In December 1986, the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV) implemented Đổi Mới (renovation), sparking market reforms nationwide. Yet the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) pursued more than fiscal improvement. At the conclusion of the Vietnamese Politburo’s report of the 6th Party Congress, Hanoi’s leadership wrote, “our government is ready to improve relations with America for the sake of peace and stability in Southeast Asia.”Footnote 1 Faced with global isolation from its invasion of Cambodia in December 1978 and a ruined economy from failed Socialist policies, the CPV needed to reform its domestic and foreign policies. The 6th Party Congress in December 1986 outlined monumental shifts in economic and foreign policy.Footnote 2 As the CPV pursued fiscal reform, it maintained the same diplomatic strategies toward the United States. The Politburo engaged in negotiating tactics to extract as much economic and political leverage as possible from the United States.
Washington viewed the changes espoused at the 6th Party Congress with skepticism. President Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of State, George Shultz, believed that the continued presence of senior advisors to the Politburo Phạm Văn Đồng, Trường Chinh, and Lê Đức Thọ indicated that the old guard “will continue to wield considerable power.”Footnote 3 The “old guard” still maintained consultative roles in decision-making. However, Đồng was seen as a moderate, while Trường Chinh was considered a reformer by many members of the CPV. Thọ’s influence in the party was slowly being sidelined, despite his years of organizing the party to his favor. By 1986, he had allegedly fallen afoul of the longtime General Secretary Lê Duẩn.Footnote 4 When the time came to elect new leadership for the CPV, most high-ranking members supported Nguyễn Văn Linh as the new General Secretary, replacing Chinh, who had taken over the role after Lê Duẩn’s death in July 1986.
As bilateral diplomacy remained sluggish, the Reagan administration adopted a new approach to streamline negotiations. In early 1987, Reagan named former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General John Vessey, as the special emissary to Hanoi. Washington hoped Vessey’s appointment would advance exchanges related to the Prisoners of War (POW)/Missing in Action (MIA) issue. That is, cooperation in accounting for missing American servicemen. Over time, negotiations encompassed the resettlement of Amerasians and former Vietnamese political prisoners who endured harsh reeducation camps.
A significant obstruction in genuine economic and diplomatic exchanges was the SRV’s occupation of Cambodia. Thus, Hanoi’s leadership faced the conundrum of desperately needing economic growth and diplomatic recognition by the United States while also maintaining its support for a failed foreign policy. For the United States and the SRV to normalize diplomatic relations, Vietnam would need to relinquish control of Cambodia.
The process of US–SRV normalization has most commonly been examined by scholarship that focuses on the late 1970s. Historians often overlook or ignore US–Vietnam diplomacy in the years immediately following Đổi Mới, creating a gap in the history of their bilateral relations.Footnote 5 Where US–SRV diplomacy has been examined in the context of Đổi Mới, scholarship generally depicts an improvement in ties without describing how those improvements occurred through on-the-ground negotiations.Footnote 6 A comprehensive history of Đổi Mới’s impact on the US–SRV normalization process remains elusive.
Using archival material from the Reagan administration and Vietnamese-language sources, this article examines the policy positions and diplomatic negotiations between Washington and Hanoi from the initiation of Đổi Mới in December 1986 to the end of Reagan’s presidency, focusing on exchanges on humanitarian issues and the establishment of diplomatic ties. It fills gaps in scholarship that overlook three crucial factors in US–Vietnamese diplomacy during the late 1980s. First, while the CPV leadership did decrease its rhetoric criticizing Washington, it was slow to alter its diplomacy with the United States. The SRV continued the same negotiating tactics it had used during and since the Vietnam War, attempting to extract as many economic and political concessions from the United States as possible by leveraging the POW/MIA issue as a bargaining chip.Footnote 7 Second, the Reagan administration took concrete steps to showcase its seriousness about negotiations. General Vessey, with combat experience in World War II and the Vietnam War, appealed to high-ranking Vietnamese officials, who were impressed by soldiers who rose through the ranks. Hanoi’s leadership viewed the presidential emissary as proof of the administration’s desire to hold higher-level talks. To be sure, Reagan did not create Vessey’s position as a result of Đổi Mới. Archival records show that policymakers considered establishing a presidential emissary in the summer of 1986. Vessey’s appointment as Washington’s lead negotiator reflected a US effort to streamline and anchor negotiations through a single diplomatic channel.
