ABSTRACT
The 1954 division of Vietnam was possible thanks, among other things, to Vietnam’s inadequate diplomatic thinking, marked by an unqualified confidence in proletarian internationalism and poor research on Cold War international relations, in particular on relations among the big powers. This unfortunate division was also due to the USSR-China consensus on Indochina which existed at that period. That consensus had broken down by the end of the 1950s. In 1959, the Vietnam Workers’ Party adopted Resolution No. 15, which affirmed that “the basic path of development of the revolution in South Vietnam is armed struggle combined with political struggle . . .”.1 The official documents of the Vietnam Workers’ Party, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV) and North Vietnam’s press said nothing about how the Sino-Soviet rift might be useful to Vietnam’s national struggle, and the 15th Resolution just stated that “it is the international duty of the Workers’ Party to secure and turn all favourable conditions in the world to the advantage of the just struggle of our people, because our struggle contributes to the strengthening of world peace, to the promotion of the national liberation movement and the consolidation of the socialist system”.2
But Ho Chi Minh’s patient efforts from 1959 to cultivate the friendship and support of both China and the USSR, China’s declared willingness to help Vietnam’s war efforts from the end of 1962 and particularly from 1963, and Pham Van Dong’s visit to Moscow in November 1964 (almost immediately after the fall of Khrushchev) – resulting in the USSR’s agreement to renew economic and military aid to the DRV – show that Hanoi succeeded, partly because of the rift, to win aid and support from both socialist big powers for the national liberation struggle in South Vietnam. Further, the DRV’s FourPoint policy of April 1965, its willingness to have direct and indirect contacts with the USA but rejection of talks until the USA unconditionally put an end to all bombing and war acts against North Vietnam, the Tet Offensive which took all three big powers by surprise, and the decision of the DRV to hold talks with the USA in Paris (May 1968) in spite of Chinese opposition and in spite of USSR proposals to have them in Moscow or Warsaw show that, while seeking and receiving aid, the DRV and NLF (National Liberation Front of South Vietnam) were determined, for the sake of their national
