Evening star., 1947-01-05
French Must Fight Out
Crisis in Indo-China,
Colonial Chief SAYS
BY the Asseeioted Press

PARIS, Jan. 4.-Full-scale wal
In Indo-China was foreseer
today when Colonial Minister
Marius Moutet sent word thai
France would have to fight it Out
there.
1T is necessary to have a mill.
tary decision" Mr.. Moutet told the
semiofhcial French press agency
The interview at Saigon followed
his return from an eyewitness view
of fighting in the northern city OF
Hanoi where he twice was fired on
by snipers, said by the French to
be Wet Namese.
Saying he was convinced the Wet
Namese started the fighting at
Hanoi December 10 with premedi-
tation as part of a plot against
French control of any sort, Mr.
Moutet declared:
Those responsible for this trag-
edy have Systematically destroyed
many hopes and compromised the
efforts in which we have put all
our goodwill Before any negotia-
tionS today it is necessary to have
military decision. am sorry, but
one cannot commit such follies as
the Wet Namese have done"
Resident Generals in Paris.
News of Mr.. Moutet's plans to cut
short his finding trip to
Frances oriental empire, reached
Paris simultaneously with the ar
rival on official visits of the French
resident generals of Tunis and Mo-
rocco, another high French official
was flying to Paris from Dakar in
French West Africa.
The arrival of these colonial Off
cials focused attention on the widely
held belief that the natives of these
lands were watching closely the out
come of the challenge to French
rule by the Wet Namese.
North African native groups have
shown repeated signs of restless
ness in recent years of French
weakness, and few Frenchmen
doubted that the interim govern
ment of Leon Blum was fortifying
itself with up-to-the- minute infor-
nation on the state of affairs in
the colonial empire.
Mr.. Moutet said he had no meet
tngs with President Ho Chi Mimi
or other representatives of the Wet
Namese who had broadcast sugges-
tions to treat
Too many unreliable statements
have been broadcast by the Wet
Nam radio" he said, for him to take
seriously such unofficial invitations.
French Reported Encircled.
Mr.. Moutet's expressed belief that
the issue would have to be decided
by fighting focused attention on
Frances top mobile warfare expert
In Indo-China, Gen. Leclerc. Pre-
Sumably he would be in command if
the French begin full-scale Of
fensive in Indo-China's jungles and
rice paddles.
Latest French communiques said
the French were holding the central
sections of Hanoi but were encircled
by about 10000 Wet Namese along
a 15-mile front.
The Wet Namese had artillery and
mortars, which the French say was
captured by the japanese and turned
over to the natives
The French had tanks and planes
which have been used to knock out
all but four of the Wet Nam artillery
pieces around Hanoi.
The French had been forced to
evacuate five small towns on the
mountain road from Hanoi to Lang
son on the Chinese border The evac-
uation was carried out. the French
said, when a line of communications
for the e~Langson garrison was estab-
lshed to Tienyen on the Tonkin
coast. Among the persons withdrawn
from the five towns, including Bac-
ninh and Phulangthuong, we're 300
French, Chinese and Annamite civil
ians and Catholic Spanish mission
aries.
The French were believed to have
about $1,000 troops scattered
throughout Indo-C China with possibly
10000 more en- route or due to start
this month. But how soon they could
be organized for an offensive was
problematical.