Finally, advances in US–SRV relations stemming from Đổi Mới and Vessey’s inclusion in negotiations occurred amid decreased Cold War tensions. Soviet reconciliation with the United States is crucial to understanding the moderation of Vietnam’s policies toward Washington in the final years of Reagan’s administration. The Soviet Union was key to pressuring the SRV to honor its promise to withdraw from Cambodia. In almost every meeting between American and Vietnamese diplomats, Hanoi’s representatives reassured their American counterparts that their occupation of Cambodia would end soon. Although the Vietnamese withdrawal would not occur until a year after Reagan’s presidency, archival records suggest that Washington was well aware of the approaching conclusion of the Third Indochina War.Footnote 8
Official normalization remained elusive throughout the remainder of Reagan’s presidency. Still, the post-Đổi Mới years saw significant unofficial progress toward that outcome. Without Hanoi and Washington maintaining dialog, normalization could have occurred even later than it did. I am not implying a counter-factual; instead, as historian Amanda Demmer accurately notes, the United States and Vietnam conducted an immense number of diplomatic exchanges by the late 1980s.Footnote 9 This paper shows that the most crucial element in improving relations during this period was including Vessey in negotiations. This period of diplomatic activity fostered an atmosphere in which supporters of normalization, particularly in the United States, eventually succeeded in persuading President Bill Clinton to establish diplomatic ties with Vietnam in 1995. In sum, this article adds a layer of nuance to US–SRV diplomacy in the post-Vietnam War period.
Missed opportunities and slow negotiations (1975–1986)
The ten years following the fall of Saigon were marked by missed opportunities to normalize relations and sustain high-level talks. One of the clearest examples surrounded Hanoi’s demand that the United States pay it ＄3.25 billion to compensate for the war’s wounds. US presidents from Nixon through Carter refused to provide aid because Hanoi failed to abide by the Paris Peace Accords. When Hanoi finally dropped its aid demand in late 1978, the conditions for normalization had changed. The United States aligned with the People’s Republic of China (PRC), while the SRV formed an alliance with the Soviet Union. The final nail in the coffin of US–SRV normalization in the 1970s was Vietnam’s invasion and subsequent occupation of Cambodia in December 1978.Footnote 10 Carter asserted that the United States could not establish diplomatic ties until Vietnam withdrew its troops from Cambodia and signed a peace agreement ending the war. This condition set a precedent that his successors maintained.
President Reagan centered the POW/MIA issue as the guiding component of US–SRV bilateral relations. It would have been no surprise had Reagan formulated a hardline policy toward the SRV since he had been a strong anti-communist and had stuck doggedly to his support for the US military intervention in Vietnam when most Americans had come to see it as a mistake. He criticized his predecessors’ attempts to normalize relations with Vietnam, blamed Congress for failing to send economic support to South Vietnam in its time of need in the spring of 1975, and famously called the war a “noble cause” for the United States.Footnote 11
The most critical component of Reagan’s Vietnam policy was his support for POW/MIA accounting. When he was running for president in 1976 and 1980, Reagan promised the National League of POW/MIA Families, led by Ann Mills-Griffiths, that he would pursue a full accounting of American soldiers still in Vietnam.Footnote 12 Griffiths joined the POW/MIA Interagency group, becoming highly involved in US–SRV diplomacy. As historian Michael Allen contends, “Reagan was consumed by the thought of captive Americans.”Footnote 13 Movies such as Missing in Action and Rambo depicted efforts to retrieve US soldiers left behind in Vietnam, contributing to the narrative that Hanoi still imprisoned American POWs. Despite his harsh rhetoric against Vietnam, Reagan’s embrace of the POW/MIA issue, and eventually the resettlement of former reeducation camp prisoners and Amerasians, strengthened US–SRV ties.
