Relations between the revolutionary movements in China and
Vietnam were practically nonexistent for much of the 1930s, until the
CCP completed its ‘Long March’ to its remote northern base at
Yan’an. Communication thereafter was still a problem, but Ho
managed to pay a visit in 1938. With the outbreak of war with Japan,
communications became even more difficult. Vietnamese and Chinese
revolutionaries remained in contact in southern China, however, and
it was there Ho Chi Minh returned early in 1941. By that time
Chinese Nationalists and communists had agreed to form a united
front against the Japanese. Ho and other members of the ICP worked
closely with GMD forces in the China–Vietnam border area. In May
1941 Ho and his circle, including Pham Van Dong and Vo Nguyen
Giap, formed the Vietnam League for Independence (Viet Nam Doc
Lap Dong Minh), commonly known as the Vietminh, to act as a broad
front for their independence struggle against French colonialism.
During the war years, Vietminh activists were protected in their
bases on the Chinese side of the border by local left-leaning GMD offi-
cers. There they built up their organisation and studied communist
ideology and guerrilla warfare. Meanwhile in Vietnam the French
administration remained in place, under an agreement between Japan
and the Vichy government in France. As French military operations
made it difficult to establish secure bases in Vietnam, Ho turned to
China for help. His intention to seek a closer working relationship
with the CCP was thwarted, however, by his arrest and imprisonment
for more than a year by GMD authorities.^4
The Chinese Nationalists, in the meantime, attempted to bring
together a number of non-communist revolutionary organisations to
form the Vietnam Liberation League (Dong Minh Hoi). This was
part of a deliberate attempt ‘to resuscitate China’s leadership in
Asian affairs’, and more especially its ‘special position’ with respect
to Vietnam.^5 The Dong Minh Hoi, like the Vietminh, was dedicated
to liberating Vietnam from French colonialism, but under Chinese
Nationalist, rather than communist, tutelage. Ho Chi Minh was
The changing world order