Part I VIET -NAM DOCUMENTS AND RESEARCH.NOTES

Transcription

1 Part I VIET -NAM DOCUMENTS AND RESEARCH.NOTES

2 c~, Document No. 114 July, 1973 VWP-DRV LEADERSHIP 1960 to 1973 \. TABLE OF CONTENTS PART I j Introduction Part I The Central Committee of the Viet-Nam Workers' Party, Its Political Bureau and Its Staff Biographical Sketches Members of the Politburo Members of the Central Committee Alternate Members of the Central Committee Page i PART II [under seperate cover] The Government of the Democratic Republic of Viet-Nam, Lists of Members of the Government of the DRV, Lists of Military Leaders of the DRV Cj

3 Document 114 July, 1973 VWP-DRV LEADERSHIP, 1960 TO 1973 Introduction 1t. ;1 This research notes attempts to round-up all the data on Party and State leadership in North Viet-Nam which has become available to its editor in the past three and a quarter years, when he was responsible for Viet-Nam Documents and Research Notes and Principal Reports from Communist Sources. The essential assistance that these publications and this research note have received from other United States government researchers and the collaboration of a colleague in Saigon, James M. Haley, is gratefully acknowledged. Some of the research embodied in this paper was undertaken for Viet-Nam Documents and Research Notes No. 103 and 107, "The Structure of Power In The DRV: Constitution and Party Statute" and "The Bases Of Power In The DRV". This document does not replace either of those. The first reprints the two basic "constitutional" cannons of the Democratic Republic of Viet-Nam, and demonstrates that the Viet Nam Workers' Party's monopoly of political power in North Viet-Nam is sanctioned by the national constitution. It also showed that the "reunification" of Viet-Nam under communist rule, to follow from an involved political process, is a stated Party and national objective of the DRV. "The Bases Of Power In The DRV" attempted to describe the way in which the Politburo of the VWP rests upon four pillars, the Party, the Viet-Nam People'S Army. the civil government of the DRV, and the congeries of ceremonial institutions and "mass organizations" which the Party controls. Decisions result from the interaction of these power bases. In each of them the key positions are occupied by members of the Politburo, assisted by functionaries of the Party Secretariat and other members of the Central Committee. It showed too that persons based in one or another of these apparatuses also held important positions in another. It follows that the structure of power in the DRV is tightly integrated, at least at the top. Unfortunately there is not sufficient data available to permit a similar probing of the institutions of the DRV down to

4 ... iithe provincial, municipal, district and village levels, or to local Party committees or V. P. A. units to assess the degree to which they reflect the seemingly perfectly integrated power structure at the top. Document 107 did present some evidence that performance of cadres at the local level was disappointing to the handful of ageing revolutionaries who have managed to hold tightly to their monopoly of power at the top. What percentage of the Party's approximately 200,000 cadres, its allegedly 1,200,000 members, let alone the 20,000,000 people of North Viet-Nam, are truly responsive to the regime's appeals is even more difficult to ascertain. As Viet-Nam Documents and Research Notes No. 112 "DRV Cadre Policy In The 'New Phase' " indicated the Party is concerned about the quality of its junior officers and n. c. os. who have failed to become or create "socialist men." Nonetheless, it is this Party and this govermnent with which the governments and peoples of the world are going to be confronted during the coming years. So, no apologies are advanced for an attempt to familiarize ourselves with its top strata in more detail than was provided in the two research notes which it supplements. This research note breaks into several parts. The first is a study of the Central Committee of the Viet-Nam Workers' Party from 1960 to So far as one knows there have been no changes of significance in its membership since 1969, but there have been alterations in the governmental structure of the DRV since 1960 which have resulted in some changes in the status of personalities within the Party, personalities about whom little is known outside of North Viet-Nam. These changes are indicated in the biographical sketches of members of the Central Committee provided here as well as in the lists of ministers. Least satisfactory is the section on military leadership. While in a few cases biographical details are more fullsome for military than non-military leaders in the VWP-DRV, the relationships within the military are less known. For example, the composition of the Central Military Party Committee has never been revealed in a comprehensive listing, nor does one know at what point in the chain of command the authority of political o~ficers and Party committees is reduced, and line commanders or chiefs of staff departments become in fact the heads of their units.

5 c) -iii... The year 1960 was chosen as the starting point of this study for a number of reasons. Data is more fullsome for the period since 1960 than it was prior to that year. The Constitution of the DRV drafted in 1959 became effective then, and the government was reconstituted following the National Assembly elections of the spring of More important, the most recent National Congress of the VWP was held in 1960, electing a new and enlarged Central Committee and publicly committing the Party to the direction of the revolution in the South, and establishing the National Front for the Liberation of South Viet-Nam upon which the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Viet-Nam is based. (For the relationship between the VWP-DRV and the NFL-PRG readers may wish to see Viet-Nam Documents and Research Notes No. 101 and 11l "The PRGRSV and lithe Leadership of the PRG, the NFLSV and their Affiliated Organizations, ") The cut-off date of this study is 30 June DRV leaders had returned from a successful aid-seeking mission to the People's Republic of China, and agreed to the communique of the May-June discussions with a United States official in Paris for the implementation of the January 1973 Agreement to end the war and restore peace to Viet-Nam. On June 14, the D~V National Assembly Standing Committee published a number of cabinet changes and modifications in the structure of economic and logistical ministries in the civil government of the DRV. These changes have been incorporated into the discussion and the tables in the section of this research note on the government, and into the biographies of those Central Committee members who were involved William C. Gausmann

