President Bush accepted Prime Minister Phan Van Khai's invitation today (for next year), while extending the hospitality of the White House. Since virtually every step of the official US-Vietnam Summit was carefully pre-scripted and agreed to, the results were both positive and pre-ordained....the US supports WTO accession and hopes to finish this year (although doubts persist on the practicality of this schedule, and negotiations will continue); there will be increased defense cooperation and an intelligence exchange, etc. (no doubt of major interest to China).
Bush and Khai also agreed progress on human and religious rights needed before Congress can be expected to approve any WTO deal. Management issues also persist, partly because the Vietnamese Government didn't coordinate it's own involved bureaucracies, with some resulting confusion; and two US business groups were dueling behind the scenes for primacy. All in all, a metaphor for the types of things Hanoi needs to work on to resolve issues with business and the international community as it grows into the economic and diplomatic life of Asia.
If one is not paying attention to the subject between the lines, one might conclude Bush has changed his stripes. The truth is Vietnam is the only country to have decisively beaten China TWICE in border wars in this century. Bush is after the intellegence Vietnam can offer. This is just another move in the plan to encircle China with US allies to contain it's hegemony. Bush'll be happy to provide all the disinformation he can to Vietnam, so that we can fight the Chinese to the last Vietnamese.
Complete Article
The Agonist - From tonight's Nelson report:
SUMMARY: if you are of a certain age, did you ever imagine a US president going to Hanoi on a return visit? No imagination needed...President Bush accepted Prime Minister Phan Van Khai's invitation today (for next year), while extending the hospitality of the White House. Since virtually every step of the official US-Vietnam Summit was carefully pre-scripted and agreed to, the results were both positive and pre-ordained....the US supports WTO accession and hopes to finish this year (although doubts persist on the practicality of this schedule, and negotiations will continue); there will be increased defense cooperation and an intelligence exchange, etc. (no doubt of major interest to China).
Bush and Khai also agreed progress on human and religious rights needed before Congress can be expected to approve any WTO deal. Management issues also persist, partly because the Vietnamese Government didn't coordinate it's own involved bureaucracies, with some resulting confusion; and two US business groups were dueling behind the scenes for primacy. All in all, a metaphor for the types of things Hanoi needs to work on to resolve issues with business and the international community as it grows into the economic and diplomatic life of Asia. Contrast today's Bush/Khai meetings with the House of Representatives' nearly unanimous endorsement of continuing the Burma sanctions...
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1. A measure of how things have progressed, not just in the 30 years since US military involvement in the Vietnam War ended, but since even the early 1990's, when the Clinton Administration finally was able to "normalize" relations, is that former combatants in the war...and recent political rivals...will join tomorrow for a Capitol Hill "thanks" for those involved in bringing about normalization despite the lingering MIA/POW political problem.
-- Senators John Kerry and John McCain, joined by fellow Vietnam Vet/hero Richard Armitage, and others, will host a reception recognizing the work done on Capitol Hill which helped bring about today's remarkable White House meeting. (Commenting parenthetically, observers note that Kerry's involvement shows he's looking to the future, and not dwelling on his defeat by President Bush.) But McCain today made clear he also will warn Hanoi on the need for greater progress on human rights and related issues.
2. At the Bush/Khai meeting human rights was frankly discussed, as the two leaders put their official signatures on a very carefully pre-negotiated set of agreements and statements designed to help promote Vietnam's accession to the WTO later this year (a goal which may not be achieved, observers warn, hence the requirement for continued bilateral negotiations over the coming months). The Administration hopes to smooth the legislative ride through a Congress which, despite planned expressions of good will, contains significant reservations along the lines noted by McCain, perhaps the most famous former POW.
-- also at issue are continued problems for and within the business community which, while eager to increase investment in Vietnam, reports remaining bureaucratic and legal impediments to trade and business, despite official Vietnamese government approval of the larger goal of opening the economy to the first world economies of its neighbors and trading partners. Khai and his deputies made clear they are resolved to address these complaints.
3. Perhaps reflecting continued internal Communist Party reservations about not just the pace of opening, but the more fundamental issue of whether to open fully, business reps this week reminded Administration officials and visiting Vietnamese officials that they still face serious obstacles such as a confused decision-making process, a very slow pace of decisions, and unclear instructions to bureaucrats involved in regulating foreign investment (such as the allowable percentage of foreign ownership).
-- observers wryly noted that a metaphor for continued bureaucratic problems with Hanoi is that there appeared to be competition between agencies on who was in charge of the Prime Minister's visit, with the unfortunate result that as many as three competing "official schedules" were floating about, and had to be consolidated at the last minute by Administration and US business counterparts.
4. Competition on the US side added to the confusion, apparently, as at least two US business groups vied with each other, and the visitors, for primacy...an example of the free enterprise system at work which may not inspire Hanoi to greater levels of coordination, it was privately noted. But Khai, diplomatically, met with both US groups, resolving at least the issue of hearing about their problems, if not who's #1.
-- and in any event, the White House knew what it wanted and it got it...agreement on cooperation on defense, and the war on terrorism, which was expected; agreement to officially exchange known or open intelligence officials in each embassy, which was not; and the two leaders "frankly" discussed the human and religious rights issues which continue to spark controversy in Congress, and in some street demonstrations here in Washington.
5. Khai went over to DOD for meetings with Secretary Rumsfeld and his brain trust, to consolidate the details on defense and intel cooperation agreed to at the White House. Observers with long memories note not just the various ironies of former adversaries in war now trying to be both friends and allies...but also the likely impact on China of today's events.
-- we recall from our own staff-level involvement in 1978, that then-Asst. Sec. State East Asia Dick Holbrooke had virtually completed normalization negotiations with Vietnam (just three years after the surrender of Saigon!) when China's paramount leader, Deng Xiao-ping, personally intervened and offered accelerated US-China normalization talks with a principle goal of blocking US-Vietnam ties.
6. Deng's gambit worked, and Chinese concerns about its traditional enemy have not been resolved, observers note...so the impact of the increasing US-Vietnam defense cooperation will likely be seen, in Beijing, as further evidence that "containment" of China is a very active US policy despite President Bush's personal diplomacy, etc.
Very interesting, to say the least.
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