The Reagan administration was largely consistent in its policy toward Vietnam. During his first year in office, National Security Advisor Richard Allen wrote that the current policies in Indochina were to convince the SRV to withdraw its soldiers from Cambodia, see Cambodia and Laos independent of Hanoi’s influence, reduce Moscow’s presence in the region, and strengthen Washington’s regional alliance, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Reagan had succeeded in furthering many of those objectives by the end of his presidency.
The Reagan administration intensified its diplomatic efforts with Vietnam in 1982. In February, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Armitage visited Vietnam to rekindle negotiations pertaining to accounting of POWs and MIAs. This visit marked the first serious diplomatic effort between the two countries in four years. Although the Armitage delegation asserted that normalization was a separate issue from POW/MIA accounting, he hoped that the visit would lead to a “spirit of cooperation and cordiality” between both countries.Footnote 14 Over the next four years, US officials, led chiefly by National Security Council official Richard Childress and Griffiths, and Vietnamese diplomats under the direction of Foreign Minister Nguyễn Cơ Thạch, convened repeatedly to address a wide range of bilateral concerns.
These negotiations often failed to produce long-term agreements. Much of this stemmed from the SRV’s sensitivity to criticism and its confidence in its foreign policy objectives. The CPV remained tethered to its ideological worldview and perceived superior negotiating position. Hanoi halted POW/MIA talks over minor disputes, such as not receiving enough praise from the Reagan administration for its cooperation on humanitarian problems.Footnote 15 As Colonel Paul Mathers, who partook in the United States search for MIAs from the 1970s to the late 1980s, recalled, the Vietnamese were highly sensitive to any action or word from the United States that they perceived as antagonistic. They were ready “to withhold their cooperation at the first drop of a critical word.”Footnote 16 Vietnam often linked issues, including normalization and Washington’s poor efforts to create a “favorable atmosphere,” with their collaboration on the POW/MIA issue.Footnote 17 Hanoi’s negotiating tactics slowed down diplomatic progress and increased frustration in the Reagan administration.
The CPV often blamed regional crises on US imperialism. For example, when describing the exodus of Vietnamese from the SRV in 1981, Hanoi’s leadership asserted that the United States was “inciting people to flee abroad by land, in order to create an unstable political situation in our country.”Footnote 18 The Politburo’s accusation was outlandish, given that Washington engaged with Hanoi and the United Nations to stem the exodus. The large displacement of people from Vietnam stemmed from persecution by the communist party and failed Socialist policies. In 1984, Party officials blamed Vietnam’s economic difficulties on “the embargo, blockade and sabotage policies of American Imperialism.”Footnote 19 As Prime Minister Phạm Văn Đồng stated in an interview with Time, “the Americans are morally and materially responsible for Vietnam.”Footnote 20 Rather than admit to the failings of their monetary policies, Vietnam shifted the blame onto the United States.
Hanoi’s diplomatic posturing and condemnation of the Reagan administration occurred against the backdrop of the Third Indochina War, which saw the United States and PRC support non-communist and communist Cambodian militias to resist the Vietnamese and Soviet backed People’s Republic of Kampuchea (PRK). Reagan continued Carter’s policy of aiding anti-PRK factions, including the Khmer Rouge, becoming a significant component of the Reagan Doctrine.Footnote 21 By 1985, the administration supported nearly half a dozen anti-Soviet resistance groups.Footnote 22 At the same time, Reagan pursued diplomacy with US adversaries to mitigate actions that seemed counterproductive, thereby reducing Cold War tension.
