Flying Blind by Nguyen Vu Tung

Author:Nguyen Vu Tung
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: POL011000, JPS
Publisher: ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute
Published: 2021-02-10T00:00:00+00:00

THE AMERICAN CONNECTION

Some observers may have wondered whether Hanoi would use its membership of ASEAN to improve relations with the US, for the purpose of constructing indirect deterrence against Beijing. A 1992 report by the MOFA American Affairs Department seemed to provide evidence of this calculation. After stressing the predominant role of the US in the Asia-Pacific region in the aftermath of the Cold War and concluding that the “containment elements” had become more visible than the “engagement elements” in US China policy, the report stated: “to serve its interest in Southeast Asia, the US wants to maintain peace and stability in Southeast Asia as well as improve the region’s economic and political postures with a view to preventing any single superpower from dominating the region. Therefore, the US wants to accelerate the integration of the Indochinese countries into Southeast Asia and check Chinese expansion in the region, encourage improvements in the Vietnam-ASEAN relations and improve its own relations with Vietnam, Laos and Kampuchea.”131 The report then suggested:

Against this background, we have strategic interests in normalizing relations with the US. In the growing complicity of the situation due to China’s violation of our territorial integrity and expansionism in the East Sea, diversification of our foreign relations and normalization of relations between Vietnam and the US have become more urgent in order to rally force to check the Chinese expansionist schemes. Maintaining peace and stability and checking Chinese expansionism in Southeast Asia have become a matter of common interest between the US and Vietnam. The US therefore supports Vietnam to join ASEAN and integrate itself into the regional and international communities.132

Ambassador to the US Le Van Bang also said, “We should ‘make friends’ with all the superpowers, including the US and China, and welcome the US to contribute to peace, stability, and development in the region.”133 Le Van Bang even supported the exchange of military attachés as well as an increase in “military and security relations” between Hanoi and Washington following normalization of relations.134

Yet, Hanoi soon realized that a policy of seeking to rely on the US to help check China might not be feasible for a variety of reasons. In the first place, Washington attached a greater importance to improvements of Sino-US relations. A MOFA report on the November 1994 Seattle meeting between Clinton and Jiang Zemin in the framework of the APEC Summit (the first Sino-US Summit held after the Tiananmen Square incident) noted that both China and the US were readjusting their strategies and reducing tensions in the bilateral relationship. The US, according to the report, had encouraged Beijing to engage in the multilateral frameworks in the Asia-Pacific, which would serve as a means to accelerate China’s reforms and integration into the rest of the world, thus raising the costs of Chinese actions that would destabilize the region.135 The report also took note of the fact that during the meeting, Clinton and Jiang did not mention developments related to South China Sea and Vietnam and stated that, “President

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