6 Part I The Central Committee of The Viet-Nam Workers' Party its Political Bureau and Its Staff.. c) The Central Committee of the Viet-Nam Workers' Party, elected by the Party's Third National Congress, in Hanoi, September 5-10, 1960, consisted of 43 full members and 28 alternate members. The Committee in turn selected a Political Bureau of 11 full members and two alternate members, and a Secretariat of seven, of whom the first four named were Politburo members. The other three were full members of the Committee. President Ho Chi Minh was confirmed as Party Chairman, and Le Duan as First Secretary. As the list was read Congress delegates "stood up in stormy ovation", said the Hanoi Viet-Nam News Agency report in English of September 10, upon which the following lists are based. The Politburo members were listed in the rank order which still prevails, save for the deletion of the names of the two members who have died, as were the members of the secretariat. However, except for placing Ho Chi Minh's name first, the lists of Committeemen were presented alphabetically. Consequently there was no indication of their seniority. Scattered references in North Vietnamese media during the years preceding the Congress permit the construction of Politburo and full Central Committee seniority estimates. In the first list which follows the names of Ho Chi Minh and Nguyen Chi Thanh appear. They were both elected to the Politburo at the Third Congress, and indeed were Politburo members as early as 1951 when the Viet-Nam Workers' Party was proclaimed. It, rather deceptively, is referred to as the Second Congress, since the Party is the direct descendant of the Indochinese Communist Party organized in In 43 years the VWP and its predecessor organization have held only three congresses. The Party Statute, read by Le Duc Tho at the Third Congress, provided that congresses should ''usually'' be held every four years. None has been held since the Statute was adopted in The first list gives the dates of election to the Politburo of its members in so far as they can be deduced. Current pecking order follows it remarkably closely, allowing for the demise of

7 -la- List 1 VIET-NAM WORKERS' PARTY Political Bureau As Elected At 1960 Party Congress Believed To Have Been Elected At 1951 Party Congress Ho Chi Minh, died 1969 Truong Chinh Pham Van Dong Vo Nguyen Giap (Gen.) Le Duan Le Duc Tho Nguyen Chi Thanh, died 1967 Believed To Have Been Elected Between 1951 and 1960 Congress Pham Hung Nguyen Duy Trinh Le Thanh Nghi Hoang Van Hoan (~) Elected Alternate Members At 1960 Congress, Promoted To Full Membership 1972 Tran Quoc Hoan Van Tien Dung [Central Committee members Hoang Quoc Viet and Le Van Luong are believed to have been elected to the Politburo in They stepped down during the land reform "rectification" program in 1956 and were not returned to the Politburo at the 1960 Congress. Le Van Luong, however, was swim a secretariat position at the 1960 Congress.] (J r!

8 c: -lb- List 2 RECAPITULATION Politburo Membership By Listing Order Le Duan.. Truong Chinh Pham Van Dong Pham Hung* Vo Nguyen Giap (Gen.) Le Duc Tho Nguyen Duy Trinh c) Le Thanh Nghi Hoang Van Hoan Tran Quoc Hoan Van Tien Dung (Col. Gen.) *[Pham Hung has not in fact appeared on any VWP list since Ho Chi Minh's funeral in September There is rallier evidence however of his being secretary of the Central Office of South Viet-Nam (COSVN) as late as August Presumably he remains fourth ranking member of the Politburo. The above list is the order in which the names appeared in Hanoi media following the 1960 Congress minus the two members who are deceased. ]

9 _2_ Ho and Thanh. There were, nonetheless, a few interesting changes in the 1960 name order, but none since then. In the 1960 announcement Le Duan advanced to second place, immediately after Ho Chi Minh by virtue of being then First Sec'retary of the Party. Truong Chinh was accorded third place as former secretary general of the Party and perhaps also by virtue of his having, prior to the convening of the Congress, been chosen as Chairman of the National Assembly Standing Committee. The Constitution of the DRV in one of its many anamolies ranks the NASC Chairman ahead of the Premier, who is the effective head of the government. Pharn Hung though junior in Politburo membership to Giap was listed ahead of him, possibly because he was First Vice Premier. It appears, therefore, that state rank had some influence in Politburo listing, but it was not followed rigorously. Date of election to the Politburo mattered, as demonstrated by Thanh's being given seniority over Thinh and Nghi who were Vice Premiers of the government. The second list shows the current order of Politburo listing as followed in every announcement of gatherings at which most or all of the Politburo members, except Pharn Hung, have appeared. Save for the absence of Ho and Thanh it is precisely as read to the Congress delegates in (J The third list shows, so far as available information pernlits, which of the 1960 Central Committee members were first elected at the 1951 Congress of the 43, plus another seven who were probably designated alternate members in 1951 and elevated to full membership in the intervening nine years, and another four who are known to have been Central Committee members before the 1960 Congress convened. In short, 29 of the 43 were Central Committee members prior to Only 14 were newly selected. All of the 29 carry-overs, with perhaps two exceptions about whom insufficient biographical data is available, were members of the Indochinese Communist Party prior to 1940, as were, apparently, a majority of the 14 new full members of the Comnrlttee, and of the alternates all of whom were newly chosen in Consequently pre. World War II communists held a decisive majority of the full and alternate seats on the VWP Central Committee in and in The fourth and fifth lists recapitulate Central Committee membership as it presumably was in June 1973.

10 _._- -2A List 3 VIET-NAM WORKERS' PARTY CENTRAL COMMITTEE As Elected At 1960 Party Congress Believed To Have Been Elected At 1951 Party Congress Ho Chi Minh, died 1969 Nguyen Luong Bang Truong Chinh Le Duan Pharn Van Dong Vo Nguyen Giap (Gen.) c) Hoang Van Hoan Tran Quoe Hoan Pharn Hung Ung Van Khiem Le Van Luong Le Thanh N ghi Chu Van Tan (Col. Gen.) Ton Due Thang Nguyen Chi Thanh, died 1967 Le Due Tho Nguyen Duy Trinh Hoang Quoe Viet

11 -2B_ Believed to Have Been Alternate Member In 1951, Elevated To Full Membership Prior To 1960 Congress. Hoang Anh Van Tien Dun.g (Col. Gen.) Ha Huy Giap To Huu Nguyen Van Kinh.. Nguyen Khang Nguyen Van Tran Others Known To Have Been Meulbers Prior To 1960, May Have Been Elected Alternates in Tran Huu Duc Do Muoi Nguyen Thi Thap (Nguyen) Xuan Thuy «(J

