Domestic context and internal causes leading to the revolutionary climax of 1930-1931 and the Nghe Tinh Soviet
The revolutionary propaganda and mobilization of organizations such as Thanh Nien, Tan Viet and later the Indochina Communist Party and other communist organizations were the torch that guided the struggle against oppression and exploitation by the tyrants and landlords in the countryside of the working peasant masses of Nghe Tinh.
The Great Depression broke out in North America and Western Europe in late October 1929, but by the end of 1930 its impact and influence on the economy of the colonial Indochina was still insignificant. However, due to the brutal exploitation policies of the French colonialists and their henchmen, the vast majority of the Vietnamese people, especially farmers and workers, had long been driven to the brink of economic and social ruin. The research results of a number of French colonial researchers and officials at that time also confirmed the above situation.
On that basis, American historian William J. Duiker was right to say that: Even without the Great Depression, “... the chronic economic and social problems in Vietnam at that time were enough to create potential for riots.” During the period from mid-1925 to early 1930 in Vietnam, there were a number of political parties and religious-political movements whose activities more or less influenced the political and social consciousness and mood of the masses. These were the Constitutional Party, the Cao Dai religion, the Nguyen An Ninh secret society, the Phuc Viet Association (later changed to the Tan Viet Revolutionary Party), the Vietnam Nationalist Party, the Vietnam Revolutionary Youth Association, and then the three communist organizations.
Among the above organizations and movements, the Constitutional Party, the Nguyen An Ninh Secret Society, the Vietnam Nationalist Party, and the Phuc Viet Association (in the early period, before being influenced by Thanh Nien) paid little attention to propaganda and mass mobilization. All of the above organizations did not advocate carrying out a national liberation revolution based on the widespread and active participation of the masses, so they did not have a strategy for propaganda and mass mobilization. In addition to a loose and extremely secretive organizational system, these organizations did not establish mass organizations or unions. Therefore, their influence among the masses, especially among workers, peasants, and the urban poor, was relatively limited and weak.
However, some activities of these organizations also directly or indirectly awakened political consciousness and encouraged patriotism among the masses, such as the campaigns of the Phuc Viet Association, some activities of Nguyen An Ninh and his secret society. In particular, the activities of the Vietnam Nationalist Party and the uprising led by this organization in the first half of February 1930 directly contributed to heating up the political atmosphere and directly contributed to promoting the emergence of a revolutionary climax among the masses in Vietnam shortly thereafter.
Among the above organizations and movements, only Cao Dai and the Vietnam Revolutionary Youth Association are really interested in propaganda and mass mobilization, and are the two organizations with the most significant number of people.
Cao Dai dignitaries, mostly Western-educated intellectuals, big landowners, and former Vietnamese officials in the colonial administration, were extremely clever in exploiting traditional cultural and spiritual elements to propagate and attract the masses. Therefore, in a relatively short period of time, they had a group of followers numbering in the hundreds of thousands, mainly tenant farmers. Joining Cao Dai, as a "religion", could bring faith to followers, but it did not bring them an awakening of political consciousness and of their own role in the movement for national liberation and social liberation. However, the prophecies and spirit writings of Cao Dai (and some other sects) about the approaching end of the world, about the collapse of the existing order, also contributed to creating a mentality of hatred for the colonial order, believing that a social order was about to be overthrown. Therefore, when the revolutionary movement of 1930-1931 broke out in the South, many Cao Dai followers participated in peasant demonstrations under the banner of the Communist Party.
Completely different from the above political organizations and parties, the Vietnam Revolutionary Youth Association, founded, led and trained by leader Nguyen Ai Quoc, determined from the beginning that "workers and peasants are the root of the revolution", and that students, small merchants, small landowners... are "revolutionary friends of workers and peasants". From the very beginning, Thanh Nien considered mass mobilization as the central task of the organization. The decisive turning point of Thanh Nien was the emergence of the proletarianization movement from around August 1928. Through this movement, on the one hand, the cadres of Thanh Nien, mainly (over 90%) Western-educated intellectuals, coming from the upper classes, became closer to and more knowledgeable about the situation and aspirations of the workers and peasants. On the other hand, through this, the influence of Thanh Nien penetrated deeply and spread to a large part of the masses, contributing to awakening their political consciousness and fighting spirit. This was the most important reason contributing to the sudden development of the workers' movement from spontaneous to conscious in the period from 1925 to 1930.
Continuing that tradition of Thanh Nien, the three communist organizations formed in Vietnam from mid-1929 to early 1930 paid great attention to mass mobilization, especially worker and peasant mobilization. The Indochinese Communist Party, the Annam Communist Party and the Indochinese Communist Federation, after their establishment, continued to promote the proletarianization movement, continued to send cadres to infiltrate the workers, peasants and urban poor, and organized many struggles of workers and peasants, of which the most prominent were the strikes of workers at the Phu Rieng rubber plantation (South Vietnam), and the strikes of workers at the Nam Dinh Textile Factory, which received strong support from workers at many other large factories in North Vietnam in late 1929 and early 1930.
