Boring politics

[huy.duong@ctsu.ox.ac.uk]

Dear anh Buu Long,

This is my only message on this topic on VNSA.

Your question:
**************
<<<So, for wich reason had the Vietnamese leaders invaded Cambodia 1). Just 
to follow the order from theirSoviet "quantha^`y", or 2).To end the 
genocide in Cambodia and, meanwhile, to move the war from the 
Vietnam-Cambodia borders to the Cambodia-Thailand ones (less civilian 
loss)?, or on both reasons?>>>

Answers comes from asking good questions. Your question is flawed.
(2), as you listed, consists of two completely diffrent motives: humantiarian 
and military. Let me rephrase your question:

Was it (1) international communism or (2) humanitarian or (3) military?

Let look at the first possibility. Some Vietnamese claim that the leadership
in Hanoi is a tool of international communism. To me this is wrong and it
stops us from understanding the situation and look for solution. What is 
international communism? What was the relationship between China and the Soviet
Union? What was the relationship between the SU and Eastern Europe? What
was the relationship between Russia and other members of the SU? Was there an
international Communism? Sometimes people say Hanoi is a crony of Moscow.
Sometimes people say Hanoi is a crony of Beijing. Since Moscow and Beijing
have little love for each other and control of each other, these are nothing
more than Cold War rhetoric leftovers used as anti-communist propaganda.
In fact, Hanoi is certainly not a crony of Bejing. At the Geneva conference,
Zhou En Lai double crossed Hanoi and forced it to first accept the partition,
then the 17th parallel, then the long-term-ness of it. Hanoi's delegation
said `He has double crossed us'. After the Paris convention, Beijing
tried to dissuade Hanoi from trying to unify the country. Neither was Hanoi
a crony of Moscow. Moscow did not want a war in SEA (Kruschev especially did
not want to antagonise the US and China's antagonising the US over Taiwan
was a cause of the Mao-Kruschev split) and was extremely reluctant to give 
advanced weaponry to Hanoi despite persistent requests. Moscow only did it when 
the situation forced it to either do it or loose face. Please read Stanley 
Karnow's Vietnam A History, a Pultizer book.

To view Hanoi was a crony and the wars in SEA as international communist 
expansionism if a mistaken 50s view. There is no point for a Vietnamese to hang 
on to a mistaken view of America after 40 years. Hanoi has its own purposes
and is very wise and pragmatic in achieving its purposes.

Let's look at possibility (3). I remember by family selling the bed to buy
food in early 79. The buyer was a colonel in the People's Army of Vietnam. In
the chit chat, he said to my dad that Vietnam had to attack Cambodia or Vietnam 
will not survive. My mum's uncle, who was working in the Phu? Thu? Tu+o+'ng also 
said this. There was a possibility that Vietnam had to fight a war with two
fronts: China in the North and Cambodia in the South. Any good military man 
would have acted decisively to end the threat on one on the fronts. Bear in mind
that Pol Pot was extremely hostile. Armed clashes occured between the Khmer 
Rouge and Vietnamese forces in Cambodia even before 1975, when the Vietnamese
forces was helping them. And Pol Pot used to attack Vietnamese villages
and massacre civilians (the did the same to Thai villages too). When the 
Vietnamese attack, the KR crumbled. And one thing led to another. I don't
know if the Vietnamese's historical wish to dominate Indochina have
anything with it too. But I would say that it began with a military necessity.

China's invasion:
*****************
You have these superpowers who got -da' -di't by Vietnam and they go and find
excuses. America blamed all sorts of things. China said `Oh no, we had a long
term plan'. Nobody would admit that Vietnam gave them a bloody nose. And it's
sad that some Vietnamese themselves join in with the excuses for the foreigners.
Deng hated Vietnam. Read last week's Time. `The only time when I saw Deng
shaking with anger is when talking about the Vietnamese...'. The US vice pres
made a joke and Deng didn't even smile. The Chinese might have got
some of their ojectives, of course, but China is massive and it was supposed to 
be easy for them. It wasn't, and the paid dearly, even against the home guards,
not the chi'nh quy. They killed a lot of civilians to add to their body counts.
And Vietnam withdrew from Cambodia because of many things, NOT because of
Chinese military pressure. And before we say how wonderful the Chinese
are, why don't we try to remember what land the have taken from Vietnam when 
they were being wonderful? When will we stop thinking of the Chinese as
being the good guy because they attack other Vietnamese who are not on `our 
side'?

Huy