Newly released documents on the land reform

vu tuong <vhtuong@yahoo.com>

date May 25, 2007 9:45 AM

subject [Vsg] Newly released documents on the land reform

Dear list,

Just to piggyback on the comments from my dear

Mongolian comrade Balazs, I have run into two recently

released Party documents which are relevant to the

topic. Before I discuss these documents, let me say

that I am focusing on the particular issue of executed

and persecuted people during the land reform. I am not

trying to assess all the good and bad things about the

land reform, which is a different topic.

1) “Chi Thi Cua Bo Chinh Tri Ve May Van De Dac Biet

Trong Phat Dong Quan Chung” (Political Bureau’s Decree

on Special Issues in Mobilizing the Masses), May 4,

1953. Van Kien Dang Toan Tap v. 14 (2001), 201-206,

wrote:

Quote—

“In this campaign, [we] will have to execute [xu tu] a

number of reactionary or evil landlords. In our

current situation, the ratio of executions [xu tu] of

these landlords to the total population in the free

areas is fixed at the rate of 1/1000 in principle.

This ratio will be controlled by the leadership and is

to be applied for the rent and interest reduction

campaign this year and next year; it does not mean

only for this year, and it does not mean that every

village will execute landlords according to this

ratio. (Thus there may be communes that execute 3-4

people, others that execute only one or none at all).

The lives of people are an important matter. It is not

that we don’t want to execute those who deserve

execution. But the number of executions should not be

too many; if so, it would be difficult [for us] to win

popular support.

[The document went on to mention several mitigating

factors (such as “dia chu tre tuoi co hoc thuc va co

hy vong cai tao duoc”) and special cases such as

Catholic priests that require special treatment].

“[The executions of] criminals [pham nhan, referring

to landlords to be executed] who were local cadres

from district level up, who were soldiers from the

company level up, must be approved [in advance] by

central leaders [Trung Uong]. [The executions of]

local cadres at the commune level [and below] must be

approved by Interzone Party Committee. [The executions

of] soldiers from the platoon level [and below] must

be authorized by the Central Party Committee of the

Army [Tong Quan Uy].

At the central level, an executive committee will be

formed....This Committee is authorized to collect and

protect information about criminals, make

recommendations to the Chairman of the Government [Chu

Tich Chinh Phu—Ho Chi Minh himself, who was also a

member of the Politburo which issued this decree] for

approval, and deliver the decision to the special

people’s court for ruling on the cases.”

Unquote—

I am not sure if this document had ever been released

before—I would appreciate any information on this. In

all the five volumes that contained documents on the

land reform (1953-1957), this was the only document

that mentioned the issue of executions in specific

terms. Now what is the value of this document?

First, one often hears the argument that the central

government did not intend to kill so many people

during the land reform. This happened only during the

implementation of the policy and was the acts of some

zealous low-level cadres. Perhaps this was true to

some extent. The question is how much of the mistake

was the responsibility of the central government?

On the one hand, the document shows that Politburo

members (or at least some of them) were concerned

about indiscriminate killings. This caution, if not

for humanitarian reasons, was driven by political

concerns for popular support for the policy as the

document explicitly mentioned. The Politburo also

suggested that the ratio or quota was to be applied in

a flexible manner depending on local situations.

On the other hand, the Politburo had calculated and

decided in advance, before launching the campaign, a

targeted ratio of 1/1000, or 0.1% of the total

population, to be executed. If we take the population

of North Vietnam in 1955 to be 13.5 million (Nguyen

Tien Hung, Economic Development of Socialist Vietnam,

1955-1980, Praeger 1977, p. 98), about 13,500 people

were to be executed. The population in “the free

areas” that this execution ratio was meant for were in

fact much fewer, perhaps about 10-11 million people.

In this case, the number of executions planned for for

1953-1954 was 10,000-11,000. But after 1954 the

campaign was extended to most of North Vietnam, so the

figure of 13,500 was perhaps within the expectation of

the Politburo.

The document (together with many others in the same

volume) also demonstrates the careful planning of the

campaign. There was a clear process of required

approval for executions that could go all the way up

to the Chairman of the Government. I am sure that

there were many cases (persecutions out of personal

revenge) in which local committees did not report the

executions (against central order), but I doubt that

this was widespread. It seems more plausible that

those local committees would rather fabricate crimes

to get their requests for executions approved than to

kill people without approval from above. I am also

aware that the campaigns moved left and right a few

times during 1953-1956, but the dominant trend was the

fear of committing rightist rather than leftist

errors. Given this fear, and the way these political

campaigns were run in North Vietnam (read To Hoai’s

new novel Ba Nguoi Khac [Three Different Characters]

for a sense of campaign-style politics; To Hoai served

as a land reform cadre), local committees must have

had greater incentives to over-report than

under-report executions. The central government, and

its Chairman, must have approved most, if not all,

executions. Central leaders could blame local

officials for fabricating charges and for

overreporting, but it was they who gave the final

approval to most executions. At the very least, the

document suggests that, besides the fact that the

central government was responsible for the overall

supervision of the campaign, it must bear sole

responsibility for at least 10,000-11,000 deaths that

it planned to carry out.

