HO Chi Minh was an anti-imperialist Vietnamese nationalist first and foremost. He turned to communism only because it was a potent anti-imperialist ideology, especially in the context of Vietnam’s history with French imperialism.
According to William Duiker, by the end of World War 1, there were 50,000 Vietnamese in France, many of whom toiled in the factories as replacement workers. Aside from them, there were a few hundred Vietnamese scions of wealthy families studying in the country. Understandably so, there was a very strong politicized atmosphere among the Vietnamese students in France but Druiker lamented that “little had been done to channel…[nationalist sentiments] to the cause of independence.”