12 c) -2C- Apparently Elected Initially In 1960 Le Quang Ba Nguyen Can.' Duong Quae Chinh Va Thuc Dong Song Hao (Lt. Gen.) Nguyen Lam Tran Luong (Maj. Gen.) Le Hien Mai (Maj. Gen.) Chu Vim Man (Maj. Gen.) Ha Thi Que (Mrs.) Bui Quang Tao Phan Trang Tue (Maj. Gen.) Hoang Van Thai (Lt. Gen.) Le Quae Than, C')! ~.J

13 -2D- List 4 RECAPITULATION VWP CENTRAL COMMITTEE As Constituted Full Members Hoang Anh Le Quang Ba Nguyen Luong Bang Duong Quae Chinh Truong Chinh Nguyen Can Le Duan Van Tien Dung (Col. Gen) Tran Huu Due Pham Van Dong Va Thue Dong Va Nguyen Giap (Gen) Ha HUy Giap Song Hao (Lt. Gen) Hoang Van Hoan Tran Quae Hoan Pham Hung To Huu Nguyen Van Kinh Nguyen Khang Ung Van Khiem Nguyen Lam Le Van Luong Tran Luong (Maj. Gen) Le Hien Mai (Maj. Gen) Ghu Huy Man (Maj. Gen) Do Muoi Le Thanh N ghi Ha Thi Que (Mrs.) Bui Quang Tao Chu Van Tan (Col. Gen) Phan Trang Tue (Maj. Gen) Hoang Van Thai (Lt. Gen) Ton Due Thang -- Nguyen Thi Thap (Mrs.) Le Quae Than Le Due Tho (Nguyen) Xuan Thuy Nguyen Van Tran Nguyen Duy Trinh Hoang Quae Viet

14 Ci -ZE- List 5 Alternate Melllbers., Ly Ban Nguyen Thanh Binh - Dinh Thi Can (Mrs.) Nguyen Tho Chan Le Quang Dao (Maj. Gen) Tran Do (Maj. Gen) Ngctyen Don (Maj. Gen) Tran Quy Hai (Maj. Gen) Tran Quang Huy Le Hoang Nguyen Khai Nguyen Huu Khieu *Hoang Van Kieu Le Lielll Ngo Minh Loan Nguyen Van Loc Nguyen Huu Mai Ha Ke Tan (Maj. Gen.) Nguyen Khanh Toan Hoang Tung Tran Danh Tuyen Le Thanh Dinh Duc Thien (Sr. Col.) Ngo Thuyen Tran Van Tra (Lt. Gen) Bui Cong Trung Nguyen Van Vinh (Ma.j. Gen) Nguyen Trong Vinh * Several references to Kieu in DRV output since 1969 suggest that he has been elevated to full lllelllbership in the Central Co=ittee, in keeping with his position as Party Secretary for the Tay Bac Autonolllous Zone.

15 Obviously, the question arises, are all of these Central Committee members, other than Ho Chi Minh and Nguyen Chi Thanh, still alive and participating in the work of the Committee and in the governance of the DRV? List 6 demonstrates that the Politburo members' average age is 63. All of them were, beyond doubt, alive in June 1973, (with the possible exception of Pharn Hung) since all but Pharn Hung were mentioned during that month by Hanoi media as having participated in some activity. But what of the Central Committee members whose average age was about 62, and the alternates, who, in so far as their ages are known, averaged 55 or 56? It is actuarily unthinkable that all of these men were still in place in June As the biographical sketches presented here indicate about a half dozen of them have dropped out of sight, some for nearly a decade. One or two of these may be in retirement, possibly as "deviationists"; the others may have either died or become incapacitated. But no announcements to this effect have appeared in DRV media. Turning back to lists three and. five--newly elected full members of the Central Committee and the alternate members chosen at the 1960 Congress -it is apparent that the principal source of new committeemen was,"th:eviet-nam People's Army. Of the 14 new members six arc:v1l.sted. with their military titles. A seventh, Le Quang Ba, haj:l/just that year left the army to accept a civil post. Two of the recruits, however, Nguyen Con and Nguyen Lam, have proved to be economic managerially oriented, and so 'have increased that skill category in a committee still dominated by men who first gained prominence as professional revolutionaries--the ICP majority. Among the alternate members chosen in 1960 those bearing military titles also loom large on the list, with an assortment of technicians, propagandists and educators rounding it out. Among them, so far as one can make out, ICP members, as has been said, still received preference, but men whose political initiation was primarily in the Resistance War against the French--Viet Minh products--began to appear at least on the road to political power. But, so far as the scanty biographical data on most alternate Central Committee members reveals, few if any of them began their political careers in circumstances other than revolutionary "armed political" struggle. i) \.. Another fact that leaps out of the data about VWP Central Committee members is the large number of themjincluding Ho Chi Minh himself, who were born or were first active politically in Central Viet-Nam, the least heavily populated but traditionally most

16 c) -3A- List 6 Years and places of Birth of Politburo members Name YOB POB I.e Duan 1908 Quang Tri Truong Chinh 1908 Nam Dinh Age in ~ c) Pham Van Dong 1906 Quang Ngai Pham Hung 1912 Vinh Long Vo Nguyen Giap 1912 Quang Binh I,e Duc Tho 1910 Nam Ha Nguyen Duy Trinh 1910 Nghe An I.e Thanh Nghi 1911 NVN Hoang Van Hoan 1905 Nghe An Van Tien Dung 1917 Ha Dong * The average age for the 10 Politburo members for whom information is available is 63. I years. The only member whose age is not known, Tran Quoc Hoan, is thought to have been born in 1910, which would make the average age in 1973 an even 63 years. Of the 11 members of the Politburo, five are known to have been born in Central Viet-Nam. A sixth, Tran Quoc Hoan, appears also to have been raised in Central Viet-Nam, in Ha Tinh Province. Le Duan, Pham Van Dong, and Pham Hung were born in provinces now in the Republic of Viet-Nam.

