Tran Trong Kim
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- This is a Vietnamese name; the family name is Trần, but is often simplified as Tran in English-language text. According to Vietnamese custom, this person properly should be referred to by the given name Kim.
Trần Trọng Kim (1883–1953) was a Vietnamese scholar and politician who served as the Prime Minister of the short-lived Empire of Vietnam, a puppet state created by Imperial Japan in 1945. This came after Japan had seized direct control of Vietnam from the French colonial forces during the Second World War.
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[edit] Early years
Kim was born in Ha Tinh Province in northern central Vietnam in 1883. At the time, French Indochina had just been formed after the colonization of Vietnam, and Ha Tinh was part of the central region which had been become a French protectorate under the name of Annam. Kim’s early career was as an interpreter, serving in Ninh Binh in northern Vietnam, which was known as the protectorate of Tonkin. In 1905, Kim was sent to France as an employee of a private company. In 1908, he won a scholarship from the Ecole Coloniale (Colonial School) to begin his training as a teacher at the Ecole Normale of Melun (Seine-et-Marne). Kim returned to Vietnam in September 1911, commenced his career as a teacher in Annam, and slowly rose in the educational hierarchy. By 1942, he had risen to become an inspector of elementary public instruction in Tonkin.[1]
[edit] Academia
In contrast to his obscure career as a pedagogue, Kim was widely known as a scholar for a collection of textbooks published in Romanized Vietnamese (quoc ngu), especially for his writings on Confucianism, Buddhism, and Vietnamese history. Due to his reputation in literary circles, Kim was a leading figure in the Buddhist and Confucian associations and in 1939 he was appointed to the Chamber of People's Representatives in Tonkin.[1]
[edit] World War II
After the outbreak of the Second World War, Japan invaded and annexed Indochina into its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in 1940-1941. Since France had fallen to Nazi Germany, the colonial administration in Vietnam of Admiral Jean Decoux was loyal to the Axis collaborationist Vichy France of Marshal Petain. Since Vichy France was nominally allied to Japan, the French administration was left in charge of the day to day affairs of French Indochina, with the Japanese overseeing them. In the early 20th century, Japan was also seen by many Vietnamese as a promoter of Asian nationalism, and many Vietnamese nationalists had travelled to Vietnam in an attempt to further the Vietnamese independence movement. During the period, Kim was approached by several Japanese experts in Vietnamese studies. These contacts, together with his ties to a progressive association in Hanoi, made Kim politically suspect to the Decoux administration. When Decoux implemented his second major purge of pro-Japanese Vietnamese in the autumn of 1943, Kim was reported to be on the list of the Surete (Criminal Investigation Department). As a precaution, on October 28, 1943, Japanese agents escorted Kim to the Kempeitai (military police) office in Hanoi to be placed under protection. There, Kim was joined by Duong Ba Trac, a co-editor on a dictionary that was currently being written. According to Kim, Trac persuaded him to co-sign a letter requesting their evacuation to Singapore. In early November, the Japanese escorted them to Saigon. After a short stay of residence in the Kempeitai office, they became the guests of Dai Nan Koosi, a Japanese business firm owned by Matsushita Mitsuhiro, well-known for its scantly disguised intelligence operations.[1]
[edit] Return to Vietnam
On January 1, 1944, Kim and Trac boarded a Japanese vessel headed for Singapore. After spending just over a year on the island, and following Trac's death from lung cancer in December 1944, Kim was transferred to Bangkok. Three months later, on March 30, 1945, he was unexpectedly recalled to Saigon by the Japanese to be consulted on "history". He was introduced to General Kawamura, Chief of Staff of the Japanese Garrison Army (38th Army), and Lieutenant Colonel Hayashi Hidezumi, Kawamura’s chief of political affairs. Kawamura told Kim that he was one of the “notables” invited by Emperor Bao Dai to consult in Hue on the creation of the new independent government. By this stage, the Liberation of Paris in August 1944 and the fall of Vichy France meant that Japan could no longer depend of the French colonial administration to cooperate. As a result, they had assumed direct control of Indochina after deposing the French on March 9, and declared Vietnam to be independent under the newly created Empire of Vietnam with Bao Dai, who was Vietnam’s titular monarch, as its head of state. Japan however, maintained military control.[1]
According to his own account, Kim accepted the invitation because Hoang Xuan Han, a young friend, was also on Bao Dai's list. Kim departed Saigon on April 2, and arrived in Hue three days later. On April 7, Bao Dai held a personal meeting with Kim, and to his astonishment, the Emperor "looked respectful and spoke right things". As a result, Kim prolonged his stay and finally agreed to form a new government on April 16. The following day, Kim submitted his proposed cabinet consisting of ten ministers. With the exception of Luu Van Lang, a naturalized French citizen who refused his office, the others arrived in Hue by late April or early May to take office).[1]
[edit] Rule
Kim only had the chance to rule for five months, and most of his policies were not implemented before the Vietminh seized power following the Japanese collapse at the end of the Second World War. After his government collapsed, Kim returned to his research and academic work.[1]
[edit] Notes
[edit] References
- Vu Ngu Chieu (February 1986). "The Other Side of the 1945 Vietnamese Revolution: The Empire of Viet-Nam". Journal of Asian Studies 45 (2).
