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"The Viet Minh are correct," says one of these millions, a onetime Viet Minh official who deserted to the West. "They don't violate women. They take nothing. If they borrow a cup of water today, they return it tomorrow. But they watch you. They watch you all the time. They watch what you do. They know what you eat, how much you spend every day on meat and vegetables, whether you have a servant, or want one.
" Little by little, in careful ways, they correct you so that you may lead a more worthy proletarian life. You learn to dress shabbily in drab colors, like the others, and to put your children to work. If you do not, your taxes are raised. You learn to be enthusiastic. If you are not, they will whisper from mouth to mouth in your village that you want to be rich, that you are a reactionary. They will threaten you with public discussion. They will isolate you: you will find that your neighbors will not dare speak to you. If this does not teach you joy, they will assign you work that will kill you. And it is never the Communists who do any of these things, it is the people; it is always in the name of the people."
Antagonism & Deception. Since the Geneva settlement a bare four months ago, the Viet Minh Communists have:
¶ Imposed an unshakable authority over North Viet Nam, whose people were supposed to decide their future for themselves in free elections.
¶ Doubled their army—in specific violation of Geneva—so that it now exceeds that of Pakistan (pop. 76 million) and is considered by Moscow to be more efficient than that of any Red satellite.
¶ Infiltrated South Viet Nam (pop. 10½ million) so deeply that effective Viet Minh control now extends through 85% of the country almost to the gates of the capital, Saigon—where the Nationalist administration of Bao Dai is disintegrating. The Viet Minh are also deeply embedded in Laos (pop. 1.1 million), a state theoretically protected by the Manila Defense Pact. The Viet Minh have assassinated 87 Nationalist leaders in South Viet Nam and the Defense Minister of Laos.
How did all this come to pass? Indo-China was a place where the grand antagonisms of the 20th century met, joined and clashed: colonialism, nationalism, Communism interacted violently upon one another. Sometimes such cataclysms throw up one forceful man. or he seizes a ready opportunity. But Indo-China was a place where one man was already waiting, a man who had spent 30 cunning, tortuous years preparing the event, weaving, dodging, converting reverses into successes and eventually triumphing. That man was a strange, blazing-eyed consumptive who called himself Ho Chi Minh.