17 -3B- Years of birth and birthplaces are known for the following members of the Viet-Nam Workers' Party Central Executive Committee: Name YOB POB Age in 1973 Le Quang Ba Nguyen Luong Bang Truong Chinh Le Duan Van Tien Dung Tran Huu Due Pham Van Dong Vo Nguyen Giap Hoang Van Hoan Pham Hung To Huu Nguyen Van Kinh Ung Van Khiem Nguyen Lam Tran Luong Le Hien Mai Chu Huy Man Le Thanh Nghi Ha Thi Que Chu Van Tan Phan Trong Tue Hoang Van Thai Ton Due Thang Nguyen Thi Thap Le Due Tho Xuan Thuy Nguyen Van Tran Nguyen Duy Trinh Hoang Quoc Viet Cao Bang NVN Nam Dinh Quang Tri Ha Dong Quang Tri Quang Ngai Quang Binh Nghe An Vinh Long Thua Thien Cho Lon Long Xuyen (? ) Ha Tinh Son Tay Nghe An NVN Ninh Binh Thai Nguyen Son Tay Thai Binh Long Xuyen My Tho Nam Ha Ha Dong SVN Nghe An Bac Ninh , Of the 29 members of the 41-member VWP Central Committee for whom information is available, the average age is 62.2 years. The range is from 51 to 85 (Ton Due Thang). If Thang is excluded, the average age of the remaining 28 members is years.

18 (i -3C- Years and places of birth are known for the following alternate members of the Viet-Nam Workers' Party Central Executive Committee: c Age in Name YOB POB 1973 Dinh Thi Can 1920 Nghe An 53 Nguyen Tho Chan 1922 NVN 51 Tran Do 1922 NVN 51 Nguyen Don 1914 Quang Ngai 59 Tran Quy Hai 1917 Quang NgaL 56 Nguyen Khanh Toan 1903 CVN 70 Tran Dang Tuyen 1912 Bac Giang 61 Tran Van Tra 1918 Quang Ngai 55 Bui Cong Trung 1910 Hue CVN 63 Nguyen Van Vinh 1917 Narn Dinh 56 Of the 10 of the 28 alternate members of the Central Executive Committee for whom information is available, the average age is 56.9 years. The age range is from 51 to 70 (Nguyen Khanh Toanl. If Toan is excluded, the average age of the remaining members is 55.

19 _4_ politicized of the three areas of Viet-Nam! Central Viet-Nam, Annam, or Trung Bo, as it has been called, consisted of the provinces of Thanh Hoa, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, and Quang Binh in what 'is now the northern Democratic Republic of Viet-Nam, and the provinces of Quang Tri, Thua Thien, Quang Nam, Quang Tin Quang Ngai and Binh Dinh and a few provinces just to the South, in the southern Republic of Viet-Nam. (West of these coastal Provinces lie the Central or Western Highlands, including the provinces of Kontum and Pleiku. Like the western portions of the coastal provinces they are mountainous, under-populated, and peopled for the most part by nomadic ethnic minority groups rather than by ethnic Vietnamese people.) It was from the Vietnamese population of the valleys and coastal strip of these central provinces in both North and South Viet-Nam that a disproportionate number of the leaders of Vietnamese communism have been drawn, leaders of the Party and government in the DRV, and of the People's Liberation Armed Forces and the People's Revolutionary Party in South Viet-Nam. (See Viet-Nam Documents and Research Notes No. III "The Leadership of the PRG, the NFLSV and Their Affiliated Organizations, 1973" on the southern aspects of this phenomenon. ) List 7 shows those DRV leaders, Party Central Committeemen, plus a few important other office holders, who were born in Trung Bo with brief statements as to the positions they hold in the DRV, and their Trung Bo origins. It is possible that in one or two instances it is a mistake to assume that a man's having first held an important political assignment in Central Viet-Nam established any meaningful identification with the area. The reasoning which prompted the listing is suggested,.and the reader is enabled to reduce the list if he so wishes. (On the other hand Politburo Le Thanh Nghi whose first political notoriety was gained in Quang Ninh province, in Tonkin, is not included although he too may have been born in and joined the Party in Quang Binh for which he currently sits in the National Assembly. There is a tendency for national leaders of the DRV born in provinces within its borders to take Assembly seats from their native provinces. ) The fact remains that even if several names were :) 1. Central Viet-Nam, scene of the Tay Son rebellion in the late 18th century, the restoration of the Nguyen throne at Hue in the early 19th century and the principal area of scholars I and mandarins' revolts against the French during the early 20th century. i) \,.

20 -4A- List 7 CENTRAL VIETNAMESE HOLDING IMPORTANT POSITIONS IN THE VWP AND DRV VWP Politburo Secretariat, and Central Committee Members I' Le Duan~' Member of the VWP Central Committee Political Bureau; First Secretary of the VWP Central Committee; Member of the National Defense Council. Duan was born in the province of Quang Tri in Central Viet-Nam. \, C j Pham Van Dong* Vo Nguyen Giap Member of the VWP Central Committee Political Bureau; Premier of the Government; Vice Chairman of the National Defense Council. Dong was born in Quang Ngai province. Member of the VWP Central Committee Political Bureau; Senior General; Chairman of the Central Military Party Committee; Commander-in-Chief of the Viet-Nam People's Army; Minister of National Defense; Member of the National Defense Council. Giap was born in Quang Binh province and represents a Quang Binh constituency in the DRV National Assembly. Nguyen Duy Trinh Member of the VWP Central Committee.Political Bureau; Vice-Premier of the Government; Minister of Foreign Affairs. Trinh was born in Nghe An province. Hoang Anh Member of the VWP Central Committee Secretariat; Chairman of the VWP Central Committee's Resettlement Department; Vice-Premier of the Government; Chairman of the Central Agricultural Commission. Although there is no information available regarding Anh's place of birth, in the early 1950's he served as Chairman of the Resistance and Administ rative * Born in provinces now within the Republic of South Viet-Nam.

