Hanoi, December 5th, 1954.
General VO-NGUYEN-GIAP
Commander-in-Chief of the Vietnamese People’s Army,
to the
Chairman of the International
Commission for Supervision
and Control in Vietnam.
Mr. Chairman,
The Geneva Conference has come to agreements aiming at putting an end to the hostilities and restoring peace in Indo-China on the basis of recognition of the national rights of the peoples of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
Pursuing the policy of peace and of respect of the armistice agreements of the Government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, the High Command of the Vietnamese People’s Army has most faithfully and scrupulously implemented the agreements signed, since these agreements became effective.
The cease-fire has been strictly observed on various fronts by all units of the People’s Army.
The operations of regroupment and transfer of troops have been carried out in order and within the time limit.
We have handed over to the other side all the prisoners of war and civilians detained.
In the territories which the French Union Forces transferred to us following their withdrawal, the republican regime guarantees all the democratic liberties to the population; in all these territories, no act of reprisals or discrimination whatever has been committed against those who, during war-time, cooperated with the other side.
The Vietnamese People’s Army has implemented the agreements not only in Vietnam but also in Laos and Cambodia. All units of Vietnamese Volunteers in Cambodia as well as in Laos have completely withdrawn from the territories of these countries before the time assigned in the agreements.
While we implement scrupulously the agreements signed, the French Union Forces do not do the same. Under the pressure of the American interventionist circles and camouflaging the activities carried out by the Ngo-Dinh-Diem clique in violation of the agreements, the High Command of the French Union Forces has committed more and more flagrant violations of the agreements.
The article 14, paragraph C of the Agreement on the cessation of hostilities in Vietnam stipulates:
“Each party undertakes to refrain from any reprisals or discrimination against persons or organizations on account of their activities during the hostilities and to guarantee their democratic liberties”.
The paragraph 9 of the Final Declaration of the Geneva Conference stipulates:
“The competent representative authorities of the Northern and Southern zones of Vietnam, as well as the authorities of Laos and Cambodia, must not permit any individual or collective reprisals against persons who have collaborated in any way with one of the parties during the war, or against members of such persons families”.
But, in defiance of all these provisions, the Ngo-Dinh-Diem clique in Southern Vietnam, that is in the regrouping zone of the French Union Forces, is now pursuing a policy of terror directed against those who have participated in the Patriotic war or who have manifested their sympathy for the Government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. According to still incomplete figures, in two months only, from the cease-fire till the beginning of October 1954, 709 acts of reprisals, arrest or massacre have been committed in the regrouping zone of the French Union Forces, during which 619 of our compatriots were killed, 2,786 injured and 6,112 put in jail.
During numerous bloody incidents, the other side has used relatively important military forces to open fire on the unarmed population.
Thus:
— The incident at Kim-Doi, Thua-Thien province (South Central Vietnam, Ed.), on August 2nd, 1954, has caused 17 dead and 67 wounded among whom many children and old aged persons;
— The incident at Ngan-Son, Chi-Thanh district, Phu-Yen province (South Central Vietnam, Ed.) on September 7th 1954, has caused 74 killed, 56 wounded and 15 others arrested and imprisoned;
— The incident at Mo-Cay, Ben-Tre province (South Vietnam, Ed.) on September 16th, 1954, has resulted in 10 persons killed, 500 injured by bullets, bayonets or bludgeons, and 140 others arrested and imprisoned;
— The incident at Vinh-Xuan in Can-Tho province (South Vietnam, Ed.) on October 25th and 26th, 1954, has led to 40 persons killed, 116 wounded and 70 others put in jail;
— The incident at Binh-Thanh, Long-Xuyen province (South Vietnam, Ed.) on November 11th, 1954, has caused 7 dead, 8 wounded, 74 imprisoned.