Hanoi’s leadership closely monitored the dialog between Washington and Moscow. Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev began their détente with their first meeting in Geneva in November 1985. After Gorbachev made his landmark speech at Vladivostok in July 1986, Chairman of the Council of State Trường Chinh declared that the CPV “warmly welcomes and responds to the important strategic initiatives” that pertained to Asia.Footnote 23 Vietnam’s approval of Gorbachev’s speech is not surprising, considering the Soviet leader maintained that the Third Indochina War was an “affair of two sovereign governments.”Footnote 24 In practical terms, the SRV depended entirely on Moscow, which had spent the last decade subsidizing Vietnam’s economy.
The Third Indochina War drained Vietnam, and by extension the Soviet Union, of its resources. Even after Hanoi’s leadership announced in August 1985 that it would withdraw all PAVN soldiers from Cambodia by 1990, Moscow continued its propaganda along the same lines.Footnote 25 In numerous meetings between Shultz and his Soviet counterpart Eduard Shevardnadze, the latter blamed the United States for Vietnam’s economic situation and claimed that Washington should accept Vietnam’s occupation of Cambodia.Footnote 26 Moscow’s position on the war and its support for Hanoi occurred amid its adverse relations with the PRC. Until there was a reshaping of Cold War geopolitical relations, the Third Indochina War remained a sticking point in US–SRV diplomacy.
By 1986, Hanoi’s leadership faced a dire economic situation. As journalist Huy Đức describes, after another failed currency devaluation, inflation reached 600%, production fell, and people went hungry as they were forced to sell their products for less than their actual value.Footnote 27 The Politburo was aware of the dire situation the country faced. From 1982 to 1986, Trường Chinh gradually laid a “theoretical foundation to explain reality and begin innovation.”Footnote 28
The key to CPV pursuing this innovation was the death of General Secretary Lê Duẩn in July 1986. Trường Chinh was elected to lead the CPV. He quickly sought approval from Gorbachev, who, upon listening to Truòng Chinh’s planned reforms for Vietnam, said “there are ways in which you comrades have gone further than us.”Footnote 29 At the 6th Party Congress in December 1986, the CPV affirmed its support of Gorbachev’s Vladivostok speech, seemingly approving of the Cold War de-escalation pursued by Washington and Moscow. The day before Lê Duẩn’s death, the Politburo issued Resolution 32, which linked the resolution of the war in Cambodia to Hanoi’s desire to normalize relations with Beijing. Resolution 32 represented a significant turning point in Vietnam’s foreign policy. It signaled its desire to reconcile with its northern neighbor, with which it had been embroiled in a half-decade-long border war.Footnote 30 On US–SRV relations, the Politburo noted that the “government continues to discuss with America to solve humanitarian problems left by the war.”Footnote 31
The ten-year period following the fall of Saigon saw Hanoi attempt to control the pace and issues that guided US–SRV diplomacy. The Politburo had refused to accept Carter’s offer to normalize relations in 1977. They frequently opened and closed negotiations with the Reagan administration over trivial grievances. It remained to be seen whether the post-Đổi Mới discussions would break the foreign policy Hanoi’s leadership employed toward the United States.