21 -4B- Nguyen Con Hoang Van Hoan T ran Quoc Hoan To Huu* Tran Luong Tran Huu Duc* Committees of Viet-Minh Interzones 4 and 5 (both in Central Viet-Nam). And currently represents a Thanh Hoa province constituency in the DRV National Assembly. Member of the VWP Central Committee Secretariat; Vice-Premier of the Government; Member of the National Defense Council; Chairman of the State Planning Commission. Con's birthplace remains unknown, as does his early career. However, he represents a Nghe An constituency in the DRV National Assembly. Member of the VWP Central Committee Political Bureau; Vice-Chairman of the National Assembly Standing Committee; Hoan was born in Nghe An province. Member of the VWP Central Committee Political Bureau; Minister of Public Security; Member of the National Defense Council. Although Hoan's place of birth is not known he is thought to have been born in Central Viet-Nam. For at least the past 8 years, he has represented a Ha Tinh province constituency in the DRV National As sembly. Member of the VWP Central Committee Secret ariat; Chairman of the VWP Central Committee's Propaganda and Education Department. Huu was born in Thua Thien province. Member of the VWP Central Committee; Major General in the Viet-Nam People's Army; Member of the Current Affairs Committee of the Central Office for South Viet-Nam (COSVN). Luong was active in the Nghe-Tinh Soviet movement in 1930 and during the 1940's was a guerrilla leader in Ba To district, Quang Ngai province. Member of the VWP Central Committee; Minister at the Premier's Office; Member of the National Defense Council. Duc was born in Quang Tri province.."\..

22 -4C- Vo Thuc Dong Chu Huy Man Dinh Thi Can Nguyen Don* Nguyen Huu Kieu Tran Qui Hai* Member of the VWP Central Committee; Ambassador of the DRV to the USSR. From at least early 1962 until his ambassadorial appointment in 1972, Dong was Secretary of the Provincial VWP Committee of Nghe An province. Member of the VWP Central Committee; Major General in the Viet-Nam People's Army; Commander and Political Officer of the Western Highlands Front in South Viet-Nam. Man was born in Nghe An province. Alternate Members of the Central Committee Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee; Vice -Minister of Public Health. Mrs. Can was born in Vinh, the provincial capital of Nghe An Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee; Major General in the Viet-Nam People's Army; Deputy Chief of the VPA General Staff; Vice Minister of National Defense. Don was born in Quang Ngai province. Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee; Chairman of the VWP Central Committee's Rural Work Department; Minister of Labor. Khieu's place of birth is unknown. However, in the past he has represented constituencies in Thanh Hca province and the Vinh Linh special zone in the DRV National Assembly. Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee; Major General in the Viet-Nam Peoples Army and formerly Chief of its Rear Services Department. Hai, like the more currently prominent Generals Tra and Don was born in Quang Ngai province. Nguyen Khanh Toan* Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee; Vice -Minister of Education; Chairman of the State Social Sciences Commission. Toan was born in the Thua Luu region of Central Viet-Nam, between Hue and Danang.

23 -4D- Ngo Thuyen Tran Van Tra* Bui Cong Trung~' Nguyen Trong Vinh Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee; Ambassador of the DRV to the People's Republic of China. Until his appointment as ambassador to Peking in 1970, Thuyen was Chairman of the Thanh Hoa Provincial Administrative Committee, a position he had held since at least Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee; Lieutenant General in the Viet-Nam People's Army; Deputy Chief of the VPA General Staff; Deputy Commander of COSVN: PRG Delegation Chief Four Party Joint Military Commission, Tra was born in Quang Ngai province. Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee. Trung was born near Hue. [Trung has not been mentioned publicly for some time. He is reported to have been involved in the 1967 ''Hoang Minh Chinh Affair" in which several middle-ranking Party cadres attempted to force a negotiated settlement to the War.] Alternate member of the VWP Central Committee; Major General in the Viet-Nam People's Army. Vinh served as Secretary of the Thanh Hoa Provincial VWP Committee in the early 1960's. Phan Anh Pham Kiet* Tran Dang Khoa* Nguyen Xien Other DRV Officials Minister of Foreign Trade; Member Vietnamese Democratic Party. Anh was born in Nghe An province. Vice-Minister of Public Security; Commander of the People's Armed Security Forces; Major General in the Viet-Nam People's Army. Kiet was born in Quang Ngai. Vice-Chairman of the National Assembly Standing Committee. Khoa was born in Hue. Vice -Chairman of the National Assembly Standing Committee. Xien was born in the provincial capital of Nghe An, Vinh...

24 Cl -4E- T on Quang Phiet* Secretary-General of Standing Committee. Thien province. the National As sembly Phiet was born in Thua- c Hoang Minh Giam Minister of Culture; Deputy Secretary General Viet-Nam Socialist Party. Giam was born in Nghe An province, as was his friend Ho Chi Minh. *

