1 From an address by Governor-General of French Indochina Pierre Pasquier in Grand Conseil des Interêts Économiques et Financiers de l'Indochine, Session Ordinaire de 1930, Discours prononcé le 15 octobre 1930 par M.P. Pasquier, Gouverneur général de l'Indochine (Hanoi: Imprimerie d'Extrême Orient, 1930), 118.
2 On World War Two in Indochina see David G. Marr, "World War II and the Indochinese Revolution," in Southeast Asia Under Japanese Occupation, ed. Alfred W. McCoy, Yale University Southeast Asia Monograph Series, no. 22 (New Haven: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies, 1980), 126-58.
3 Phillipe Devillers, Histoire du Viêt-Nam, de 1940 à 1954 (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1952), 81; and Archimedes L.A. Patti, Why Vietnam? Prelude to America's Albatross (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980), 25-34.
4 The argument that after March 1945 Indochina "ceased to be French" is presented in Huynh Kim Khanh, Vietnamese Communism, 1925-1945 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986), 292.
5 Short for Viet Nam doc lap dong minh (Vietnamese Independence League), the Viet-minh was a paramilitary front formed in 1941 to resist the Japanese occupation. After 1945, it led the fight against the restoration of French control in Indochina. On the Viet-minh see Bernard B. Fall, The Viet-Minh Regime: Government and Administration in the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1956).
6 Henri Navarre, Agonie de l'Indochine (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1958), 80-2; and Bernard Fall, "Indochina, The Last Year of the War: The Navarre Plan," Military Review 4 (December 1956): 23-8.
7 Paul Ély, L'Indochine dans la tourmente (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1964), 25. This translation and all others are the author's.
8 Bernard B. Fall, Street Without Joy (Harrisburg: The Stackpole Co., 1961), 282; and Le Monde (Paris), 22 April 1954.
9 This "domino theory" is explained in Alphonse Juin, Le Viêt Minh, mon adversaire (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1956), 237.
10 The French Union (1946-1958), or Union Française, was a commonwealth of states. Paris described it as an association of sovereign and independent peoples, free and equal in their rights and duties, under the protection of France. Xavier Yacono, Histoire de la colonisation française (Paris: Presses universitaire de France, 1969), 110-7.
11 The treaty is reproduced in Press and Information Division, French Embassy, Washington, D.C., Indochinese Affairs 1 (February 1954): 25-28.
12 Le Monde (Paris), 3 May 1954.
13 Georges Catroux, Deux actes du drame indochinois (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1959), 168-9.
14 Le Monde, (Paris), 3 May 1954.
15 The operation is described in Bernard B. Fall, Hell in a Very Small Place: The Siege of Dien Bien Phu (New York: Da Capo Press, 1966), 1-26.
16 See the chapters on Dien Bien Phu in both Cecil B. Currey, Victory at Any Cost: The Genius of Viet Nam's Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap (McLean, VA: Brassey's, 1996) and John Colvin, Giap: Volcano Under the Snow (New York: Soho, 1996).
17 Jules Roy, La bataille de Diên Biên Phu (Paris: René Julliard, 1963), 37.
18 Bui Dinh Phong, "Ho Chi Minh voi Dien Bien Phu," Nghien cuu Lich su 2 (1994), 14.
19 The DRVN was proclaimed on 2 September 1945. In December 1946, after the French reasserted their control over Hanoi, it became a clandestine government based at Pac Bo in the mountains of northern Vietnam.
20 Quoted in Ho Chi Minh, Selected Writings (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1976), 154.
21 Le Mau Han, Dang cong san Viet Nam: Cac Dai hoi va Hoi nghi Trung uong (Ha Noi: Nha xuat ban Chinh tri quoc gia, 1995), 58.
22 Bo Quoc phong - Vien lich su quan su Viet Nam, Lich su nghe thuat chien dich Viet Nam trong 30 nam chien tranh chong Phap, chong My (1945-1975), Tap I: Trong khang chien chong Phap (1945-1954) (Ha Noi: Nha xuat ban Quan doi nhan dan, 1994), 211-12.
23 From "Contributions to the History of Dien Bien Phu," Vietnamese Studies 3 (1965): 51.
24 Ban nghien cuu lich su quan doi, Lich su Quan doi nhan dan Viet Nam, Tap I (Ha Noi: Nha xuat ban Quan doi nhan dan, 1974), 562.
25 From the passage quoted in Catroux, Deux actes, 155. See also Roy, La bataille, 83.
26 Luu Van Loi, Nam muoi nam ngoai giao Viet Nam (1945-1995), Tap I: Ngoai giao Viet Nam, 1945-1975 (Ha Noi: Nha xuat ban Cong an nhan dan, 1996), 170.
27 For a good account of the genesis of the Conference refer to Robert F. Randle, Geneva 1954: The Settlement of the Indochinese War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969), 3-156.
