The United States and Vietnam. 1787-1941

and

S J

178 1941

~ober¢ Hopkins MiHer

Cover: Cochinchinese shipping on the River Tai-fo. (Cover art prepared by

Laszlo Bodrogi, based on an illustration in John Barrow, A Vox'a.~e to

Cochinchina, Oxford in Asia Historial Reprints, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford

University Press, 1975.)

theUNITED STATES

and

VIETNAM 1787 - 1941

theUNITED STATES

and

VIETNAM a787-1941

Ro~~ Mopk~ M~H~

1990

National Defense University Press

Washington, DC

National Defense University Press Publications

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llln'~trations on pages xiv. 2.5. 10. 12, 44. and 46 may be reprcxluced only with the written permission of the

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First printing. October 1990

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Miller, Robert ttopkins.

The United States and Vietnam. 1787-1941 ,, Robert Hopkins Miller.

p. Cnl,

Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.

$10.00

1. United States-.Foreign relations--Vietnam. 2. Vietnam--Foreign relations--United States.

I. Title.

E183.g.V5M55 1990

327.730597--dc20 90-13317

CIP

vi

To Kaity, George, and Margaret, lbr whom Vietnam became much

more than a faraway place ...

CONTENTS

Foreword ........................................... xi

Acknowledgments ................................... xiii

Preface ............................................ xv

I MERCHANT SHIPS AND THEIR CAPTAINS

The Fame and Captain Jeremiah Briggs ........... 3

The Brig Franklin and Captain John White ....... 6

II DIPLOMATS AND NAVAL VESSELS

John Shillaber, US Consul in Batavia ............ 17

Edmund Roberts, Special Agent, and the

Sloop-of-War Peacock ..................... 19

Edmund Roberts: Second Mission ............... 34

Joseph Balestier, US Consul, and Captain

John Percival of the USS Constitution ........ 41

I!I COMMERCE, STRATEGIC THINKING, AND

COLONIAL EXPANSION

Daniel Webster and Commodore Perry ........... 57

Colonies and Consulates ....................... 66

France and China: A Growing Confrontation ...... 80

IV THE UNITED STATES' GOOD OFFICES

The First Attempt: July-August 1883 ............. 89

The Second and Third Attempts:

July-August 1884 ......................... 102

The Fourth Attempt: September-November 1884 ... 122

Breathing Space: Trade and Consuls ............. 137

V THE UNITED STATES AND JAPAN: PRELUDE

TO CONFRONTATION

American Beginnings in Indochina ............... 151

Coming Confrontation ......................... 154

Arms Shipments, High Diplomacy, and

Commercial Considerations ................. 159

VI JAPAN'S SOUTHWARD ADVANCE

Japan's Southward Advance Accelerates .......... 175

Japanese Forces Occupy Tonkin ................. 192

Exploratory US-Japanese Conversations Begin ..... 217

The "Pudgy Thumb" Falls and Talks Resume ..... 234

Notes ............................................. 265

Chronology of" Events .................................. 287

Appendixes .......................................... 297

Index ............................................... 315

The Author . ......................................... 324

ILLUSTRATIONS

Launching of the Ship Fame in 1802 ..................... xiv

Jeremiah Briggs ...................................... 2

Jeremiah Briggs' Handwritten Log of the Fame's Voyage .... 5

King of Cochin China ................................. 10

Cochinchinese Soldier ................................. 12

Draft Treaty Between the United States and

Cochinchina ..................................... 20-21

Record of Mission Undertaken by Edmund Roberts including

letter from President Andrew Jackson ................ 26-27

US Frigate Constitution ....... " ......................... 44

Lieutenant John Percival, USN .......................... 46

MAP

East Indies Before World War I1 ......................... 174

FOREWORD

As efforts continue to settle the Cambodia-Laos issue, Vietnam

is again a focus of American attention• With the passage of time

since the United States pulled out of Vietnam, American policy￾makers have begun approaching the major Indochinese issues from

new perspectives, particularly new perspectives toward that general

region. As is so often the case, history, by informing, may also help

illuminate these issues.