Higher-level talks (1987)
The Reagan administration did not wait to see if Hanoi would moderate its posturing toward the United States. Instead, it planned to streamline high-level talks through the creation of a presidential emissary. The person chosen for this position was General John Vessey, whose inclusion marked a pivotal moment in the history of bilateral relations. US policymakers had begun to consider the establishment of a special position to deal with the POW/MIA issue back in October 1986. They considered several options to reenergize diplomacy with the SRV. One idea was to form a presidential commission similar to the one Leonard Woodcock had led on Carter’s behalf in 1977.Footnote 32 As National Security Council official Childress recalls, he offered several names to National Security Advisor John Poindexter, including Robert ‘Bud’ McFarlane and William Clark Jr. However, with the fallout from the Iran-Contra scandal, no one on Childress’s list was chosen. Griffiths then suggested General John Vessey, who had retired as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1985.Footnote 33
In February 1987, Reagan asked Vessey to be Washington’s “special envoy in Hanoi in order to advance our discussions” about POW/MIA affairs.Footnote 34 The lack of progress in US–SRV negotiations and the 6th Party Congress delayed Reagan’s announcement of the initiative for several months.Footnote 35 On February 24, Vietnam’s chargé d’affaires in Thailand, Lê Anh Kiệt, expressed his government’s frustration to Washington’s Ambassador to Thailand, William Brown. Kiệt explained that, despite years of cooperation on humanitarian issues, the United States failed to provide any political reciprocity. The SRV rejected Childress’s proposal to visit Hanoi. From his conversation with Kiệt, Brown deduced two points. First, Hanoi expected higher-level negotiations. Second, Vietnam once again sought a linkage between normalization and humanitarian issues.Footnote 36
The first issue was easy enough to address. The Reagan administration was preparing to advance its POW/MIA objectives through Vessey. Up to that point, Childress and Griffiths were the central figures representing the United States in negotiations. While they still took part in talks, adding Vessey gave Hanoi the optics that Reagan was upgrading the level of diplomacy. American policymakers hoped that Childress would introduce the idea of a presidential emissary on his next visit to Vietnam. An active, developing dialog is key to any normalization process. Vessey’s inclusion showed that talks were advancing.
The Vessey initiative marked a pivotal moment in the history of US–SRV relations. The Reagan administration’s decision to appoint Vessey as the vanguard for most US–SRV diplomatic exchanges provided consistency to negotiations. Two Vietnamese scholars label Vessey as the “catalyst” who advanced cooperation on issues left over by the war.Footnote 37 Many of his contemporaries across multiple presidential administrations remember him as an effective negotiator with the Vietnamese.Footnote 38 Vessey understood when to remain firm with Vietnamese negotiators and when a concession was necessary.
The recurring issue of linkage, however, was a non-starter for US officials. Secretary of State Shultz wrote to the Vietnamese that the matters of political and humanitarian concern were separate. He warned that the progress made in POW/MIA accounting over the past several years would be disrupted if Hanoi maintained the mindset that there were any linkages at all. Shultz alluded to Vessey’s inclusion when he wrote to Hanoi that the Childress delegation “wishes to discuss and lay the groundwork for a new initiative in order to accelerate cooperation” on the POW/MIA issue.Footnote 39
Hanoi rejected Shultz’s accusation that it was linking normalization with humanitarian issues. Instead, Kiệt maintained that “the United States refused to make its commitment to create a favorable atmosphere for” resolving the POW/MIA issue.Footnote 40 US diplomats clearly saw that Hanoi wanted a reward for its cooperation. Yet, the Reagan administration maintained its position that the United States would only consider diplomatic reciprocity in the context of a resolution to the ongoing conflict in Cambodia and sustained cooperation on the POW/MIA issue. Shultz’s hints at a new US initiative excited the Vietnamese, who pressed US officials in Thailand for details. Kiệt signaled that Hanoi had changed its mind and would approve of Childress’s delegation to visit the SRV.Footnote 41
Childress laid the groundwork for his visit to Vietnam when he met Vietnam’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Bùi Xuân Nhật, in April 1987. Childress thanked Nhật for his country’s willingness to proceed with the Vessey initiative. He explained that the origin of a presidential emissary for POW/MIA affairs stemmed from the lack of progress on the issue. More than anything, Childress wanted to get across to Nhật that the purpose of Vessey’s future visit was specifically humanitarian in nature.Footnote 42 The degree to which the Reagan administration emphasized the de-linkage between diplomatic normalization and POW/MIA cooperation suggests how much the idea of diplomatic relations was on the minds of US and Vietnamese officials.