29 Pierre Rocolle, Pourquoi Diên Biên Phu? (Paris: Flammarion, 1968), 46.
30 Tran Do, Stories of Dien Bien Phu (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1962), 27.
31 Nguyen Khac Huyen, Vision Accomplished: The Enigma of Ho Chi Minh (New York: Collier Books, 1971), 229.
32 Vo Nguyen Giap, Guerre du peuple, armée de peuple (Hanoi: Éditions en Langues Étrangères, 1973), 199-200.
33 Su that ve quan he Viet Nam-Trung Quoc trong 30 nam qua (Ha Noi: Nha xuat ban Su that, 1979), 28.
34 From a 24 March 1954 speech to the Overseas Press Club by American Secretary of State John Foster Dulles reproduced in Melvin Gurtov, The First Vietnam Crisis: Chinese Communist Strategy and the United States Involvement, 1953-1954 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1967), 188.
35 François Joyaux, La Chine et le règlement du premier conflit d'Indochine - Genève 1954 (Paris: Publications de la Sorbonnes, 1979), 66; and Le Monde (Paris), 4 May 1954.
36 Joseph Laniel, De Diên Biên Phu au pari de Genève (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1957), 84.
38 Navarre is quoted in Rocolle, Pourquoi, 68-9.
39 George C. Herring, "Franco-American Conflict in Indochina, 1950-1954" in Dien Bien Phu and the Crisis of Franco-American Relations, 1954-1955 , ed. Lawrence S. Kaplan, Denise Artaud, and Mark R. Rubin (Wilmington, Del: SR Books, 1990), 40.
40 Originally planned for 25 January, the attack was later postponed for twenty-four hours.
41 Hoang Xuan Thuy, interview by author, 19 June 1990, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Thuy was Giap's aide de camps at Dien Bien Phu. See also Vo Nguyen Giap, Dien Bien Phu: The Most Difficult Decision and Other Writings (Hanoi: The Gioi Publishers, 1992), 39, 40, 45.
42 Vien lich su quan su Viet Nam - Bo Tu lenh binh chung phao binh, Lich su nghe thuat su dung phao binh trong chien dich (1945-1975) (Ha Noi: Nha xuat ban Quan doi nhan dan, 1996), 62.
43 Peter Macdonald, Giap: The Victor in Vietnam (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1993), 129.
44 Bo Quoc phong - Vien lich su quan su Viet Nam, Lich su cuoc khang chien chong thuc dan Phap, Tap V (Ha Noi: Nha xuat ban Quan doi nhan dan, 1992), 229; Erwan Bergot, Les 170 jours de Diên Biên Phu (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1979), 144.
45 Giap quoted in Gérard Le Quang, Giap, ou la guerre du peuple (Paris: Éditions Denoël, 1973), 155.
46 Macdonald, Giap, 145; and Vo Nguyen Giap, Guerre du peuple, 209-10.
47 Vo Nguyen Giap, Diên Biên Phu (Hanoi: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1984), 89.
48 On the state of French morale during the battle see Jean Pouget, Nous étions à Dien Bien Phu (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1964), 255-310.
49 An account of the late March 1954 visit to Washington is provided in Ély, Indochine, 59-62.
50 George C. Herring and Richard Immerman, "Eisenhower, Dulles, and Dienbienphu: 'The Day We Didn't Go to War' Revisited," in Light at the End of the Tunnel: A Vietnam War Anthology, ed. Andrew J. Rotter (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1991), 80.
51 Lack of congressional support was the main reason behind the decision not to intervene. A concise presentation of the American presidential position appears in "Telegram from Dulles to Dillon," 5 April 1954, United States-Vietnam Relations, 1945-1967: Study Prepared by Department of Defense (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1971), Book 9, 359.
52 Dulles is quoted in J.R. Tournoux, Secrets d'État (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1960), 56. See also Georges Bidault, D'une résistance à l'autre (Paris: Les Presses du Siècle, 1965), 198.
53 In his memoirs, Ély contended that Paris never intended to use nuclear weapons. Ély, Indochine, 90. On the entire episode consult Melanie Billings-Yun, Decision Against War: Eisenhower and Dien Bien Phu, 1954 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988).
54 Roy, La bataille, 566, 568; Bo Quoc phong, Khang chien, 266.
55 Tran Do, Stories, 29-32; Rocolle, Pourquoi, 251; and Vien lich su quan su, Su dung phao binh, 69.
57 Doan Khue, "Chien thang Dien Bien Phu vi dai va cong cuoc bao ve To quoc chu nghia xa hoi ngay nay," Quoc phong toan dan 4 (1994): 4.
58 Dinh Van Ty, "La brigade des chevaux de fer," Études Vietnamiennes 3 (1965): 47-61; Bo Quoc phong, Lich su nghe thuet chien dich Viet Nam, 271; and Luu Van Trac, "Dong bao dan toc it nguoi voi chien dich Dien Bien Phu," Nghien cuu Lich su 1 (1984): 43.