Vietnamese nationalism awaited a rallying force.īorn Nguyen Sinh Cung in 1890, Ho left Vietnam at the age of 21 as a galley boy on a French freighter. There were periodic revolts - but the resistance was notorganized enough to succeed against a ruthless French security system. Many thousands of Vietnamese died labouring in appalling conditions on rubber plantations rice was exported despite the starving local people. In reality Vietnam was treated as a huge plantation fuelling French industrialization. The French justified their rule of Indochina by the idea that they were bringing into light and liberty the races and peoples still enslaved by ignorance and despotism'. In 1887 French Indochina was formed from the colony of Cochinchina and the protectorates of Annam (central Vietnam), Tonkin (northern Vietnam), Cambodia and Laos. The French gradually eroded the power of the emperors further north, while keeping them as puppet figureheads. They attacked in 1858 and eventually established the colony of Cochinchina in the south of Vietnam, with Saigon as capital. The Vietnamese emperor s execution of the more troublesome of these prompted Napoleon Ill to send troops. The first French were missionaries who dabbled in politics.
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