Was French imperialism a root cause of the Vietnam war?

Question

It seems odd that the US takes the lions share of blame when the French exploited the Vietnamese people and denied them independence, imposing their own culture and language on the people for a hundred years.

Did the behaviour of the French lead to the later war?

Have the French ever sent aid to the Vietnamese in restitution?

Answer 1

You have a good question because since the day humans crossed the waters everyone has put their nose in.  this is not only the French, but many others.  I am American and I do not blame England, Spain, not France.  There is proof in the Aluet race of Viking people here before even the days of Columbus. Alaska and Nova Scotia too.  I have seen blond blue eyed Native Americans.  

Answer 2

A sad fact:  Seems like it was in October of 1945 we returned French soldiers to Vietnam in our US boats.  Truman wanted a strong French government as a counterbalance to the new Soviet threat.  

We were democratic and generally anti-imperialisitc.  We were against England keeping her colonies.  BUT because France was weak we backed them going back to Vietnam when the Second War was over.  

Then we were stupid enough to take over the French war when they got their butts kicked at Yo Bein Phucked.  We did this because the Vietnames decided they were "communists"......  

Oh dear!  History - and how easily it repeats!  

Answer 3

I can be fairly argued that the Vietnam war got its start as a revolution against French colonial rule. The French took over the three neighboring countries of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos in the late 19th century. The local people took advantage of the weakness of the French after WWII to try to drive them out, and they were pretty successful.

What happened then is odd. During the French rule, many Vietnamese converted from Buddhism to Roman Catholicism, and these converts found preference in advancement in the colonial government. When the French got kicked out, there was a reaction against them. Cardinal Spellman, the influential RC leader of New York, was concerned about their loss of status. He used his connections with the Kennedy family to get JFK to send military advisors to help out the largely Catholic government of South Vietnam against the Buddhist/atheist north. And that's how the US first got sucked into the fight.

Answer 4

You're absolutely correct. The US got involved in Vietnam to assist the French, who were getting their butts kicked. Not long ago I saw the movie Rush Hour 3 on TV and in one scene a Parisian taxi driver claims Americans are all blood thirsty warmongers. He cites the fact that we fought in Vietnam as evidence of our belligerence. When I heard that I the subject of your question immediately came to mind. Many modern wars are the long term result of European colonialism and imperialism. America is left to clean up the mess of Europeans and yet somehow we come out as the bad guys.

Answer 5

After the French defeat in the late 50s Vietnam was divided along the DMZ.  The plan was to hold a plebiscite to determine who would govern Vietnam.  The communists in the north were willing to hold the plebiscite because they knew they would win, but the anti-communists in the south were unwilling, for the same reason.  Conflict broke out as a civil war.  At first the US involvement was minimal, being advisers and instructors for the south but the involvement rapidly escalated.  The reason for that escalation was rooted in fear of communism and the domino theory.

The French did not create the conditions for the civil war except in the sense that, had they not been the colonial power, the conditions for that civil war would not have come into existence.  But that is a negative.  If there is a positive cause it was the unwillingness of the corrupt southern regime, supported by the US, to submit to a plebiscite they knew they would lose.