Could you please describe to us your young days in the Resistance and your experiences in the penal island of Poulo Condore and what you did?

I can tell you all these things quite readily enough because they are always on my mind. Under the French our people were severely oppressed and repressed. If you had opened up a map of the world before 1945, you would have seen that there was no such thing as Vietnam. This was because the French cut our country into three parts and called them Tonkin, Annam and Cochinchina respectively.

They call these regions "countries." And, together with Laos and Cambodia, formed what they called French Indochina. There was no such thing as the word Vietnam on the map.

And so when I went to work in a boat called Chantilly and told my French co-workers that I was a Vietnamese in response to their question about my nationality, they were all very surprised, asking me where this country was and what kind of a country was it because they had never heard of it before. When I pointed out to them on a map where Vietnam was, they said that there was no such thing as Vietnam, only Tonkin, Annam and Cochinchina.

I am telling you all this to show you how treacherous the French policy was. The point was to wipe out our identity. But this policy only roiled our anger because the Vietnamese from all over the country, whether north, central or south, were all very patriotic.

I'll tell you an anecdote to illustrate this. I was sent to the southern part of the country at one point to discuss things with our comrades there. The discussion was very heated and it was very difficult to iron things out. Then I happened to mention the name Ho Chi Minh. These people in the south asked me who Ho Chi Minh was.

I told them that he was Nguyen Ai Quoc. They all stood up and clapped and said that as I was a representative sent by Ho Chi Minh then there was no need for any further discussion. This was because at that time there was a feud going on between the so called "Old Viet Minhs" and "New Viet Minhs." But when they heard from me that Ho Chi Minh was indeed Nguyen Ai Quoc, they were all overjoyed, saying that if Nguyen Ai Quoc had returned home to lead the movement then everything would be solved, that there should be unity and solidarity.

So when I arrived in the south to transmit the political lines and strategies, the mention of Ho Chi Minh's identity alone helped solve all problems. Hence, when I told the southern comrades what the policies of the Central Committee of our Party and the Viet Minh were, these people were ready to accept them and carry them out.

Could you tell us of your experiences the Poulo Condore? You were there and you wrote about it, didn't you?

I was exiled to the island in late 1930 and was kept there until 1936 when the victory of the Popular Front in France produced an amnesty for political prisoners in Vietnam. Although the island was distant from the mainland, the prison had many layers of walls. We were kept in underground cells with huge iron bars above us. On top of the cells were cement bridges along which the French guards marched back and forth so that in case something happened they could always pour down bullets on us.

They treated us very inhumanely and often tortured us. I was imprisoned with Comrade Pham Van Dong then; and when they mistreated us Comrade Pham Van Dong lectured them in French, telling them not to be so inhumane. They were really taken aback, saying: "What? You know how to speak French?" You see, they thought that we were all a bunch of illiterates.

This kind of attitude was very indicative of the way the French treated us because they had been used to regard us as slaves working for them in the rubber plantations, for example. In the rubber plantations the workers were treated so inhumanely that they died young and died in droves. There was a saying in the plantations that the workers were fertilizers for the rubber trees because their corpses were often buried under the trees.

If you were in Con Dao penal island thirty or forty years ago, you would have concluded that it was the worst prison on earth. Once you were political prisoners like me, you could be beaten at any time.

As prisoners there, we had no beds and mats. We were forced to sleep on the cold cement floors. And the roofs were leaking, water just poured in. Therefore, in a very short time, several hundred comrades died. Under these conditions, we told each other that we had to struggle because we would all die eventually if we did not fight anyway.

We could consider it a meaningful sacrifice if they shot at us and killed us. But if we succeeded in our struggles, then our living conditions could be improved. Therefore, the several thousand prisoners there at the time agreed with this decision to struggle.

At first we staged a hunger strike, screaming our protests for three days and three nights. Therefore, the French Governor of Cochinchina, named Krautheimer, had to go to Con Dao to find out what happened. I don't know what happened in their meetings after the French Governor arrived, but conditions began to improve a little bit. They told us that they did not have people to mill the rice and cook the meals and that we had to do all these things ourselves. We agreed.

When they allowed us to run ourselves in this way, a really surprising thing happened. Before, the water they gave us to drink was as red and dirty as mud water in the paddy fields. This was because the well was only two meters deep. We deepened the well until we had a water level of about four meters. The water was now crystal clear.

We also told the French to allow us to build open water cisterns with which to store this water. From then on, our health improved and we became stronger. This was also because we could now take showers and clean our bodies.