In this book, Ambassador Robert Hopkins Miller, a diplomat

with considerable experience in Southeast Asia, presents the early

history of US-Vietnam relations. In 1787. President Thomas Jeffer￾son first showed an interest in the region--then called Cochinchina--

for the purpose of trading for rice. From this beginning, Miller traces

the ebb and flow of US diplomatic, economic, and strategic interests

in Vietnam. Amply illustrated with excerpts from contemporary cor￾respondence and official documents, the research shows Vietnam's

intricate relationship with China, the gradually increasing commercial

involvement of the Western powers, and the impact of Japan's expan￾sionist policy• The chapters building up to World War II are par￾ticularly informative as they demonstrate, among other matters, the

responsibility of national leaders to identify unambiguous political

aims.

In documenting the early development of US-Vietnam relations,

the author has provided a service for historians and contemporary

analysts alike. In presenting the long view of historical perspective,

Ambassador Miller has enhanced our understanding of this area of

the world.

Vice Admiral, US Navy

President, National Defense

University

xi

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

i would like to acknowledge with gratitude the assistance given me

on this manuscript:

To Lieutenant General Bradley C. Hosmer, US Air Force, former

President, National Defense University, whom I served as Vice Presi￾dent of the University, and who supported my research and encour￾aged publication;

To Dr. Fred Kiley, Director of the Research Directorate, National

Defense University, tbr encouraging me to complete the manuscript

and revise it for publication;

To Major Kent Esbenshade, US Air Force Academy, for a careful

editing of the completed manuscript;

To Dr. Dora Alves, Research Directorate, National Defense Univer￾sity, who spent many long hours as my editor assisting and advising

me with great skill and patience;

To Mrs. Susan Lemke, Director, Special Collections, National

Defense University Library, for her intrepid work in tracking down

early documents, drawings, and photographs to illustrate the book;

To my son, George Keith Miller, who assisted me in the research on

early American sailing vessels reaching Vietnam;

To my daughter, Margaret Helen Miller, for an initial editing and

typing of the manuscript;

To Mrs. Yvette Taylor, of my office, who in countless ways partici￾pated in this project;

To Mrs. Karren I. Villahermosa, who typed the entire manuscript and

who suffered through innumerable revisions of the text.

Errors and inaccuracies are, of course, my own responsibility.

xiii

i ! !i I !~

Launching of the Ship Fame in 1~2, by George Ropes. This photograph may be repr~uced only with

writ|en ~rmission of The E~x Institute. Courtesy of The Essex Institute~ Salem, MassachusetB.

PREFACE

In July 1787, Thomas Jefferson, then American Minister to

France, expressed an interest in acquiring rice seed from Vietnam (or

Cochin China, as it was commonly referred to at the time). This may

constitute the first official American awareness of that distant foreign

country. Writing to William Drayton of South Carolina, Jefferson

noted, "Monsr. Poivre, a farmer general of the Isle of France, in

travelling through several countries of Asia, observed with particular

attention the objects of their agriculture, and he tells us that in

Cochinchina they cultivate 6 several kinds of rice, which he

describes, three of them requiring water, and three growing on high￾lands. TM Later in the same letter, Jefferson--visionary as always--

resolved to import the best Vietnamese rice:

The dry rice of Cochinchina has the reputation of being

whitest to the eye, best flavored to the taste, and most pro￾ductive.It seems then to unite the good qualities of both the

others known to us. Could it supplant them, it would be a

great happiness, as it would enable us to get rid of those

ponds of stagnant water so fatal to human heahh and life. But

such is the force of habit, and caprice of taste, that we could

not be sure beforehand it would produce this effect. The

experiment however is worth trying, should it only end in

producing a third quality, and increasing the demand. I will

endeavor to procure some to be brought from Cochinchina.