The lives and properties of the population in Southern Vietnam are constantly menaced. Apart from cases of massacre, the High Command of the French Union Forces has given a free hand to Ngo-Dinh-Diem’s agents to arrest, put in prison or assassinate at liberty those who have taken part in the war of resistance and those who desire unity, independence and respect for the Geneva agreements. Thousands of arrests have taken place in the Southern zone; and the majority of persons arrested have been submitted to the most barbarous tortures and often executed without trial. The most elementary individual liberties are trampled on. In a month, from September 20th to October 20th, 1954, and in a single village in the 5th interzone (South Central Vietnam, Ed.), there were 265 persons killed or imprisoned and 19 cases of confiscation of properties.
The freedom of expression is quenched: in Saigon, newspapers more or less independent have been closed down one after another. More recently, the Ngo-Dinh-Diem clique has ordered the arrest of 7 members of the Executive Committee of the Peace Movement in Saigon—Cholon area, among whom Professor PHAM-HUY-THÔNG, Lawyer NGUYEN-HUU-THO and Chemist TRAN-KIM-QUAN.
All the reprisals and terrorist acts in Southern Vietnam constitute grave violations of the armistice agreements. We have many a time sent protest to the delegates of the High Command of the French Union Forces to the Central Joint Commission. We have also, on several occasions, informed the International Commission about the matter and the latter has carried out numerous investigations and made great efforts. Nevertheless, due to the lack of faith on the part of the other side, the situation has not very much improved. The arrested persons are still detained in Ngo-Dinh-Diem’s prisons and new arrests take place everyday. The culprits of the above-mentioned assassinations and massacres are not punished, although the article 22 of the Agreement on the cessation of hostilities in Vietnam stipulates that “the commanders of the forces of the two parties should undertake to see that the persons placed under their respective control and who violate any provisions in the present agreement, will be submitted to appropriate sanction”.
If in the whole of Southern Vietnam, that is in the regrouping zone of the French Union Forces, the policy of reprisals, terror and massacre is prolonged, it is exactly due to the fact that the American interventionist circles, the French military authorities and the Ngo-Dinh-Diem clique consider that this policy alone may help them maintain Ngo-Dinh-Diem in power, that it alone may, through terror, prevent the people from expressing their aspirations for peace, democracy, unity and independence, and thereby creating conditions for hindering the general elections and impede the unification of Vietnam so as to realize the aggressive policy of the American imperialists.
In many of its provisions, the Geneva agreements have forbidden the two parties to bring into Vietnam new troops, military personnel, arms and ammunition and to create new military bases.
The articles 16, 17 and 18 of the Agreement on the Cessation of hostilities in Vietnam stipulate that:
“All reinforcing armed forces and subsidiary military personnel as well as all types of reinforcing weapons, ammunition and other war materials shall be prohibited entry into Vietnam; no new military base shall be set up in the whole of Vietnam”.
The article 19 reads:
“With effect from the date of entry into force of the present Agreement, no military base under the control of a foreign state may be established in the regrouping zone of either party; the two parties shall ensure that the zones assigned to them do not adhere to any military alliance and are not used for the resumption of hostilities or to further an aggressive policy”.
The Final Declaration of the Geneva Conference, in its articles 4 and 5, takes note of the above-mentioned clauses and points out the deriving obligations for the two parties.
These are very important clauses, the strict application of which alone permits to prevent a new war and consolidate peace in Indo-China.
But, in defiance of the provisions in the Geneva agreements, and hardly two months have passed since the conclusion of these agreements, the Manila Treaty, of which the United States is the protagonist and in which the French Government has taken part, tried to integrate the regrouping zone of the French Union Forces in Southern Vietnam as well as Laos and Cambodia into the zone of “protection” of the Southeast Asian military bloc.
The Manila Treaty, baptised by the signatory countries as “South-east Asia Defence Treaty” with the pretended aim of “struggling against communist invasion” or “preventing subversive activities”, is actually an aggressive military bloc in the service of the aggressive policy of the American imperialists, of the latter’s policy of repression against the national liberation movement in Southeast Asia. Moreover, this treaty has been preconised by the United States; and out of eight signatories, only three are countries of Southeast Asia, the more so as these are the countries now placed under the American influence, whereas the majority of the countries of Southeast Asia embracing more than four fifths of its population, did not only refuse to take part in the treaty but also oppose it. The fact that such a treaty includes Southern Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia within the zone of an aggressive military bloc proves more clearly the intention of its initiators to hinder the implementation of the Geneva agreements in Indo-China.