Childress and Griffiths visited Hanoi from May 26 to 28. Childress recalled that the delegation “was treated to a hostile diatribe and an obstinacy never before encountered.”Footnote 43 The Vietnamese side, led by Foreign Ministry officer Đặng Nghiêm Bái and First Deputy Foreign Minister Đinh Nho Liêm, listed a litany of complaints, such as the lack of assistance with POW/MIA accounting and in helping alleviate Vietnam’s humanitarian concerns, US–Thailand military exercises, and various statements critical of Vietnam’s domestic and foreign policies. Bái and Liêm carefully attempted to link their country’s grievances with greater political concessions from the United States. They stated, “if you cannot discuss Cambodia or your policies toward the PRC, Thailand, or ASEAN in connection with any humanitarian issues,” the Vessey initiative was likely to fail. When the American delegation pointed to the linkage, Bái and Liêm denied their attempts to broaden negotiations. Childress and Griffiths received “no solid confirmation by Vietnam of its willingness to deal constructively” with Vessey’s proposed agenda. Because the Vietnamese representatives had yet to show they understood the distinction between humanitarian and political concerns, the Americans could not recommend that Vessey undertake his mission.Footnote 44
During his visit, Childress formally proposed the Vessey initiative by passing a letter from National Security Advisor Frank Carlucci to Foreign Minister Thạch. In his letter, Carlucci acknowledged the concerns Hanoi’s leadership had expressed in recent exchanges and reaffirmed that the Reagan administration would “seriously consider them and respond where possible,” assuming no linkages between the issues.Footnote 45 At the end of June, Thạch responded to Carlucci by agreeing that Vietnam would host Vessey. Thạch affirmed his government’s position that it would not link humanitarian and political issues.Footnote 46 Despite similar promises in the past and the May delegation’s skepticism about Hanoi’s seriousness, the administration took Thạch at his word, and both sides agreed that Vessey would visit Vietnam in early August.Footnote 47
From August 1 to 3, 1987, Vessey led a delegation to Hanoi to reenergize POW/MIA negotiations. He was largely successful. Thạch agreed that Vietnam would continue holding expert-level meetings to resolve cases of missing American service members. When Thạch asked how the United States could show reciprocity to assist Vietnam’s humanitarian problems, Vessey responded that “the United States could not and would not attempt to solve Vietnam’s problems stemming from the war.” However, he proposed that the United States would send prosthetic specialists to Vietnam to assist with the problem of disabled war veterans. Along with its own 300,000 missing soldiers, Vietnam had a staggering 1.4 million disabled soldiers and civilians after the war.Footnote 48 Both sides agreed that logistical meetings about POW/MIA accounting and disabled Vietnamese veterans would occur at the end of August. Overall, Thạch understood the conditions to normalize diplomatic relations with the United States. In a private meeting with Vessey, Thạch shared that Vietnamese forces would withdraw from the PRK by the end of the decade and that Washington should be involved in any political settlement in Cambodia.Footnote 49
Vessey also carried a letter from Reagan meant for the Chairman of the State Council, Võ Chí Công. The US president asked the SRV for “mutual humanitarian cooperation” to “finally put the war behind us.”Footnote 50 In Công’s response to Reagan, he confirmed the productivity of Vessey’s conversations with Thạch and appreciated the reciprocity that Washington had shown Hanoi.Footnote 51 The Vessey mission had resembled that led by Leonard Woodcock a decade earlier for President Carter. This time, Vessey would stay in his position to maintain continuity in talks.
The success of the Vessey-Thạch meeting stemmed from, as historian Robert Schulzinger describes, both sides dealing with “concrete practicalities.”Footnote 52 The first Vessey mission to the SRV revealed two significant characteristics of US–Vietnamese diplomacy. The Vietnamese were frustrated with the Childress-level meetings and the lack of political incentive. They desperately wanted an end to the embargo that was undermining the credibility of the CPV. Vessey’s appointment as Reagan’s emissary demonstrated to Hanoi that the United States sought to elevate the level of dialog. Second, Thạch’s comments to Vessey in the private meeting reassured Americans that Hanoi understood the conditions for normalizing diplomatic relations.
