We’re getting into the French War proper now, and we’ll make it almost all the way to the outbreak of the war in Korea by the end of this one.
I’ve got some videos whose audio I couldn’t use, for various reasons, in the show itself, but that might serve to give all of us a better picture of the life and times of the place and period we’re talking about.
First we’ve got a silent short on Saigon after the British moved in in 1945:
Here we have the triumphant entrance of General Leclerc (and if you listen closely, you can hear exactly how wrong I’m pronouncing his name most of this episode) into Hanoi in 1946 after the March 6 Accords:
Then we’ve got a French newsreel on the outbreak of war in 1947 after the battle of Haiphong and during the ongoing battle of Hanoi:
I don’t speak a lick of French, but there are plenty of names I (and you) will be able to pick out. We hear from (and see!) Jean Sainteny, Overseas Minister (“de France Outremer”) Marius Moutet, Generals Morliere and Valluy,
On a less Indochinese front, we’ve got a propaganda film produced under the Marshall Plan, one of hundreds created at George Marshall’s Paris headquarters and aimed at Europeans who doubted their ability to rebuild after the war. That is, to stave off both Communist takeovers and fears of the same by holding out the redevelopment of the Marshall Plan as Western, Capitalist hope:
Then we’ve got maps, to back up the geography lesson in the first part of this show. Here’s modern Vietnam, with a very readable relief.
And then a map of Indochina, including Laos and Cambodia.
No subsidiary story in the notes today; that’s going to be next Monday’s show.
And last but never, ever least:
Bayart, Jean-Francois. “Africa in the World: A History of Extraversion.” African Affairs, 2000, 217-267.
Ellsberg, Daniel. Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers. New York; Viking Press, 2002.
Fall, Bernard. Hell in a Very Small Place. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1966.
Fall, Bernard. Last Reflections on a War. New York: Schocken Books, 1972.
Fall, Bernard. Street without Joy: Indochina at War, 1946-54. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1961.
Fall, Bernard. The Two Viet Nams: A Political and Military Analysis. New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1963.
Fehrenbach, T. R. This Kind of War: A Study in Unpreparedness. New York: Macmillan, 1963.
Fitzgerald, Frances. Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1972.
Gaddis, John Lewis. Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Security Policy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Halberstam, David. The Best and the Brightest. New York: Random House, 1972.
Halberstam, David. The Coldest Winter: America and the Korean War. New York: Hyperion, 2007.
Herr, Michael. Dispatches. New York: Knopf, 1977.
Hickey, Gerald Cannon. A Village in Vietnam. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1964.
Huntington, Samuel. “The Bases of Accommodation.” Foreign Affairs, 1968.
Karnow, Stanley. Vietnam: A History. New York: Penguin Books, 1997.
Lacouture, Jean. Ho Chi Minh: A Political Biography. New York: Random House, 1968.
Lacouture, Jean. Vietnam: Between Two Truces. New York: Random House, 1966.
Logevall, Frederick. Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America’s Vietnam. New York: Random House, 2012.
Maclear, Michael. The Ten Thousand Day War: Vietnam, 1945-1975. New York: Avon Books, 1982.
Mus, Paul and McAlister, John T. The Vietnamese and Their Revolution. New York: Harper and Row, 1970.
Moore, Harold G., and Galloway, Joseph L. We Were Soldiers Once…and Young. New York: Random House, 1992.
Niehbuhr, Rienhold. The Irony of American History. Chicago: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1952.
Sheehan, Neil. A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam. New York: Vintage, 1988.
Audio Credits:
Berlin Airlift – The Story of a Great Achievement (1949). British Government Public Information Films, Crown Film Unit, National Archives. The National Archives.
Berlin Air Lift (1949). British Pathé. YouTube.
Cold War – Truman Doctrine. Mat Shackleton. YouTube.
French out of Indo China. sotonsom. YouTube.
Funeral in Paris of General Leclerc (1947). British Pathé. YouTube.
Hollywood Red Communism Probe Begins – 1947 Newsreel. CoolOldVideos. YouTube.
Looking Back – On 1947. British Pathé. YouTube.
Newsreel: End of the Nuremburg Trial (1946). Nuclear Vault. YouTube.
Japanese Sign Final Surrender 1945 Newsreel. PublicDomainFootage. YouTube.
Review of the Year 1946. British Pathé. YouTube.
Reviewing the Year 1949. British Pathé. YouTube.
The Big Picture “Army in Action” Marshall Plan Episode 9 74512. Periscope Film. YouTube.
War in the East (1947). British Pathé. YouTube.
War Victims Find Haven in America – 1946 Newsreel. C-SPAN. YouTube.
West Wins Berlin Blockade Battle (1949). British Pathé. YouTube.