As the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam has stated, “the Manila Treaty constitutes a flagrant violation of the Geneva agreements, an encroachment upon the independence and sovereignty of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, a menace to the security and peace in Southeast Asia”.
Following the Manila Treaty, the French Government have opened negotiations towards the end of September with a view to granting military aid to the French Expeditionary Corps and the Associated States of Indo-China. General Paul Ely, French General Commissioner for the Associated States of Indo-China and Commander-in-Chief of the French Union Forces in Indo-China, has himself confirmed that “aid (French aid in Southern Vietnam Ed.) should be coordinated with the American aid” and that “it will also take a military form”.
The policy of violating the armistice agreements pursued by the U.S Government with the collusion of certain French ruling circles in Paris as well as in Saigon, has taken an alarming turn with the arrival of General Lawton Collins as U.S Ambassador to Ngo-Dinh-Diem. According to the declarations made by General Collins himself, his special mission consists in “giving to Ngo-Dinh-Diem Government unconditional support of the United States,” “in bringing it every possible aid of the United States Government.” This aid mainly consists in the “training by the American Mission of the forces of the Vietnamese Army”, “90 percent equipment of which is American”. Collins has blankly stated that “the United States Government intends to entrust the American Mission with the task of training directly the Vietnamese National Army with the cooperation of General Ely”, that, in this training, French instructors “will closely cooperate with the American instructors”, that it wants to “apply here a program which has been tested in the Philippines, Korea and Greece”.
At the very moment when the American interventionists, in coordination with the Ngo-dinh-Diem clique and some French ruling circles, are manoeuvring in Saigon against peace and the Geneva agreements, some political personalities and some press organs supporting the United States’ policy of war in the United States and France, have unleashed a campaign of tendencious news aiming at deceiving public opinion. According to these news, the reinforcement of military effectives in North Vietnam is alarming; since the cessation of hostilities, the Vietnamese People’s Army has doubled its effectives and created “three new divisions, including two armoured”. It is quite obvious that these are but sheer fabrications since everybody knows it is materially impossible to double, within two or three months, the effectives of an army which has required years of efforts and fight to be built up. Yet one needs to unleash such gratuitous and ridiculous news in order to camouflage the plots of aggression and to sabotage the armistice agreements on the part of the American imperialists and their lackeys.
It is therefore undeniable, with the above-mentioned declarations of General Lawton Collins, that the American interventionists as well as some French ruling circles hostile to the armistice agreements, are plotting to put into execution the Manila Treaty in Southern Vietnam. The American interventionists are actively preparing for the introduction of new weapons in Southern Vietnam in violation of the article 17 of the Agreement on the Cessation of hostilities in Vietnam; for the introduction of new military personnel, concretely speaking the American instructors, in violation of the article 16, for the utilisation of the regrouping zone of the French Union Forces for the aggressive policy of the United States, in violation of the article 19 of the armistice agreement and of the paragraph 5 of the Final Declaration.
In order to carry out their policy of aggression and of violation of the Geneva agreements, the American interventionists, in cooperation with some military authorities of the French Union Forces, have been trying by every possible means to prop the Government of Ngo-Dinh-Diem, a government that is detested by the large majority of the Vietnamese people, a government that is pursuing a policy of repression and terror against the peace and freedom-loving population in Southern Vietnam. The repeated statements of General Collins, according to which the United States gives support only to Ngo-Dinh-Diem government and only recognises it as the legal government in Southern Vietnam, show more clearly that the Ngo-Dinh-Diem clique is composed of agents of the American interventionists, that the United States’ policy of brazen interference is in complete contradiction with the aspirations for peace and independence of the Vietnamese people, in contradiction with the Geneva agreements, in contradiction with the consolidation of peace in Indo-China and in Southeast Asia.
