Pre-Unification Transition in South Vietnam and the Ho Chi Minh City Military Administration (1975–1976)

Abstract

Using materials from the Vietnam’s National Archives Center No. 2, in particular the incomplete series of the Military Administration Committee’s weekly or monthly reports, as well as recently published archival documents from the Central Office of South Vietnam (COSVN), this paper aims to shed light on the issue of “Tiếp quản”, the transition of power in Saigon after 30 April 1975 from the Republic of Vietnam (RVN) to the combined Vietnamese revolutionary forces by studying the Ủy ban Quân quản Thành phố Sài Gòn – Gia định (UBQQSG), the Military Administration Committee for the City of Saigon – Gia Dinh.

This paper will start by examining what kind of challenge Saigon represented for the Vietnamese revolution and how the revolutionaries prepared to face it. Second it will tackle the issue of the presence of Southerners in the state apparatus for transition. Third, it will go over the main policies that the UBQQSG implemented, what resistance it confronted and how it struggled with issues of discipline amongst its assigned cadres. Finally, the article proposes an expansion of the dates in which the Vietnam War is generally examined by pushing back the end of the periodization to July 1976 and the official reunification of Vietnam.

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