The coexistence of three communist organizations, as presented in the previous chapter, led to a situation of competition for influence, struggle for the masses and struggle for recognition by the Communist International as the only genuine communist organization in Indochina. In that condition, under the influence of the Communist International's line adopted at the 6th Congress and under the influence of the uprising movement to establish communes and Soviets in China, all three communist organizations mentioned above put forth extremely leftist propaganda slogans in the process of mobilizing the masses, gathering forces and organizing the struggle.
Since June 1929, right in the Manifesto after the founding of the Indochinese Communist Party, one of the party's tasks in organizing daily struggles was declared: "Lead the masses to gradually fight politically and prepare to seize power". That Manifesto ended with slogans to call on the masses: "Overthrow imperialism! ... Overthrow the big landlords, the feudal regime and the methods of pre-capitalist exploitation! Workers' and peasants' dictatorship! Proletarian dictatorship! Destroy the class! Realize a communist society!".
The above slogans were also widely disseminated in the propaganda documents of the Indochinese Communist Party. For example, the Hammer and Sickle newspaper, the Party's mouthpiece, in a special issue commemorating the Guangzhou Commune on December 1, 1929, called for: "Workers, peasants, and soldiers of Indochina! Following the example of the October Revolution, following the Guangzhou uprising, following the Communist Party... 1. Overthrow French imperialism and the mandarins of the whole of Indochina,... 3. Establish the Indochinese Soviet government of workers, peasants, and soldiers, 4. Hand over the factories to workers to manage, 5. Give land to the peasants, 6. Give land and jobs to the soldiers".
Considering the subjective and objective conditions of the Vietnamese revolution at that time, it was clear that these were extremely leftist slogans and propaganda. When they reached the masses who were groaning under the brutal domination and exploitation of the French colonialists and their lackeys, they would become a call for a fledgling uprising. Such extremely leftist propaganda mottos of the Indochinese Communist Party were also applied, even more drastically, at local Party bases. For example, in November 1929, in the appeal leaflet of the Central Region Committee based in Vinh on the occasion of the anniversary of the Russian October Revolution, the Party called for: "Workers, peasants and soldiers unite following the example of the Russian October Revolution! Overthrow imperialism and capitalism, overthrow the feudal regime of the Southern Dynasty, establish the Indochinese Soviet Government of workers, peasants and soldiers! Hand over the factories to the workers, hand over the land to the peasants! Practice the dictatorship of the proletariat and communism!"
Similar propaganda slogans were also used quite commonly in the propaganda and campaign documents of the Annam Communist Party and the Indochina Communist Federation.
The leftist strategies and tactics of the three communist organizations that were formed and operated in Vietnam from mid-1929 to early 1930 contributed greatly to the preparation and strong explosion of the revolutionary movement of 1930-1931, and the later appearance of the Soviets in the "red villages" in Nghe Tinh certainly did not come entirely from the spontaneous "initiative" of the grassroots cadres of the Central Region Party Committee, but originated from the appeals of the Indochinese Communist Party that were widely spread in Central Vietnam and some other localities. It should also be noted that, during that period, the Vietnam Nationalist Party was also actively preparing to throw itself into a fierce armed uprising. Thus, at the beginning of 1930, all revolutionary organizations in Vietnam were making every effort to prepare and call on the masses to rise up and overthrow the colonial and monarchical regimes. This was the main cause leading to the revolutionary climax of 1930-1931.
In addition to the above economic and political causes, some traditional socio-economic factors also contributed to the fierce outbreak of the 1930-1931 revolutionary movement. Due to the harsh exploitation of feudal landlords and the abuses, oppression and discrimination of the tyrants and bullies, for a long time in the Vietnamese countryside, there had been intense social conflicts and contradictions. These were the main causes leading to the continuous outbreak of hundreds and thousands of peasant uprisings and rebellions over the centuries, especially since the 18th century. Under the French colonial period, these conflicts and contradictions were not only not resolved, but were also exacerbated by the colonial rule through heavy tax collection policies.
Typically, in the rural areas of Nghe Tinh, these social conflicts have long been expressed in the form of fierce struggles between the peasant faction (a form of solidarity of poor, oppressed, and discriminated farmers) against the gentry faction (groups of gentry and landlords united in villages to oppress farmers and protect their privileges and benefits).
By the end of the 1920s, the struggle between the nobles and the protectors became increasingly fierce and widespread in most villages and communes in Nghe Tinh. In many villages, the nobles were quite strong, not only strong enough to isolate, boycott, and nullify village rules set by the protectors to exploit and oppress the villagers, but also even dominated the entire village and commune management apparatus, taking it upon themselves to collect taxes, divide public land, and surround and expel Westerners when they entered the village to search for smuggled alcohol and salt.
The fierce struggle between the peasants and the gentry in the rural areas of Nghe Tinh is a typical manifestation of the fierce conflict of Vietnamese peasants against the oppression of the autocratic monarchy and colonialism in the countryside.
It was in that context that the revolutionary propaganda and mobilization of organizations such as Thanh Nien, Tan Viet and later the Indochina Communist Party and other communist organizations were enthusiastically responded to and accepted by the working peasant masses, especially in the rural areas of Nghe Tinh, because it not only suited their aspirations but also provided them with a torch to light the way and show the way for the struggle against the oppression and exploitation of the tyrants and landlords in the countryside.
