Lieutenant aux Pieds Nus, p. 156.
  • Lebrun, Le Lieutenant aux Pieds Nus, p. 242.
  • Quoted in Olivier Maestrati, Indochine. Autopsie d’un échec. Légion-Paras (Paris: Société des gens de Lettres 1995), p. 276.
  • Quoted in Delpey, S.O.S. Tonkin (Givors: Editions André Martel, 1954), p. 184.
  • Lebrun, Le Lieutenant aux Pieds Nus, p. 142.
  • Vietnamese parachutists were sacrificed during the battle of Dien Bien Phu as Alain de Sédouy rightly points out (see ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’, about the 49th mn). See also: Jean Pouget, Nous étions à Dien Bien Phu (Paris, Presses de la Cité, 1964), which highlights the bravery of the fifth Bawouan.
  • Account by Trocmé in Henri Le Mire, Epervier. Le 8e Choc à Dien Bien Phu (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1988), p. 274.
  • de Saint Marc, Mémoires, p. 136.
  • Bui Tin in ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’ (about the 45th mn).
  • Michel Bodin, Les Combattants Français Face à la Guerre d’Indochine 1945–1954 (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1998), pp. 142–45.
  • De Lattre succumbed to cancer in Paris on 11 January 1952. A mythical figure of the North Vietnam Commandos, Chief Adjutant Vandenberghe was the subject of two flattering portraits: Bernard Moinet, Vanden. Le commando des Tigres noirs (Paris: France Empire, 1987) and Erwan Bergot, Commando Vandenberghe. Le pirate du delta (Paris: Pygmalion, 1985). For Vietnamese partisan commandos see also the well documented: Jean-Pierre Pissardy, Commandos Nord Vietnam 1951–1954 (Paris: Indo Editions, 1999) and Bernard Gaudin’s war testimony Commando 25 (Aix-in-Provence: Sodeb, 1990).
  • de Saint Marc, Mémoires, p. 112.
  • Antoine Mattei, Tu Survivras Longtemps (Paris: Olivier Orban, 1975), p. 43.
  • Gérin-Roze, ‘La Vietnamisation’, p. 145.
  • Albert Merglen, La Naissance des Mercenaires (Paris: Arthaud, 1970), p. 91. The author, in what appears to be a war journal describing operations in the Red River delta between March and October 1952, criticised the Vietnamese state’s inaction, see p. 90.
  • de Saint Marc, Interview in Lyon.
  • Vanuxem, La Mort du Viet-Nam, (Paris: Editions de la Nouvelle Aurore, 1975), p. 68.
  • ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’ (about the 55th mn).
  • ‘Les Parachutistes Indochinois’ (about the 40th mn). See also the enthusiastic article of Elizabeth Fugier: ‘Futurs chefs de l’armée no. 1 du Sud-Est asiatique’, Indochine Sud-Est Asiatique, 28 (April 1954), 22–26.
  • SHD, 10H 4199, HCF-IC, Service de Sécurité du Haut Commissaire au Sud Viet-Nam, Renseignements généraux, Note No. 7236 S/RG, ‘Partis nationalistes vietnamiens. Dai Viêt’, Saigon, 24 April 1951 (Translation of extracts from the periodical Dai Viet No. 2); Guillemot, Dai Viêt, p. 483.
  • Spillmann, p. 242.
  • Spillmann, p. 248.
  • Spillmann, pp. 248–49.
  • Spillmann, p. 250.
  • This survey is for information only. It is based only on South Vietnam and about 15 per cent of all the battalions. On the creation of the light battalions in 1953, see: Claude Guigues, ‘Quang-Yen fabrique les ‘K[h]inh-Quan’ à la chaîne’, Indochine Sud-Est Asiatique, 23 (November 1953), 52–57. On the other hand, Annie Roulet studied the development of this ambitious programme and its difficulties in local military recruitment, see: Roulet, pp. 316–24.
  • See the characters of Bao who accidentally drown in Georges Fleury, Le Guerrier (Paris: Bernard Grasset, 1981), pp. 293–99 and Toan in Le Mire, Epervier, pp. 274–75.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 2.
  • ‘Les Armées des Etats Associés’, p. 3.
  • Bao Dai, p. 278.
  • For a portrait of Nguyen Van Hinh, see: Yvonne Pagniez, Naissance d’Une Nation. Choses vues au Vietnam (Paris: La Palatine, 1954), pp. 38–39.
  • De Lattre, La Ferveur and le Sacrifice, pp. 131, 132. Bao Dai’s message is reproduced in pp. 123–31.
  • Spillmann, pp. 251–52.
  • Spillmann, pp. 255–56.
  • Spillmann, p. 279.
  • Commandant Denoix de Saint Marc, Maison de détention, Tulle, no. d’insertion: 4·241, Mémoire de fin d’année: ‘Mise sur pieds d’une unité militaire composée de Vietnamiens, dans le cadre de la formation de l’armée nationale vietnamienne’, s.d. (quoted hereafter as Mémoire de Tulle). The author thanks Mr de Saint Marc for having provided this rare document.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 4.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 5.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 7.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 8.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 9.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 11.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 11.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 11.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 11 bis.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 11 bis.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 11 bis.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, pp. 11–12.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 12.
  • Mémoire de Tulle, p. 12.
  • This is not to dismiss the difficulties involved in field training with the many different ethnic minorities who also took part in the war.
  • De la Motte, p. 55. This kind of fragile relationship was also true in the context of the national army, particularly in the case of Vietnamese commando units trained by French officers.
  • Vanuxem, p. 68.
  • On its mutation, see: Brigadier General James Lawton Collins Jr, The Development and Training of the South Vietnamese Army 1950–1972 (Washington, DC: Department of the Army, Vietnam Studies, 1991); and Nguyen Van Phai’s thesis, second part (‘La relève américaine’).
  • See Goscha’s article in this Special Issue.
  • Thanks to Shawn McHale who pointed out to me this important cause. On the subject of colonial armies confronted to nationalism, see Tobias Rettig and Karl Hack, Colonial Armies in Southeast Asia (London: Routledge, 2009) (see in particular the contributions of Henri Eckert on Tirailleurs troops in Tonkin and Sarah Womack on the Garde indigene of Cambodia).
  • Thanks again to Shawn McHale who pointed out to me this latter argument.
  • de Saint Marc, Interview in Lyon.
  • Pagniez, p. 29.
  • ‘A cause for which many Vietnamese died’ and which is ‘undeniable’ according to General Yves Gras (Gras, ‘L’Autre Armée Vietnamienne’, p. 273).
  • Maestrati, p. 274.
  • Nguyen Ly Tuong, ‘Vai tro Quan Doi trong viec bao ve quoc gia, bao ve dong bao’ [‘The role of the army in the defence of the nation and our compatriots’], Chien Si Cong Hoa [The Republican Combatant], 18 (thang 12 2010) [December 2010], 30.

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