These are a number of facts which we wish to bring to the knowledge of the International Commission. Nevertheless, in this memorandum, we have abstained from mentioning other acts of violation of the armistice agreements, such as resorting to constraint and dupery to entice hundreds of thousands of our compatriots to leave for the south where they are left in misery and privations, refusing to deliver to us all the prisoners and detained civilians.
The above-mentioned facts prove that:
1 — In violation of the Geneva agreements, the Ngo-Dinh-Diem clique is carrying out a policy of reprisals, discrimination and massacre in the regrouping zone of the French Union Forces in Southern Vietnam;
2 — In violation of the Geneva agreements, the American interventionists, with the sending of the Lawton Collins Mission to Saigon are now preparing for the introduction of new armaments and military personnel into Southern Vietnam with a view to turning this part of our country into an American military base, with the coordination of the Ngo-Dinh-Diem clique and some French ruling circles hostile to the armistice agreements;
3 — The present military authorities of the French Union Forces in Southern Vietnam are themselves taking part in the acts of violation of the armistice agreements although they are signatories of these agreements and are responsible for their execution.
The acts of violation of the armistice agreements mentioned above have a severe character. They aim at using violence to oppose the will for peace, independence, unity and democracy of our compatriots in the south. They also aim at integrating the southern part of our country into the aggressive Southeast Asia military bloc headed by the United States. They aim at creating conditions to hinder the coming general elections, obstruct the unification of our country, sabotage the settlement of political problems in Vietnam, that is to sabotage the most important clauses of the Geneva agreements, concerning the sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity of Vietnam and the realisation of unity through free general elections. These acts are part of the United States’ aggressive plan to transform Southern Vietnam into an American colony, to use it as a military base for the benefit of the United States’ war preparation policy in Southeast Asia. The result is that the policy of violation of the Geneva agreements in Southern Vietnam is greatly prejudicial to the atmosphere favourable for peace created by the Geneva Conference, that it constitutes an obstacle for the restoration of good relations between the northern and Southern zones of Vietnam, an obstacle for the establishment of good relations between Vietnam and France, an obstacle for the consolidation of peace in Indo-China and Southeast Asia.
By order of the Government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, the High Command of the Vietnamese People’s Army vigorously denounces the above-mentioned systematic acts of violation of the Geneva agreements.
It considers that the American interventionist circles and the Ngo-Dinh-Diem clique should bear the main responsibility in these acts of violation of the agreements; however, as these acts have occurred in the regrouping zone of the French Union Forces and, moreover, as the French military authorities have colluded with American interventionists and Ngo-Dinh-Diem, the High Command of the French Union Forces, being a signatory and responsible for the execution of the agreements on behalf of the French Government, should also share its responsibility in these acts of violation.
Basing itself upon the mission of control and supervision of the International Commission, the High Command of the Vietnamese People’s Army hopes that the International Commission will pay particular attention to the above-mentioned acts of violation and that it will take appropriate measures so that the Geneva agreements will be respected, especially the article 14, paragraphs C and D and the articles 15, 16, 17, 18 and 19 of the Agreement on the Cessation of hostilities in Vietnam.
The above-mentioned acts of violation have provoked a wave of indignation among the whole Vietnamese people. The will of struggle for peace, independence, unity and democracy of the Vietnamese people is unshakable. The policy of respecting the agreements signed by the Government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam is a consistent one, and the High Command of the Vietnamese People’s Army is determined to implement it. We are sure that, with the efforts made by our Government and people, with the sympathy of peace-loving countries and peoples in the world, with the efforts of the International Commission, peace will be consolidated in Vietnam and in Southeast Asia, and that the plots to sabotage the agreements of the American imperialists and their lackeys are doomed to failure. The Geneva agreements should be respected.
I am happy, Mr. Chairman, to extend my sincere greetings to the International Commission.