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Date:         Sat, 7 Nov 1992 19:56:00 EST
From:         "Carl A. Trocki" <CTROCKI@GUVAX.BITNET>
Subject: Re: US-Vietnam Normalization

Max's responses to my and Thang's notes suggests both a patronizing
and insulting tone.  Moreover, it is clear that he really doesn't
understand what is being said in many cases.
        The proof of the futility of isolation in the cases of
Vietnam, Cuba, N.Korea is self-evident.
        I can't believe there are people still alive in the 1990s
talking about "Soviet vassal states".  What exactly does that mean?
Do they send tribute?  Did the xUSSR choose their leaders?  Get off it
Max, these words don't mean anything.  Go back to Joe McCarthy.
        It strikes me that the cure for communism is capitalism.  Do
you think that "communism" can continue if a capitalist economy is
constructed?  Not even a Marxist would believe that is possible.
Anyway, I'm not sure that what they have in Vietnam is communism.  It
certainly is nothing like what Karl Marx had in mind.  What you have
is a party, an army and a lot of poor people without jobs and with
very few opportunities.  Foreign investment, foreign trade and
contacts between outsiders and Vietnamese will bring fundamental
changes to the society.
        I never said anything about us teaching the Vietnamese
anything.  I said that the Vietnamese will, through contact with other
people from other countries, realize that there are a vast range of
political, economic and social possibilities open to them.  So long as
we keep the door to contact shut, we are in fact colluding with the
Vietnamese government in isolating the people.  They are quite capable
of making their own decisions in their own time.  Freedom comes in
through the open door.
        Your view of China is quite short-sighted.  Our contact with
Beijing goes back to 1970.  Prior to that time, the PRC was a member
of the isolation ward.  The improvement that has taken place in the
past 22 years has been considerable.  The events of 1988 in Tien An
Men Square were terrible, but it takes a long time for a people to
gain their freedom.  We would not help the Chinese democrats by
slamming the door on them.  Tyranny, like family violence, flourishes
behind closed doors.  If the doors are open, oppression cannot
flouriish.  I think China is very good proof that constructive
engagement is far more effective than isolation.
        In the case of some places like Chile, Guatemala and Haiti -
the relationship maintained by the US has not been inadvertent.
Rather those who control our relations with those states have actually
colluded with the tyrants.  For people like Ronald Reagan and Jean
Kirkpatrick, it was okay to kill Indians and peasants and Blacks as
long as you called them communists.  By the way, it was that way in
South Vietnam before 1975.  It's still that way in Indonesia.  And,
anyone that the government kills was a communist.  I don't want to
jump to conclusions, but I hear that mentality in your remarks, Max.  I
don't think it's right to kill communists, or anti-communists.
        Finally, I think that it is in our, and the whole region's
intersts that Vietnam is recognized.  I think that there is serious
trouble brewing in the South China Sea over the Spratley/Paracels
issue.  China has made the most extra-ordinary claim to control of
virtually all of the South China SEa.  They know they can get away
with it, because no one will (meaning the US) will speak up for
Vietnam's interest and so long as Vietnam is isolated, there will be
no unity among the Southeast Asian countries that also have interests
in the seabed (Brunei, Philippines, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia).
So long as there is no unity, China can divide and conquer.  If,
however, China knows that Southeast Asian countries were united and
had support fromthe US, it would quickly come to terms.  But, as it
is, it is much easier for them to stake a claim and expand their
territory while the rest of us are occupied with fruitless dispute.
        Isolating Vietnam helps no one but the oppressors and adds to
confusion in the world.  Anyone who supports isolation only seeks
further conflict and increased bloodshed by innocent people.
                        Carl Trocki
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