The United States did not engage in discussions about the Third Indochina War with Vietnam. Instead, it chose to do so with the Soviet Union. When Shultz and Foreign Minister Shevardnadze met in April 1987, the Secretary of State raised the issue of Vietnam’s presence in Cambodia. Shevardnadze rebuffed Shultz’s viewpoint by claiming that, without Vietnam’s invasion, the Cambodian people would not exist.Footnote 53 Although Shevardnadze was not wrong that Hanoi had ended a brutal regime that caused the death of two million Cambodians, the exchange revealed just how much Moscow supported Hanoi’s occupation of its neighbor.
To be sure, Hanoi and Moscow’s strategic interests in supporting the former’s occupation were becoming more fragile. During both Shevardnadze’s visit to Hanoi in March and General Secretary Nguyễn Văn Linh’s visit to Moscow in May, the Soviets questioned the Vietnamese about their plans to withdraw from Cambodia and their efforts to seek a settlement. Although Moscow and Hanoi signed additional economic agreements during Linh’s visit, Soviet officials indicated that they were closely monitoring Vietnam’s actions.Footnote 54
It did not help that Vietnam was struggling to reconcile with the PRC. Beijing’s leadership rejected reconciliation, citing the absence of a settlement in Cambodia. They demanded that the CPV talk directly with the Khmer resistance factions to reach a political resolution. Yet, Hanoi continued to decline direct negotiations with the coalition forces since they included the Khmer Rouge.Footnote 55
Exchanges between US and Vietnamese officials following the Vessey mission saw two continuities in Vietnam’s diplomatic approach. After the prosthetic team arrived in Vietnam at the end of August, the Vietnamese complicated the purpose behind the visit. In an exchange of letters between Thạch and Vessey, the SRV attempted to broaden the visit’s purpose to focus on “urgent humanitarian concerns,” rather than explicitly addressing the issue of prosthetics.Footnote 56
Another illustration of Hanoi’s double standard was its complaints about US statements critical of the SRV. At the end of September 1987, Vessey met with Vietnam’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Nguyễn Dy Niên, in New York to assess the progress of agreements made at the August meetings. Niên expressed anger at a Voice of America broadcast that claimed Hanoi knew more about POWs/MIAs than it was letting on. Several months earlier, Niên told journalists that the United States maintained a hostile attitude toward Vietnam and needed to “respond to Vietnam’s war-related problems if it wants help in locating American remains.”Footnote 57 Vessey, pointing out that the SVR government organs frequently criticized the United States for its lack of support for Vietnam’s issues, recommended that both sides decrease their verbal attacks.Footnote 58 The exchange represented an oft-used tactic by Hanoi to control the pace of negotiations.
December 1987 marked the one-year anniversary of the 6th Party Congress. The most significant developments in US–SRV relations stemmed from Vessey’s appointment as presidential emissary and Washington’s offering to support a prosthetics program in Vietnam. Since September, two groups of prosthetics experts had visited Vietnam to address the needs of wounded Vietnamese from the war. When National Security official Childress met with Vietnam’s UN Embassy official, Nguyễn Bình Thanh, in December, Thanh accused the United States of avoiding “its responsibility to respond to Vietnam’s compelling humanitarian problems.” Although both sides agreed that talks on humanitarian concerns would continue in January, Undersecretary of State John Whitehead commented that the meeting followed the “pattern of similar routine discussions in the past.”Footnote 59
Hanoi’s frustration occurred in the context of its ongoing occupation of Cambodia. As historian Phương Nguyễn explains, “although ending the country’s international isolation was seen as essential for the success of Đổi Mới, foreign policy changes toward this end came only slowly because of both the CPV’s ideological inertia and the early emphasis of Đổi Mới on domestic” reforms.Footnote 60 Still, the pressure to remove its troops from Cambodia was slowly increasing. When Shultz and Shevardnadze met in December, in a complete pivot from earlier in the year, the Soviet foreign minister informed the Secretary of State that Moscow was “using its influence in Hanoi to press for a negotiated political settlement.”Footnote 61
Much of Gorbachev’s policy shift stemmed from Moscow’s efforts to improve relations with Beijing. By the end of 1987, Sino-Soviet talks had resumed, with both sides seeking to resolve issues related to the Third Indochina War, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and the presence of Soviet troops along China’s northern border.Footnote 62 While both sides made progress in the latter two issues, the major obstacle was Vietnam’s presence in Cambodia. Gorbachev likely felt the time had come to press Hanoi’s leadership to seriously consider a political settlement. Since the SRV’s occupation of Cambodia was totally reliant on Moscow’s material support, Hanoi’s leadership felt pressure from its strongest ally to inch toward compromise. Hanoi’s recognition of the changing geopolitical landscape gradually shifted its diplomacy with the United States toward a more conciliatory approach.
