link up with Chinese Nationalist forces in southern China. In March
1945, all French personnel were interned in a lightning Japanese coup
de force, but for a few who staged a fighting retreat into China, and
small pockets in Laos.
Under Japanese inducement, the kings of Cambodia and Laos
and Emperor Bao Dai of Vietnam all declared the independence of
their countries. When Japan surrendered six months later, these royal
declarations of independence were rescinded, but the genie was
already out of the bottle, even where nationalism had been slow to
develop. In Laos and Cambodia, Free Lao and Free Khmer movements
fought the reimposition of French rule over the next several years.
Indochina was the one part of Southeast Asia where Chinese
forces directly intervened after the war. Under the terms of the
Potsdam Agreement, the surrender of Japanese troops north of the six-
teenth parallel of latitude was taken by Nationalist Chinese forces and
south of it by the British Southeast Asia Command. This did not apply
to Burma, which the British had already reoccupied (a Chinese force
briefly crossed the border near Myitkyina, but was prevailed upon to
withdraw); or to Thailand, which had no common border with China.
It did apply to Vietnam and Laos. Cambodia lay south of the sixteenth
parallel.
It took time, however, for Chinese Nationalist forces to arrive.
In the meantime the Free Lao established a government in Viang
Chan that survived until the French reconquest of the country in
- In Vietnam, in an even more significant development, the
Vietminh took advantage of the temporary power vacuum to force
the abdication of Bao Dai and proclaim the independence of the
Democratic Republic of Vietnam under the leadership of Ho Chi
Minh.
By the time Chinese Nationalist forces arrived, remaining Japan-
ese troops had retreated south to surrender to the British and French.
In Laos, the Chinese favoured the Free Lao, but in Vietnam they brought
with them the Dong Minh Hoi, members of which Ho prudently
A Short History of China and Southeast Asia