25 -5- dropped from the list Trung Bo's contribution to DRV leading personnel and to the communist movement in Viet-Nam has been out of proportion to its population. It is a poor and contentious area, whose residents for decades have been attracted to politics, and to migration, to both Hanoi and the South. (1) While it would be absurd to suggest that a common area of origin has been the determining factor in the rise of the Trung Bo group in the VWP (intimacy of association in the Party is clearly a more important factor), it would be wrong too to overlook the importance in Viet-Nam of the feeling of kinship which exists upon the basis of region of origin. It is worthy of note that such regional associations have also been an active factor in the internal politics of the Republic of Viet-Nam. The list of DRV leaders of Central Vietnamese origin points to but does not adequately explore the long interchange within the Party between professional revolutionaries from one part of Viet-Nam and another. Some Party leaders, including Le Duan, have apparently worked in all three regions. Others like Truong Chinh, have been identified exclusively with one part of Viet-Nam, Tonkin, the heartland of the DRV. Prior to 1940 the three regional committees of the ICP may have had some autonomy vis-a-vis a Central Committee whose headquarters shifted back and forth between Hanoi and Saigon. Even so, that Central Committee had the authority to detail Party members from one region to another, and the labor market pulled men from Central Viet-Nam to both North and South. This pattern of hit or miss assignments and migration ended with the establishment of the DRV, and of Central Committee headquarters, in Hanoi in August-September Hence forth Hanoi assigned communists regardless of their origins to inspection trips or long-term responsibilities in Central and South Viet-Nam, and, at the same time provided sanctuary for those South Vietnamese communists who had become so well identified by the French police that they could no longer survive in t he South. \. (I) The first "modern" academy, Quoc Hoc, was founded in Hue by Ngo Dinh Diem's father. At various times Ho Chi Minh, Vo Nguyen Giap, Pham Van Dong, and Ngo Dinh Diem, first President of South Viet-Nam,were students there. i \...

26 -5A- List 8 VWP CENTRAL COMMITTEE The Southern Experience: Members Politburo Members Le Duan Pharn Van Dong Pharn Hung Le Duc Tho Born in Quang Tri Province. Second arrest by French was in 1939 when as Central Committee member he was active in the South. On release from prison, in 1945 probably after a trip North,he was assigned as Secretary of the Narn Bo Regional Committee and subsequently of the first COSVN, a post which he held until 1952 or Born in Mo Duc Village, Quang Ngai Province. Political career almost exclusively in North Viet-Narn but he is believed to have made at least one trip to Central Viet-Nam in to assist in reorganizing the Party there. In Poulo Condore prison , he had learned sometime of the Communist movement in SVN. Born in Vinh Long Province, in the Mekong Delta. Arrested by French in My Tho in 1931 he was not released until One of the senior leaders of the Nam Bo Party and resistance until 1954 when he was a member of the Viet Minh delegation to the cease fire commission. After attaining Politburo membership and First Vice Premiership in DRV returned to South in 1967 as head of COSVN Although born in North Viet-Nam, Tho was assigned as deputy head of COSVN in South Viet-Nam in about 1951, and subsequently was its chief until Nguyen Duy Trinh Born in Nghe An Province, Trinh seems to have begun his revolutionary activity in Saigon, for which he was several times jailed. In 1945 he was a leading member of the Viet Minh in the area from Vinh south to Hue, subsequently being elected vice-chairman of the Trung Bo Administrative Committee, remaining a key figure C:) in that area until 1954.

27 -5B- Van Tien Dung The VPA's chief of staff has done virtually all of his political and military work in the North, but after the battle of Dien Bien Phu he came South as chief DRV military delegate on the International Control Commission in Saigon. He is said to have planned the establishment of the arms caches later used by the Viet Congo Central Committee Members Hoang Anh Although his place of birth is not known, Anh was probably born in Trung Bo. Prior to 1951 he was Chairman of the Administrative Committee of the resistance in Viet Minh Interzone V, most of that part of Trung Bo now a part of the RVN; in 1952 he assumed like rank in Interzone IV which includes the Hue-Quang Tri area as well as that part of Trung Bo now in the DRV. Nguyen Luong Bang The DRV's Vice President, although born in the North was active in 1:he revolutionary movement in Saigon in , where he had fled from police in Haiphong. He became a seaman, and after joining the ICP in Hong Kong was again arrested in SVN. Escaping he went to China and came into NVN with Ho Chi Minh becoming secretary general of the Viet Minh. His subsequent career seems to have been entirely in the DR V Tran Huu Duc Ha HUy Giap To Huu Born in Quang Tri Province, Duc was Chairman of the Trung Bo Resistance Committee in 1946, but his later career seems to have been in NVN, where he was listed as National Assembly deputy from Hue. Although apparently North Vietnamese born, Giap is the one Party leader mentioned as a principal organizer of the 1945 August Revolution in Saigon in a pamphlet on that subject. Of a middle class Hue family, Huu was a leader in the 1945 August Revolution there, and from was Director of Information for the Viet Minh in Central Viet-Nam. He moved North when made Information Director for the whole 6f the Viet Minh in 1953.

28 .. (J Ung Van Khiem Nguyen Van Kinh Maj. Gen. Tran Luong Maj. Gen. Le Hien Mai Maj. Gen. Chu Huy Man Lt. Gen. Hoang Van Thai Born in Long Xuyen, Khiem, after some years as a communist courier between China and Viet-Narn, was a principal organizer of the 1945 August Revolution in the southern most part of Viet-Nam. He was both a military and political leader of the Nam Bo resistance and a member of COSVN until 1954 before becoming for a time Foreign Minister of the DRV. In the 1950s President of the Nam Bo Federation of Students, Cholon-born, Kinh was prominent in the Nam Bo Party Committee before moving to the DRV, which he served for ten years as Ambassador to the USSR. Apparently born in North Viet-Nam, Luong's career has been primarily in Trung Bo, where he organized a guerrilla movement in Quang Ngai Province in If, as is widely believed, he is Tran Nam Trung, Minister of the Defense of the PRGRSV he led a similar movement there in and helped reestablish COSVN in 1961, remaining in SVN as a senior political officer in the PLAF, and an NF L PRG figure. Northern-born, Mai now senior deputy chief of the VPA's General Political Directorate was a military leader of the Nam Bo resistance in the 1950s, and the Secretary of a Viet-Minh affiliated Cultural Association Originally from Nghe An Province, Man in the mid-1960s was deputy commander and political secretary in VC Military Region V, and then commander and political officer in the Central Highlands, a post he may still (1973) hold. Born in NVN in 1906, Thai after occupying senior posts inthe VPA came South in 1964 or 1965 as commander in MR V, Trung Bo, moving in 1967 to COSVN as senior NVA military figure and "commander"of the PLAF, a post he is known to have occupied through Tet 1968 and the 1972 offensive.