To be sure, this was the number planned for, not the

actual number of executions. But the intention to kill

was there, and the percentage of the population to be

killed was calculated and fixed in principle, before

any verdict had been made on those to be executed.

Furthermore, there is no reason to expect, and no

evidence that I have seen to demonstrate, that the

actual executions were less than planned; in fact the

executions perhaps exceeded the plan if we consider

two following factors. First, this decree was issued

in 1953 for the rent and interest reduction campaign

that preceded the far more radical land redistribution

and party rectification campaigns (or waves) that

followed during 1954-1956. Second, the decree was

meant to apply to free areas (under the control of the

Viet Minh government), not to the areas under French

control that would be liberated in 1954-1955 and that

would experience a far more violent struggle.

Thus the number of 13,500 executed people seems to be

a low-end estimate of the real number. This is

corroborated by Edwin Moise in his recent paper “Land

Reform in North Vietnam, 1953-1956” presented at the

18th Annual Conference on SE Asian Studies, Center for

SE Asian Studies, University of California, Berkeley

(February 2001). In this paper Moise (7-9) modified

his earlier estimate in his 1983 book (which was

5,000) and accepted an estimate close to 15,000

executions. Moise made the case based on Hungarian

reports provided by Balazs, but the document I cited

above offers more direct evidence for his revised

estimate. This document also suggests that the total

number should be adjusted up some more, taking into

consideration the later radical phase of the campaign,

the unauthorized killings at the local level, and the

suicides following arrest and torture (the central

government bore less direct responsibility for these

cases, however).

Second, the decree suggests that the campaign in

Vietnam was proportionally just as murderous as the

one launched in China after 1949. Viviene Shue

(Peasant China in Transition, University of California

Press 1980, 80) who is very sympathetic to the Chinese

revolution quotes Benedict Stavis, who estimates the

number of executions in China during 1949-52 based on

official sources to be between 400,000 and 800,000

(These executions may also have come from other

campaigns besides the land reform in the same period,

and if unofficial deaths are added, the total number

could reach more than a million). If 500,000 deaths

(officially and unofficially) can be assumed to be

specifically related to land reform, then the

proportion was also about 0.1% in the total population

of 572 million Chinese in 1952 (Dwight Perkins, ed.

China’s Modern Economy in Historical Perspective,

Stanford University Press 1975, 122). Given that

Chinese advisors were heavily involved in the

Vietnamese campaign, a relationship may have existed

between this Chinese ratio and the Vietnamese decree,

but this hypothesis needs further research to confirm.

2) “De cuong bao cao cua Bo Chinh tri” (Draft Report

of the Politburo), Van Kien Dang Toan Tap v. 17

(2001), 432-474.

(This was Party Secretary General Truong Chinh’s

report at the Tenth Central Committee Plenum, August

25-October 5, 1956, which ordered the Error

Rectification Campaign [Sua Sai]. Truong Chinh was to

resign from his post after this Plenum). I am very

certain this document had never been released before.

This document offers the most details as yet about the

number of punished cadres but unfortunately it

contains no information on those who were executed (or

the number may have been removed before publication).

In this document, Truong Chinh cited statistics about

the land reform “yet to be confirmed.” He said that

three-quarters (2,876) of all Party cells (3,777) in

16 provinces had been rectified in the rent reduction

and land reform campaigns by the time these campaigns

were suspended (some time in May 1956). 84,000 members

in these cells were punished [xu tri] among the total

of 150,000, or 56%. “Punishment” usually meant being

expelled from the Party after torture, and could

amount to execution. As Truong Chinh (ibid., 435)

frankly but belatedly admitted, “most cadres and party

members who were arrested were subject to brutal and

barbaric torture [nhuc hinh rat tan khoc, da man].”

The goal of the Party was to purge only members of

exploitative class backgrounds but in practice those

of working classes were purged as well. In the Ta Ngan

Zone (provinces to the left of the Red River), it was

found out that 7,000 of the total 8,829 persecuted

party members belonged to “peasants and other

[non-exploitative] classes.” While the persecutions of

these working-class cadres based on fabricated charges

were clearly not intended by central leaders, they

could not have been carried out without their prior

approval.