The event however will be uncertain and distant. 2

Writing to Drayton six months later, in January 1788, Jefferson

shows his continuing resolve:

1 have considerable hopes of receiving some dry rice from

Cochin-china, the young prince of that country, lately gone

from hence, having undertaken that it shall come to me. But

it will bc some time first. These are all but experiments: the

precept however is wise which directs us to try all things, and

hold fast that which is good. -~

Apparently, Jefferson's efforts with the young prince were not

successful because, over a year later, in March 1789, he wrote to

Malesherbes, a prominent Frenchman whose varied interests included

botanical studies, asking him to use his influence to obtain "'one of

XV

xvi PREFACE

the species of rice which grows in Cochin-china on high lands, and

which needs no other watering than the ordinary rains."

The sun and soil of Carolina are sufficiently powerful to

ensure the success of this plant, and Monsieur de Poivre gives

such an account of its quality as might induce the Carolinians

to introduce it instead of the kind they now possess, which

requiring the whole country to be laid under water during a

certain season of the year, sweeps off numbers of the inhabi￾tants annually with pestilential fevers. If you would be so

good as to interest yourself in the procuring for me of some

seeds of the dry rice of Cochin-china you would render the

most precious service to my countrymen. 4

On the same day, Jefferson wrote similarly to a Mr. Benjamin

Vaughn in London, again citing Poivre and hoping that Vaughn knew

people "so connected in Asia as that they could procure us some

seeds of the best of the species of dry rice from Cochinchina," and if

so, "I am sure you will readily avail us of it to procure some of the

seed. ''5 Although no reply from Vaughn is recorded, Malesherbes

answered Jefferson immediately, saying that the dry Cochinchinese

rice seed never ripened in Paris and, consequently, was very difficult

to find locally. 6

Fifteen years would pass before an American merchant ship

actually sailed into a Vietnamese port--the point at which this narra￾tive begins--and three decades would pass before an American mer￾chantman would return with a little silk and sugar and a small cargo

of rice that unfortunately succumbed to weevils and other vermin.

That second voyage encountered a xenophobia, a disinterest in trade

with America, a provincialism, and a range of exotic diseases, all of

which were discouraging to American interest in the area for yet

another decade.

Japan's occupation of French Indochina, and its subsequent

attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941--where this narrative

ends--set in train events that have not only seared Vietnam into

America's consciousness but have led to the integration of thousands

PREFACE xvii

upon thousands of Vietnamese into American society. Many writers

have examined these events, their meaning, and their origins; many

more will do so as more materials become available and the passage

of time permits greater objectivity.

The purpose of this narrative has been far more modest: to look

backward instead of forward--to trace to their earliest beginnings

American perceptions of Vietnam and its people. It has been an

endeavor that would perhaps serve little more than a narrow academic

interest were it not for the major American military commitment in

Vietnam in the 1950s and 1960s. Most of the key events in this story

have been referred to in other, broader contexts. What to the writer's

knowledge are less well known are the early 19th century American

diplomatic field assessments of Vietnam's potential as a trading part￾ner, and the four instances of American good offices concerning

Vietnam in the late 19th century. The present work attempts to focus

on all of this material systematically and in detail.

I have chosen to organize my material essentially in a chrono￾logical, rather than an analytical, format. I believe this reflects more

faithfully the gradual historical evolution of American perceptions of

Vietnam as a country and people, and of American interests in that

far-off land. Throughout the 19th century, for example, the reactions

and decisions of policymakers in Washington were surely affected by

the slowness of communications, the lag between events and their

being learned, understood, interpreted, and reported by far-flung

American diplomats and consuls. Similarly, the time taken by Wash￾ington to react and take action--on problems that must have been tar

from the center of its concerns and its attention--influenced in turn

the way American diplomats and consuls reacted to these events and

conducted their dialogues on them abroad. Even later, during the

gradual buildup of tensions between the United States and Japan that

eventually led to war, Vietnam's importance to US interests only

gradually came into focus in Washington. I believe that a chronologi￾cal treatment renders this progression more accurately than would an

analytical treatment that benefits from distance and hindsight.

If it makes even a small contribution to scholarship in this

important area, I will be satisfied that this labor of love has been

worth it. If it has missed some details, or has imperfectly described

or assessed them--as surely must be so in some cases--I hope that at

least my work will cause others as curious, but perhaps more

qualified, to fill in the gaps and to correct assessments.

I MERCHANT SHIPS AND THEIR CAPTAINS