29 _ 5D_ Ton Duc Thang Nguyen Thi Tap Nguyen Van Tran Phan Trong Tue Hoang Quoc Viet The President of the DRV was born in Long Xuyen in 1888, and began his revolutionary activity there. Mter a long stay in prison he emerged in 1945 as Chairman of the Viet Minh Committee for My Tho, but went North in 1946 to occupy a series of "Front" and governmental positions. Prior to 1954, Mrs. Tap, born in My Tho, was President of the South Viet-Nam Women's Union and the "deputy"from My Tho in the DRV National Assembly. Since 1956 she has been President of the DRV Women's Union. Southern born, French educated, Tran was active in the security services of the Viet Minh during its short-lived rule in Saigon through a Provisional Executive Committee for the South in Thereafter his career has been in the North where he is a member of the VWP secretariat and Party Secretary for Hanoi. Although born in the North, Tue appears to have begun his political while a shipyard worker in the South. Released from prison in 1945 he was active first in the Viet Minh affiliated workers' movement in the south, and then as Deputy Commander in ihe Saigon-Cho1on Special Zone. He was given Maj. Gen's rank in the VPA and then becam.e Minister of Communications and Transport of the DRV. Best known for labor agitation in North Viet-Nam, Viet in fact knew something of the communist movement in Saigon, which he visited in the 1920s as a mechanic on a French vessel sailing from Saigon. Mter the collapse of the August Revolution in Saigon he was sent by the Party in the North in autumn 1945 to direct the reorganization of the Party in the Saigon-Cho1on-Gia Dinh area. f) \ :) I I

30 c) -5E- Alternate Members of the Central Committee Tran Do, Maj. Gen. Nguyen Don, Maj. Gen. A veteran of the Viet Minh war in the North and one time commander of the 3l2th Div. of the VPA, Tran Do was sent South about 1963 as a senior political-military leader in COSVN, becoming a member of its Military Affairs Committee and a Deputy Commander of the PLAF. Born in Quang N gai, Don participated in the 1940 Ba To revolt, an area to which he returned in 1945 and again in early 1960s, then as a Maj. Gen. in the VPA. He served as commander and political officer in Military Region V for a time until Back in the DRV he has become one of the more prominent of the Vice Ministers of National Defense and Deputy Chiefs of Staff. c Tran Quy Hai, Maj. Gen. Also Quang Ngai born, Hai has had less military experience in the area than Don, although he is believed to have commanded troops there during the 1960s. He has been Chief of the Rear Services of the VPA, and a member of delegations to Russia and China., l Nguyen Khanh Toan Tran Van Tra, Lt. Gen. Born in Central Viet-Nam, Toan taught school in Saigon prior to his arrest in the late 1920s. For some years he taught languages in the Soviet Union where he became of friend of Ho Chi Minh's Born in Quang Ngai, Tra like Don was arrested after the 1940 Ba To revolt. However, upon release he was assigned to military-political activity in Nam Bo where he became a zonal commander. After training in Russia and China he held several important posts in the VPA until about 1964 when he was sent south as a COSVN member and PLAF first deputy commander Tra headed the PRG delegation on the short lived Four Party Joint Military Commission under the 1973 Paris Agreement.

31 Bui Cong Trung Nguyen Van Vinh, Lt. Gen. Although born near Hue, Trung is post-prison and exile career appears to have been entirely in North Viet-Nam in a variety of economic posts. Once prominent, little has been heard of him since the early 1960s. Vinh is said to have fought with the Viet Minh in the South in the resistance, but his role is not known. As Chairman of the VWP Reunification Dept. the government's national reunification commis sion and a VP A deputy chief-of-staff, he is thought to be Hanoi's liaison man with COSVN. There is evidence of Vinh's coming to South Viet-Nam for a COSVN conference on at least one occasion. While his visits may have been more frequent there is no indication that he commanded troops there in the 1964 to 1972 war. [Editor's note: Less biographical data is available for alternate members of the Central Committee than for full members. It is possible that more of the alternates have had southern experience.]

32 (: -5G- North Vietnamese goverrunental leaders who are not members or alternate members of the VWP Central Committee, who have had significant Southern experience. Pham Van Bach Kha Vang Can Nguyen Van Huong Chief Justice of the People's Supreme Court. Bach was born in South Viet-Nam and was active in the resistance in the South. In September, 1945 he replaced the official Communist leader in Saigon, Tran Van Giau as head of the Viet Minh Provisional Executive Committee for South Viet-Nam and subsequently was become Chairman of the Viet Minh's Nam Bo Resistance and Administrative Committee. He regrouped to North Viet -Nam following the 1954 Geneva Agreement. Minister of Light Industry. Can was born in Cholon. From the mid-1930's until the end of the Second World War, Can worked first for the Renault Company and later for his own foundry and metal-working establishment in the South. During the period of anti French resistance, Can held a variety of positions in the Viet Minh's Nam Bo Regional organization. He was in the South as late as January 1956, but since at least 1960 has been in the North. Minister of Public Health. Huong was born in the Mekong Delta province of Long Xuyen. During the anti-french resistance of , Huong served on the Nam Bo Resistance and Administrative Committee in a medical capacity. He regrouped to the North following the 1954 Geneva Agreement. He "represented" a Long Xuyen constituency in the DRV National Assembly from 1946 until 191'1.