According to the same document, in the 66 districts

and seven provinces where the party rectification

campaign was carried out (the campaign at the

provincial level was directed by none but the Party’s

Central Organizational Department headed by Le Van

Luong), 720 were “punished” out of 3,425 cadres and

employees (80% of these 3,425 were party members). The

ratio was 21%. If only cadres from provincial

department level up were counted, 105 were punished

out of 284, or 37%. Among 36 incumbent members of

provincial party committees who were subjects of the

campaign, 19 (or 57%) were persecuted. Among 61 former

members of provincial party committees who were

subjects of the campaign, 26 were punished. At the

district level, 191 out of 396 district party

committee members were punished, or 48%. In an extreme

case (Ha Tinh province), all 19 members of the

provincial party committee, police department, and

district militia commanders were branded

“counter-revolutionaries” and purged during the

campaign (all were later found to be innocent by

central authorities).

To conclude, both documents are not to be taken as

truths but they seem to be the best available sources

about this complex topic. I expect documents to be

released in the future will improve substantially on

what we know. Also it should be reiterated that,

whether some of those executed landlords deserved to

die, and whether the benefits of the campaign for the

peasantry justified or outweighed the sacrifice of

these landlords, are questions that require a

different debate.

Tuong Vu

Naval Postgraduate School

Balazs Szalontai <aoverl@yahoo.co.uk>

date May 26, 2007 2:46 AM

subject Re: [Vsg] Newly released documents on the land reform

Dear Tuong,

thanks a lot for these extremely interesting documents! I completely agree with you in that "the intention to kill was there, and the percentage of the population to be killed was calculated and fixed in principle, before any verdict had been made on those to be executed." Nevertheless, I slightly disagree with the view that "there is no reason to expect, and no evidence that I have seen to demonstrate, that the actual executions were less than planned; in factthe executions perhaps exceeded the plan." Namely, I am inclined to lay a greater emphasis on swings from right tothe left (and vice versa) than you do. The Politburo resolution of May 1953 was passed in a very "leftist" phase, and thus the quotas set by this resolution may not be representative for every subsequent phase. For instance,

on 2 November 1954 Csatorday, having conversed with various DRV diplomats on the situation in Vietnam, reported that the VWP leaders intended to extend their land reform campaign to the newlyliberated areas, but ‘while during the liberation struggles they used the Chinese method and brought thelandlords to people’s courts or subjected them to the judgement of the people, by now they have already adopted a different method. They confiscate the landlords’ holdings in a much more flexible way, with great circumspection and without making too much noise’. Protest meetings were to be stopped, and landlords were to be allowed to donate their land to the state so as to escape outright expropriation (a change also noted by Moise).

To be sure, the phase from the spring of 1955 to mid-1956 was, by and large, a "leftist" one, and thus one may applythe May 1953 guidelines to it without missing the mark too much. Still, the Hungarian document I previously quoted suggests that a higher number of persecuted persons did not necessarily mean a higher number of executions, and thenumber of executions did not necessarily grow exponentially.

I think we must pay great attention to the possible connections (1) between the land reform campaign and the struggle against the Bao Dai/Diem regimes, (2) between DRV measures and the policies of other Communist regimes (theUSSR, China, and North Korea). These two external factors underwent several changes, and if they really influencedthe progress of the campaign, it is reasonable to assume that the targets of the campaign may have also repeatedly changed between 1953 and 1956. For this reason, we cannot take granted that a land redistribution wave always claimed more victims than a rent-reduction wave. Let me point out that the land reform campaign started only after theestablishment of the Bao Dai regime, and it did not become really radical until the Bao Dai government initiated its own land reform campaign.

All the best and thanks again,

Balazs

Vietnam Indochina Tours <info@indochinatours.com>

date May 27, 2007 1:35 PM

subject Re: [Vsg] Newly released documents on the land reform

Dear Tuong,

First, thank you for your recent extraordinary post concerning the quotas.

I have several questions/comments regarding your 1) and 2) in your post with

regard to the DRV motivation for proceeding with land reform.

