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British troops arrived in Saigon on 9 September 1945 ostensibly to disarm the Japanese troops and arrange their repatriation. In fact the Japanese were not disarmed but were used by the British to fight the Vietnamese Liberation Forces, and this under the Labour Government of Clement Atlee, in order to hand Vietnam back to the French.<br/><br/> Thus the official history of the Indian armed forces noted that, 'all the dirty work, to fight and disarm the Annamites, (Vietnamese) was assigned to the Japanese troops.'<br/><br/> General MacArthur, Supreme Commander Allied Powers in South East Asia, said in Tokyo, 'If there is anything that makes my blood boil it is to see our allies in Indo-China…deploying Japanese troops to conquer the little people we promised to liberate. It is the most ignoble kind of betrayal'.
In September 1945, Gracey led 20,000 troops of the 20th Indian Division to occupy Saigon. During the Potsdam Conference in July 1945, the Allies had agreed on Britain taking control of Vietnam south of the 16th parallel from the Japanese occupiers. The French, anxious to retain their colony, persuaded Gracey's Commander in Chief, Lord Mountbatten, to authorise Gracey to declare martial law. French General Leclerc arrived in Saigon in October 1945 to assume authority but it was not until well into the first half of 1946 that enough French troops had arrived to allow General Gracey to withdraw.