Because of our struggles and because of the Popular Front government in Paris, beginning in 1934 and 1935 there were some improvements. We were allowed to mill our rice and cook for ourselves. When the amnesty came about by the end of 1935, I was released and came back to continue with my activities.

I must stress the fact that several hundred political prisoners died during the first few years of my imprisonment in the penal island as a result of lack of food and extremely bad living conditions. The cement floors were cold and the roofs leaked. So many of us got sick and died.

The founding of the Viet Minh was also the occasion for the return of President Ho to our country for the first time. We had to build a hut for Uncle Ho in Cao bang, near the border with China, so that if the French happened to go after him then we could sneak him across the border in time.

President Ho assumed personal and direct command of the movement after the Viet Minh had been founded. After the conference to establish the Viet Minh, President Ho sent out a letter calling for the support of the population. And it was this that rallied the entire country around the movement. And when people realized that Ho Chi Minh was actually Nguyen Ai Quoc, their trust in the movement was further established. This was because the name Nguyen Ai Quoc had been widely known in the country. People knew that he was a great patriot.

So when they heard that the founder of the Viet Minh was Nguyen Ai Quoc, they eagerly joined organizations such as "Workers for National Salvation," "Peasants for National Salvation," "Youths for National Salvation," and "Women for National Salvation." Uncle Ho at that time said that we had to use patriotism to rally the people. Hence the various organizations all had the words "National Salvation" attached to them.

In 1945 the Viet Minh held a conference in Tan Trao to call on the people to stage a general uprising. There were representatives from the north, the center and the south. The aim of the conference was to rally the people throughout the country.

We began to spread the message that Ho Chi Minh was actually Nguyen Ai Quoc. For a long time the general population had a lot of respect for Nguyen Ai Quoc because he was such a great patriot. So people joined the various organizations of the Viet Minh and prepared for the general uprising to the over administrative and political power. After the conference at Tan Trao, the "National Salvation Army" was organized in every locality. Everybody took up arms and ready to take part in the general uprisings.

The interesting thing was that during my trip from the north to the south, the delegates at the various conferences asked me who was this Ho Chi Minh? And when I told them that he was Nguyen Ai Quoc, they all said that there was no need for any further debate and that everyone should unite behind him. That was how great Ho Chi Minh's prestige was. There were many reasons for the success of the August Revolution, but a deciding factor had to be the role played by Ho Chi Minh.

After the establishment of the government in Hanoi, I was sent to the south to help unify and consolidate the revolutionary forces there. This was because there was disunity in the south, with the so called "New Viet Minh" and "Old Viet Minh" feuding with each other. At that point Uncle Ho asked who was person who was knowledgeable about the situation in the South. And everybody recommended me because I had been operating there.

Wherever I went, I mentioned to people that Ho Chi Minh was Nguyen Ai Quoc and that he had taken leadership of the movement. And this helped solve all difficulties. People would stand up and clap, saying that if Nguyen Ai Quoc had actually taken over leadership of the revolution then there shouldn't be any more difficulties. They then agreed to accept and carry out the policies and programs of the Viet Minh.

Please tell us what Saigon was like in 1945 when you arrived there.

When I arrived in Saigon in 1945 I found out that the population in general really supported the Indochinese Communist Party. But among the revolutionaries at that time there were some feuds between the so called "New Viet Minh" and "Old Viet Minh."

I had to tell them that Ho Chi Minh was actually Nguyen Ai Quoc and that he had taken charge of the revolutionary movement himself. Uncle Ho's prestige was so great that it helped solve the infighting at the time and produce unity. It was for this reason that the movement in the south as well as in the center agreed to send delegates to the unity meeting at Tan Trao to prepare for an uprising.

Please tell us how the British troops arrived in the South and how you prepared to fight them.

When the British troops arrived they began carrying out repression against the popular movement wherever they went.

Please tell us how the British troops came in, how the Resistance Government was set up.

Not long after we established a government, the British intervened by sending a force of British and Indian soldiers into the southern part of our country. Therefore, we had to establish right away a government for the south and called on the population in the south to defend the revolution.

I then talked things over with the comrade in charge of the south at that time, Comrade Tran Van Giau, to hold a conference to work out strategies and to bring about unity. When I reported to the delegates there that Ho Chi Minh was actually Nguyen Ai Quoc, everybody was overjoyed and was ready to unify against the enemy.