Declassified per Executive Order 13526, Section 3.3
NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011
TOP SECRET – Sensitive
3. Common Leadership. North and South Vietnam have shared leaders throughout the last three decades, a commonality which has lately developed into Northerners holding the top posts both within the GVN and within the NLF. Tran Van Gian, an old rcp leader, headed the "front" government in Saigon in 1945, and then returned to Hanoi to hold high DRV posts. His successor was ~guyen Phuong Thao (alias Nguyen Binh), a northerner, who led the Southern Resistance through 1951, and subsequently died in the North. 126/ Nguyen Phuong Thao (alias Nguyen Binh) was succeeded by Le Duan,who became First Secretary of the Lao Dong Party openly in 1960, and probably de facto in 1957· Le Duan's deputy was Le Duc Tho, in 1960 director of the Organizational Department of the Lao Dong Party, and a member of its Central Committee. Pham Hung, in 1960 a member of the Lao Dong Secretariat and a Deputy Premier of the DRV, and Ung Van Khiem, in 1960 on the Lao Dong Central Committee, were also among the leaders of the Southern Viet Minh through 1954.
Le Duan remained in the South after Geneva, or at least is mentioned in intelligence reports as being in the South frequently through 1957. 1271 His return to North Vietnam in mid-1957 precipitated, accordiI1g to some sources, a struggle among Ho's lieutenants between a moderate faction opposing DRV support of guerrilla war in the South, and a militant faction led by Le Duan. 128/ He is also reported to have been sent on an inspection trip to the South in 1958, and in early 1959, to have presented a series of recommendations for immediate action in the South to the Lao Dong Central Committee. 129/ General Van Tien Dung, Chief of Staff of the NVA and alternate Politburo member, was reportedly a member of the Party's southern apparatus from mid-1955 through 1956, having been sent south to contract alliances with Hoa Hao and Cao Dai armed bands; Nguyen Van Vinh, one of his deputies, also served there at the same time. 130/ Intelligence is vague on Le Duan's replacement in 1957. However, among those northern leaders mentioned by intelligence sources as serving in the South in the period after 1956 are Tran Van Tra, Le Duan's pre-1954 military adviser in the South, and nOlv a NVA deputy chief of staff; and Muoi Cuc (Nguyen Van Cuc), one of Le Duan's close follmrers. 131/
Both the infiltrated regroupees and the relatively few northerners who accompanied them in the years 1959-1963 were lower-level leaders. As Geo~ge Carver put it:
"They were not foot soldiers or cannon fodder (at least not until Hanoi began sending in whole North Vietnamese units in late 1964 or early 1965). Instead they were disciplined, trained and indoctrinated cadres and technicians. They became the squad leaders, platoon leaders, political officers, staff officers, unit commanders, weapons and communications specialists who built the Viet Cong's military force into what it is today. They also became the village, district, provincial and regional committee chiefs and key committee members who
