Wilson and Ho Chi Minh's Vietnam

Ho Chi Minh tride to get Woodrow Wilson to help replace the French government in Vietnam with a nationalist government. He failed.

Is there anyway he could have convinced Wilson to support him? If so how? If he could convince Wilson what happens to Vietnam during the Great Depression? During the time between the first and second world wars does an independent Vietnam suffer civil war? What is its fate in WWII? and what happens to it during the Cold War?
 
At this point Ho Chi Minh wasn't really a believer of Communism - in fact it was in France where he was influenced by Western ideals.

It is difficult for Wilson pressure the French, whom would be definately backed by the British, to give away their colonial empires. If Vietnam goes, so does the rest of Indochina, and the rest of their empires. French policy in Indochina - divide to keep them weak. We could see three seperate Vietnams (Tonkin, Annam, and Cocohina) along with Laos and Cambodia.

More plausibility would be some form of limited independence like autonomy within a French Union would certainly butterfly away the Vietnam War and give the French a lot more crediability (IOTL European empires promised various degrees of independence and autonomy in exchange for sticking with them through WWI - which was never recieved).

French rule was the lesser of two evils in WWII come the Japanese. IOTL the Vietnamese saw the Japanese as liberators until they found out they would not give them independence but instead choose to collaborate with the French in keeping the colonial system. In 44/45 roughly 1-2 million people died in Tonkin and northern Annam (later becoming North Vietnam), along with the economy crashing into the ground, at the hands of the Japanese. Without "French protection" and Vietnam actively fighting the Japanese, this number could be in the tens of millions including a possible "Death March of Hanoi." There would also be a puppet government within the Greater-East Asia Co-Sphere, possibly in 40/41 instead of 45.

In the Post-War world, it would be similar to the Phillipines - on the Western side of the Cold War in some ways but not exactly an Asian Tiger either. When China goes red, we could easily see Vietnamese forces armed with M16s have border skirmishes with ChiCom forces with AK47s in the 50s/60s. Chiang didn't care too much about Vietnam but Mao might want another Tibet situation.

I would say worse off initially but better off in the long run.
 

wormyguy

Banned
Wilson would probably think that the primitive Asiatics ought to be further civilized by their white masters before being allowed to become independent. A different decision means a different Wilson.
 
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