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Will Vietnam
Embrace China After Trump Got Elected?
By Andre Vltchek
December 03, 2016
"Information
Clearing House"
- Common wisdom says that after Donald Trump got elected
in the United States, Vietnam should be in panic.
True, there could
be some ‘objective’ reasons for alarm, if one is truly
obsessed with the ‘free’ trade agreements.
The Trans-Pacific
Partnership may soon go to the dogs and at least one
sizeable part of the Vietnamese leadership was counting
on it, hoping that it would boost the economy,
particularly its garment and agricultural sectors.
However, Vietnam
is and always was tough, and on top of it, there are
many signs indicating that the public and many
government and Party heads are actually demanding a more
‘hardline’ Communist path, not just more business
activities.
Earlier this year,
the Secretary General of the Communist Party of Vietnam,
Nguyen Phu Trong, was re-elected, while Prime Minister
Nguyen Tan Dung was pushed from power. The Australian
Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) reported:
“Mr Dung was the
party’s strongest voice in denouncing Beijing and was
credited with Vietnam’s smooth accession to a US-led
Trans-Pacific Partnership.”
In brief: he was
one of the main local advocates of the pro-Western
foreign and economic policy, which was setting Vietnam
on a dangerous crash course with China. And he is gone…
After the recent
election results in the United States were announced,
Vietnam is set to move much closer towards both China
and Russia. President-elect Donald Trump’s
‘exceptionalist’ and often anti-Asian rhetoric is
already setting off alarm bells all over the region:
from Hanoi to Jakarta, and naturally from Manila to
Beijing.
*
Donald Trump is
now getting ready to murder the ‘Trans-Pacific
Partnership’ (the 12-nation trade pact). Vietnam, which
during the previous years developed (pragmatically) a
very close relationship with the Obama administration,
is watching nervously. Before the 12th National Congress
of the Communist Party earlier this year (and
particularly since a new Constitution was adopted in
2013), Vietnam introduced and passed around 100 new
laws, some described rightly or wrongly by Western
analysts as ‘pro-market economic reforms’.
Undeniably, some
in the Vietnamese leadership believed that their country
would be one of the main beneficiaries of the TPP.
There was even
some muted grumbling about the ‘growing strategic
relationship’ between Vietnam and the United States.
To impress the
West, particularly the United States, Hanoi kept
‘improving the business climate’, ‘easing its trade
regulations and yielding to various demands from Western
and Asian businesses and corporations.
Most alarmingly,
Hanoi’s confrontational stand towards China was changing
from rhetorical to ‘tangible’, after Vietnam began
expanding its runway – and according to Reuters and
other Western sources – after it began deploying several
rocket launchers in or near the disputed area in the
South China Sea.
*
To say that
‘Vietnam changed its basic positions opportunistically
and abruptly’ would be wrong. Even before the US
elections, Vietnam began ‘diversifying’ its foreign
policy.
Now Hanoi is
hoping for the deal that is being proposed by China: a
16-nation agreement called the Regional Comprehensive
Economic Partnership, which would include Vietnam and
the rest of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian
Nations, plus Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand
and India.
Relations between
Hanoi and Beijing have been rapidly improving. It is
becoming clear that Vietnam may be following the example
of the Philippines, backing off permanently from the
confrontational course with the most populous nation on
earth. Significantly, the top Vietnamese leadership
recently hosted the outspoken anti-imperialist President
of the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte. To quote Gary Sands
from the Foreign Policy Blogs:
“…While the
previous administration in Hanoi had angered Beijing by
seeking legal advice from Manila in order to potentially
file their own claim at The Hague, the new leadership
under Quang appears to be backing off confrontation with
Beijing, along with Manila. Any jointly-coordinated
legal or military effort between Hanoi and Manila
appears now to be out of the question for fear of
provoking the dragon next door, while we await the
outcome of hopefully peaceful bilateral negotiations.”
The ideological
stand of the Vietnamese leadership became clear
following the death of the Cuban leader Fidel Castro Ruz.
The country announced a day of mourning and Vietnam’s
government and Party officials delivered powerful
emotional revolutionary and internationalist speeches.
*
One major problem
is that the Western perspective has managed to kidnap
almost entirely the narrative on the country – the way
all major or minor developments in Vietnam are being
perceived and interpreted. This does not necessarily
apply to the Vietnamese people, although many of them
are actually also consuming Western propaganda at an
excessive rate. However, it definitely applies to how
the rest of the world understands (or misunderstands)
Vietnam.
The slowing down
of Doi Moi pro-market reforms is hardly addressed by
Western mass media. As they hardly address any social
changes in neighboring China. In Europe and the US it is
generally perceived that both countries are
determinately and happily embracing the market economy
concepts.
The reality
couldn’t be any farther from that. In China and in
Vietnam (although still more in China), the majority of
the population has been disappointed, even disgusted, by
capitalist practices. People are demanding the
re-introduction of essential socialist principles. In
China, under the leadership of President Xi, the
government is yielding to the people’s demands. It
appears that Vietnam is paying close attention to its
giant neighbor in the North, and is also willing to
reconsider its hard-core pro-market stands.
The people of
Vietnam may be hopeful, but they are not necessarily
content, in the cities and in the countryside. Life is
now better than two decades ago, but expectations are
also much higher. ‘Socialism Vietnam-style’ would most
likely be welcomed by the majority, and could be coming
soon!
Andre Vltchek is a
philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative
journalist. He has covered wars and conflicts in dozens
of countries. Three of his latest books are
revolutionary novel “Aurora”
and two bestselling works of political non-fiction: “Exposing
Lies Of The Empire”
and “Fighting
Against Western Imperialism”.
View his other books here. Andre is making films for
teleSUR and Al-Mayadeen. After having lived in Latin
America, Africa and Oceania, Vltchek presently resides
in East Asia and the Middle East, and continues to work
around the world. He can be reached through his website
and his
Twitter.
The views
expressed in this article are the author's own and do
not necessarily reflect Information Clearing House
editorial policy. |