1) China-inspired wartime strategy - Perhaps the first significant shift

towards

active land reform began with the DRV's 14 July 1949 initial rent reduction

decree which corresponded to the tactical shift to a stronger position on

the battlefield from 1947 to 1949, and as well to the consolidation of Viet

Minh power within the revolution. It argues that the DRV began its movement

away from the strategy of the national front towards a strategy land reform

by mid-1949. Though the Chinese arrived at the border in late 1949/1950,

this shift in policy would have preceded their arrival and would have been

contemporaneous with the Chinese land reforms at least in some measure. A

series of events in 1951, following the battlefield victories along RC-4 in

1950 (which were in great measure thanks to the Chinese arrival at the

border), which seemed to be related followed: (1) the Viet Minh merged into

the Lien Viet in March 1951 signaling VWP dominion over the Lien Viet; (2)

the Dang Lao Dong re-emerged in 1951; and (3) Chinh's admonishment to the

nationalists during the 1951 Lien Viet Party Congress which signaled a

decisive change in policy, that the VWP, not the national front, was the

final authority. Could the shift had been as much prompted by China-inspired

wartime strategy as it was by these other events?

2) Bao Dai Land Reforms - Though the State of Vietnam/Bao Dai land reforms

were first discussed in 1951 they were enacted on 4 June 1953 (Ordinance No.

19) after the DRV's Population Classification Decree was issued on 2 March

1953 and the Mobilization Decree (second land rent reduction expanding

upon the first) was issued on 2 April 1953; both of these decrees were

enacted prior to the adoption of the Ordinance 19. The Agrarian Reform Law

followed on 4 December 1953 however the reform campaign envisioned by Truong

Chinh anticipated three steps to land reform, all inter-related and

inter-dependent to achieve the stated ends of land reform program; this

argues that the three primary laws governing the land reforms should be

viewed as three parts to the same effort, or an effort which pre-dated the

Bao Dai reforms.

There were also perhaps other considerations to the timing of the land

reform campaign as well: Giap, in reference to the Winter 1953-Spring 1954

Campaign (DBP, 2nd Edition, 57) held that a major new factor appeared, 'the

policy of systematic rent reduction,' obviously referring to the

Mobilization Decree. He attributes a dramatic rise in the morale of his

troops ("Hence, the combativeness increased greatly") after training his

troops on the decree, for they would now receive land, if they won. Could

also the timing of the DRV decrees been for the purposes of fostering morale

for the upcoming Winter/Spring Campaign and the battle of DBP itself for the

French occupation of DBP began on 20 November 1953? Contributing to this

were substantial battlefield losses in the immediate years prior, Hoa Binh,

Nghia Lo and Na San among them, which had the affect of depressing morale.

By this time too, after seven-years of war, all hope was fast diminishing

for an early result. Cumulatively, could it have been that in some

significant measure that the battlefield conditions prompted the decrees?

No doubt, as you note, there were clear aims to eliminate the landlords as a

class and use the land reforms as an organizational tool to purge the party

of undesirable elements (landlords and rich peasants), but I question the

relative significance of the Bao Dai reforms in prompting the DRV reforms

vis-a-vis other factors and as

well feel that the connection to the China-inspired strategy may require

more

elaboration to be thoroughly persuasive.

Though I am not at all clear on this, it appears that there were two series

of mass mobilizations/land reforms cleaved by Geneva which principally

addressed the liberated areas (before Geneva and exclusive of those areas

adjoining the French occupied areas as well as the Autonomous Zones) and the

newly liberated areas (Nam Dinh/Ninh Binh/Day River area, plus French post

Geneva withdrawal areas) after Geneva; there too seems to be a period of

calm after Geneva until the re-commencement of the land reforms . . . in

allowance for the business at hand? famine, regroupment and the occupation

of the French evacuation areas?

Totally agree that the existing literature tends to absolve the land reform

of its surrounding dynamics.

Courtney Frobenius

Judy Stowe <judy.stowe@btinternet.com>

date May 28, 2007 6:07 PM

subject Re: [Vsg] Newly released documents on the land reform

Hi Balazs, The ICP or more specifically Truong Chinh was very familiar with the technique of condemning possible opponents as AB elements.According to a memorial volume published in Hanoi on the life of Tran Dang Ninh,( sorry I don't have the exact reference) in August 1941 following his return from the 8th Party Plenum in Pac Bo, Truong Chinh carried out a purge of the Bac Ky Party Committee on the grounds they were AB. Truong Chinh had experienced great difficulty in returning to the Red River Delta and suspected some Party members had betrayed his itinerary to theFrench. At the same time Van Tien Dung ( later General) relates in Mo Ky Nguyen Tu Do (NXB Van Hoa, Hanoi 1980) how in 1942 having been released from detention in Son La penitentiary, he was suspected of being AB and had to spend the next 18 months in the wilderness before being accepted back into the Party's leading ranks.

Regards

Judy Stowe, Independent Researcher

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