INDO-CHINA: The New Frontier

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The emperor put on a parasol-shaped red velvet hat and a golden-dragon robe, accompanied his son on the first trip abroad for any of their dynasty. In Paris he put the prince under the tutelage of former Annam Governor Eugene Charles. "I bring you a schoolboy," said Khai Dinh. "Make of him what you will." Three years later, Khai Dinh died. He was buried in a splendid mausoleum, at Hué; at the foot of his tomb lay his prized French decorations, toothbrush, Thermos bottles and "Big Ben" alarm clock. Bao Dai, who had come 'home for the funeral, was crowned the 13th sovereign of the Nguyen (pronounced New Inn) dynasty. He turned the throne over to a regent, and hurried back to Paris.

The young Emperor continued his Chinese lessons, studied Annamite chronicles, browsed through French history, literature and economics. He was especially fond of books on Henry IV, the dynast from Navarre who began the Bourbon rule in France with the cynical remark, "Paris is worth a Mass," and the demagogic slogan, "Every family should have a fowl in the pot on Sunday." Bao Dai put his money in Swiss banks (and thereby saved it from World War II's reverses), collected stamps, practiced tennis with Champion Henri Cochet, learned ping-pong, dressed in tweeds and flannels, vacationed in the Pyrenees, scented himself heavily with Coty and Chanel perfumes.

Up to this point the Emperor had absorbed a good deal of the education of an intelligent, progressive French adolescent. He had high notions of applying what he had learned back home.

In 1932, at 19, Bao Dai formally took over the Dragon Throne at Hué; two years later he married beautiful Mariette-Jeanne Nguyen Huu Thi Lan, the daughter of a wealthy Cochin-Chinese merchant. The Empress Nam Phuong was a Roman Catholic, educated at Paris' Convent "Aux Oiseaux."

Bao Dai reigned but he did not rule. The French (Third Republic and Vichy) shrugged off his earnest pleas for social and economic reforms and more native political autonomy. Cleverly, as they thought, they encouraged the Emperor to devote himself to sport and pleasure.

Bao Dai was hunting tigers near his summer villa at Dalat when the Japanese, early in 1945, made their 1940 control of the colony official and complete. They surprised his party, took him prisoner, installed him as a puppet emperor—until their own capitulation to the Allies a few months later.

Agitator Ho. At this point, the lines of Bao Dai's destiny first crossed those of his fellow Annamite Ho Chi Minh.

The two men made a dramatic contrast. The Emperor was young (then 32), plump, clean-shaven, bland-faced, fond of snappy Western sport clothes. Ho was aging (55), slight (hardly 5 ft. tall), goat-bearded, steelyeyed, usually seen in a frayed khaki tunic and cloth slippers. Ho Chi Minh, too, had gone to France for education. As a young man, he had been sent into exile by the French police of Indo-China because of his family's nationalist agitation. His father and a brother went to political prison for life. A sister received nine years of hard labor.