ABSTRACT
In the context of guerrilla warfare, which started with World War II and lasted for the successive Indochina Wars, the support of local populations was seen as an important asset, both for the employment of guerrilla tactics and for most counterinsurgency schemes. Through World War II the myth of a special relationship between the Montagnards and their French protectors was loudly proclaimed. This chapter argues that French ethnographic practice was institutionalized in the context of mounting political tension in the region before and during World War II. It shows that D’Argenlieu’s establishment of the Pays Montagnard du Sud-Indochinois (PMSI), grounded in military and political motives in the struggle against the Viet-Minh, was the logical outcome of earlier developments in the area. The chapter describes the French attempts to gain military control of the PMSI through direct rule in the guise of Montagnard ‘autonomy’ until the Vietnamese claims to Montagnard territory could no longer be denied.