33 Tran Dang Khoa Maj. Gen. Pharn Kiet Tran Dai Nghia Ton Quang Phiet Maj. Gen. Le Trong Tan A Vice-Chairman of the National Assembly Standing Committee and Deputy Secretary General of the Democrati.c Party. Khoa was born in Hue. Under the Ho Chi Minh Government of the mid -1940' s, he served as the Chief of the Public Works Department for Central Viet-Nam. From 1946 until 1971, he represented a Hue constituency in the DRV National Assembly. Vice-Minister of Public Security and Commander of the People's Armed Security Forces. Kiet was born in Son Tinh district of Quang Ngai province. He early engaged in revolutionary activities in his horne province and was at one time before 1945 and 1954, he was an active guerrilla leader in the southern part of Central Viet-Nam. From 1955 until approximately 1959, Kiet was Chief of Military Intelligence at Region V (southern Central Viet-Nam) Headquarters. Chairman of the State Scientific and Technical Commission. Nghia was born at an unknown location in South Viet-Nam. Secretary General of the National Assembly Standing Committee. Phiet is reported to have been born in Thua Thien province and "represented" that province in the DRV National Assembly until Southern representation was discontinued in Deputy Chief of the Viet-Nam People's Army General Staff. Although Tan is a Northerner by birth, he has been active in the South for the past decade as a Deputy Commander (and, according to one report, Chief of Staff) of the COSVN military apparatus.

34 ( ""\ j o -6- To some degree too it was a matter of a new state requlrlng skills that were in short supply in the North, at least among communists and their sympathizers, a shortage that could be at least partially met by incorporating Southern comrades into the northern state. From 1945 to 1947 the traffic was largely from North to South--cadre from the DRV going South to revitalize a revolution which had ebbed there. Then the flow became two way as all the factors suggested above were operative. But after 1954 there was a South to North flood--the "regroupment" movement, until 1959 when it was reversed. First the "regroupees", then Northern cadres, went South to man revolutionary formations which lacked both the quantity and quality of personnel the revolution required. (These developments were commented upon from a Southern point of view in Viet-Nam Documents and Research Notes No. Ill). The "southern experience" of Northern and Central Vietnamese leaders of the DRV who worked in the South for greater or lesser periods of time is summarized in List 8. It also notes those communists whose early careers were in the South, but who have become important, or, in any event, prominent, personalities in the North. As "the Leadership of the PRG, the NFLSV and their Affiliated Organizations" suggested, there are interesting sociopolitical differentiations within these groups of migrants. Those Northern and Central Vietnamese who have been sent South, either as political organizers or as military commanders were, for the most part professional revolutionaries of lower middle class, worker, or peasant backgrounds, like most I. C. P. members and Viet Minh fighters o The Southerners who went North, and stayed there as luminaries of the DRV, seem to be much more bourgeois in origin, although, for the most part, recruits by 1945 to the I. C. P. As personalities they seem to have more in common with the almost excl:usively middle class leadership of the southern PRG and NFL than they do with the Party veterans who dominate politics in the DRV. It is, however, North Vietnamese, plus a sprinkling of men from the northern part of Central Viet-Nam, who predominate in the Party Secretariat and in the Party Boards directly subordinate to it. As announced at the Third Congress, the Secretariat

35 -7- was to consist of Politburo members Le Duan, as First Secretary, Pham Hung, Le Duc Tho, Nguyen Chi Thanh, plus Committeemen Hoang Anh, To Huu and Le Van Luong. Thanh has died, and Nguyen Van Tran, Xuan Thuy and Nguyen Con have been added. Tran is the only South Vietnamese member other than Pham Hung. He, oddly enough, also heads the Hanoi City Party. The Party Boards are "subordinate to the Central Committee" but must in fact function in coordination with the secretariat. Other than those like Organization and Propaganda and Training, whose strictly Party functions are obvious, the Boards, about which little is known, may have been initially established as shadow ministries, then became Party agencies to prod ministries and direct the work of Party Committees in government departments. In fact, most of them are headed by the men who have the counterr') \. Obviously the First Secretary of the Party is a member of the Secretariat as are Le Duc Tho, the head of the Organization Department, and To Huu the chief of Propaganda and Training. Pham Hung, as the Secretary of COSVN--the Central Committee's Central Office for South Viet-Nam--can be said to still be performing Secretariat duties. At the time of his 1960 appointment to the Secretariat he was probably meant to be its liaison man with the civil government of which he was then First Vice-Premier. Xuan Thuy was added to be the Secretariat's expert on international affairs. Nguyen Con, particularly after Hung's departure for the South, was to be its economist along with agriculturalist Anh. Le Van Luong was a member of the Secretariat from 1954 to 1956 when he resigned as a result in his involvement in the disasterous land reform campaign. His being restored to the Secretariat in 1960, the year that Truong Chinh was made Chairman of the National Assembly Standing Committee, and his old friend Hoan Quoc Viet was given an important state office was, perhaps, a gesture by Ho, Le Duan, Pham Van Dong, and Giap to demonstrate that the breach between the Truong Chinh group and the rest of the leadership was healed. Such a move could have been prompted by the need for complete unity in the Party at the moment when it was increasing its involvement, and consequently its risks, in the South. Luong may be the overseer of the Ho Chi Minh Working Youth Union, but this is not firmly known.

36 ( -7A List 9 VWP SECRETARIAT AND ITS SUBORDINATE AGENCIES Secretariat First Secretary LE DUAN PHAM HUNG LE DUC THO Hoang ANH To HUU Le Van LUONG Nguyen Van TRAN Xuan THUY Nguyen CON Chairman of Viet-Nam Workers I Party Boards, o Agricultural Board (Vice Chairman) Control Board Communications and Transportation Board Emulation Board Foreign Relations Board (Vice Chairman) Finance and Trade Board Flood and Typhoon Control Board Historical Research Board Industrial Board Military Affairs Board Minority Affair s Board Le THANH Tran Quoc Manh Nguyen Luong BANG Phan Trong TUE (1,4) LE THANH NGHI (1) Doan Hoang Ky Xuan THUY (1) Cao Hong Lanh Nguyen Song Tung (2) Tran Chi Hien To Duy Ha Ke TAN (1) TRUONG CHINH Nguyen Huu MAl (1) (See separate list) Le Quang BA (1)