(7 of 10)
It was a clever gambit, characteristic of Ho, and it worked for a time. But in 1956, when the government tried to force every farmer into a collective, a peasant revolt erupted in his native Nghe An province. Though the policy was almost certainly Ho's, Truong Chinh was made the scapegoat. He lost his post as party leader. Giap denounced him for having "executed too many people" and having "resorted to terror." The agrarian purge was not the only instance of the regime's bloody-mindedness. Immediately after independence was declared in 1945, Ho's officials, bent on eliminating all real or potential opposition, wiped out thousands of non-Communist nationalists, members of the middle class, and members of religious sects.
In 1960, Ho re-embarked upon collectivization, this time calling the units "cooperatives." Today 93% of North Vietnamese peasants are enrolled in them. Productivity has not been helped. Last year North Viet Nam was forced to import 750,000 tons of wheat from Russia to make up for rice shortages.
In 1954, just before partition, the shortfall was 250,000 tons of rice, and this year's may be four times as much. Ho moved almost as drastically in the industrial sector, only to see most of the results of his nation's efforts in capital investment wiped out by U.S. bombs. Consumer goods are in short supply, and quality has slipped. A thirsty Northerner, for instance, often must queue for two hours simply to quaff a glass of weak beer. Each adult is allowed a scant four yards of cloth annually. At an angry meeting of the United Women's Organization in Hanoi last spring, representatives criticized pointed or padded brassieres because it took too much time and, more important, too much fabric, to make them. The nation is barely self-sufficient in simple tools and basic agricultural machinery, and it is completely dependent on its allies for major industrial needs. North Viet Nam today is not a going economic concern.
Compounding the economic problem is the fact that morale has fallen off sharply since the halt in American bombing. As long as U.S. warplanes filled the skies over the North, workers and peasants were inspired to grim extra effort. Now, according to non-Communist foreign visitors recently in Hanoi, many seem to have relaxed their drive. Last June the newspaper Hanoi Moi reported that of 538 specific construction-industry quotas only 328 had been achieved or surpassed. Other papers maintain a steady barrage of complaint against pilferage, slackness and absenteeism, and at the beginning of 1969 the government found itself forced to open a massive campaign against factory corruption. Further complicating the economic dilemma, an estimated 500,000 workers and farmers have been drafted into the army since 1965, cutting heavily into potential productivity.
Cultural Repression