WI Nguyen Van Hinh ousted Ngo Dinh Diem in August 1954?

If Hinh ousts Diem in 1954, what do he and the French do subsequently

  • A) Carry out elections, hand the keys to Ho, and retire to France

    Votes: 7 41.2%
  • B) France stalls on elections indefinitely, tries to keep South Vietnam a proxy on the cheap (bluff)

    Votes: 8 47.1%
  • C) France encourages elections, Hinh decides against them & seeks American support to replace French

    Votes: 2 11.8%

  • Total voters
    17

raharris1973

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WI the South Vietnamese Army leader, Nguyen Van Hinh, who vocally criticized Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem in his early months in office, executed a coup d'etat to oust Diem between 1 and 20 August 1954.

PoD is that the French commander in Indochina, Raoul Salan, tells Hinh in August to go forth with the coup he was publicly bragging about doing against Diem.

Here's wiki on Diem's assumption of power:

On 16 June 1954, Diệm met with Bảo Đại in France and agreed to be the Prime Minister if Bảo Đại would give him military and civilian control. On 25 June 1954, Diệm returned from exile, arriving at Tân Sơn Nhứt airport in Saigon. On 7 July 1954, Diệm established his new government with a cabinet of 18 people.[38] On 21 July 1954, the Geneva accords resulted in Vietnam being partitioned temporarily at the 17th parallel, pending elections in 1956 to reunify the country.

...and here's wiki again on the threatened coup:

In August 1954, Diệm also had to face the "Hinh crisis" when Nguyễn Văn Hinh launched a series of public attacks on Diệm, proclaiming that South Vietnam needed a "strong and popular" leader. Hinh also bragged that he was preparing a coup. However, in the end of 1954, Diệm successfully forced Hinh to resign from his post. Hinh had to flee to Paris and hand over his command of national army to general Nguyễn Văn Vỹ.[48]

---On 20 August the US decided to support Diem and soon communicated to Saigon that it would only provide aid to a Diem government.


....so what I'm positing here is that the French and Hinh make a bolder play before the US position is made so clear.

In OTL, remarkably, there was a proxy struggle between the US and France over South Vietnam, that did not see France totally checked until mid-1955.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Saigon_(1955)

So, the French and Hinh win the struggle against Diem before he even has a chance to compete. Hinh and the Binh Xuyen gangsters are the predominant forces on the ground in South Vietnam.

What happens with France and Hinh's "victory"?

A) France directs Hinh to carry out the Geneva Accords in full, including the holding of reunification elections in 1956, and Hinh complies, resulting in an early Communist dominated united Vietnam. He and other senior pro-French officials are compensated for their surrender with asylum and a pension.

"Boat people", lower level refugees from Communism end up resettling in other part of Southeast Asia, France and the rest of the French Union in large #s

B) France, with its own factions in charge, tries to keep South Vietnam as a proxy state, and stalls on the reunification elections as long as possible.

France at this time had no appetite to lose French lives to uphold their influence in Indochina and only a limited appetite to spend money to uphold their influence. The French assumed US funding to noncommunist Vietnam. Their willingness to invest effort in supporting their influence would shrink further as the Algerian War got worse.

However, they had some sort of interest in the area, and plausibly could have been interested in upholding Indochinese proxy states on the cheap, unless and until force majeure from the communist side called their bluff.

C) As elections approach in 1956, upon being encouraged by the French to hold elections that will end his own political power, makes a timely move to switch loyalties to the US from France, and the US accepts him as their only option.
 
It's hard to say. After the whole fiasco of early 1954 - actually May to July 1954 (Dien Bien Phu, GM100 and Geneva Accord) - France is pretty much "tired" of the war/conflict in Vietnam and USA was "showing interest" in the region (in the whole context of Global Cold War). At that moment, US's biggest pawn in Vietnam was Ngo Dinh Diem. If Gen. Nguyen [his surname is Nguyen, not Hinh] was able to ousted Diem, US may choose to "support" him.

And it means they will try to block the election.

It all comes down to the attitude of the General toward the American. I'm more inclined to believe that he will have the election organized (the French has already signed the Accord, and the "State of Vietnam" was quite a puppet state). The chance for the Viet Minh (and their leader Ho Chi Minh) to win was very high, and it would mean Vietnam would be united under the communist banner (or at least a communist-friendly one). With the US in the picture, it spells trouble.
 

Archibald

Banned
After the whole fiasco of early 1954 - actually May to July 1954 (Dien Bien Phu, GM100 and Geneva Accord) - France is pretty much "tired" of the war/conflict in Vietnam

this is an euphemism. Indochina was as dead as a nail. since November 1954 France had another hot spot: Algeria. The war erupted in November 1954. Famously, the great but unfortunate Pierre Mendes France was PM in February 1954, got France out of Indochina after DBP, only for his government to fall over the Algeria crisis. Welcome to the 4th Republic hellish instability...
 

raharris1973

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this is an euphemism. Indochina was as dead as a nail. since November 1954 France had another hot spot: Algeria. The war erupted in November 1954. Famously, the great but unfortunate Pierre Mendes France was PM in February 1954, got France out of Indochina after DBP, only for his government to fall over the Algeria crisis. Welcome to the 4th Republic hellish instability...


This begs important questions like if the French were really serious about yielding South Vietnam to Hanoi through elections:

1) why did they negotiate for as large a regroupment zone as they did during Geneva? [They initially tried to bargain for a Haiphong Enclave and the 18th parallel.]

2) why did they insist on the right of resettlement of combatants and noncombatants alike if they expected a merger in the foreseeable future?

3) Most tellingly, well after the Algerian outbreak in November 1954, well into 1955, why did the French continue to contest Diem and the American's whims in South Vietnam, to the extent of supporting proxy violence against Diem? If the French saw their position in South Vietnam as dead, plain and simple, as soon as Algeria started, why didn't they just roll over immediately for the Americans and Diem and bother to continue to antagonize them?
 
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