US–SRV diplomacy in 1987 laid a strong foundation for both sides to maintain momentum into 1988. Exchanges were tangible, and relations were moving in the right direction, as evidenced by the Reagan administration’s offer of humanitarian assistance to Vietnam. Both sides continued to hold regular POW/MIA and prosthetic experts meetings.Footnote 63 The early successes of the Vessey initiative signaled a favorable conclusion for Reagan’s Vietnam policy.
The Vessey initiative’s success (1988)
In 1988, Vessey had been in his position as presidential emissary for one year. The high-level meetings in 1988 between Vessey and his counterparts in Hanoi showed why he was such a successful negotiator with the Vietnamese. He kept talks focused, grounded in practical exchanges, and ensured that Hanoi had agency in its own decision-making. Early in the year, Hanoi expressed frustration that Reagan’s plan to facilitate humanitarian assistance through NGOs was insufficient. Thạch said “there must some [aid] from the government.”Footnote 64 American officials recognized that despite Vietnam’s criticisms of US support, Hanoi could not reject the relief it received.
The administration had broadened the scope of bilateral exchanges so much that groups such as Việt kiều (Vietnamese living abroad) and POW/MIA activists hoped the United States would show restrained reciprocity toward Vietnam. Dr. Phan Quang Đán, who had served as a deputy prime minister in Nguyễn Văn Thiệu’s government, wrote to executive officials that further US assistance to the SRV would only consolidate and strengthen the CPV.Footnote 65 Others pushed for stronger ties. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) introduced legislation in March that would have established interest sections in both capitals.Footnote 66 McCain, who had spent over five years in captivity during the Vietnam War, was quickly becoming one of Congress’s most prominent advocates of closer US–SRV relations. Supporters of the bill referenced two reasons in favor of interest sections. The first stemmed from results in POW/MIA accounting. In the first four months of 1988, the Vietnamese repatriated 44 remains.Footnote 67 Although it was later discovered that many of the remains showed signs that they had been held in storage, American proponents hoped that interest sections would decrease Hanoi’s dependence on the Soviet Union, which still accounted for over 60% of Vietnam’s trade.Footnote 68
Vietnam became even more optimistic about US concessions when Vessey wrote to Thạch that the administration would “broaden the scope of our activity to address” child disability in the SRV.Footnote 69 In early June 1988, Vessey and Thạch met again in New York to reinforce the momentum that appeared to be building between the 2 countries. Thạch agreed to expand joint POW/MIA activities to include investigations and surveys of crash sites, rather than just excavations. It helped that in July, Vietnam had sent the United States the remains of 25 American soldiers in one of the largest repatriations since the end of the war. Vessey also promised Thạch that he would look into his request that Vietnam receive food assistance from the United States.Footnote 70
The pace of US–SRV cooperation accelerated significantly after Thạch and Vessey met in June. American and Vietnamese officials made a breakthrough when they agreed that thousands of released reeducation camp prisoners could resettle in the United States.Footnote 71 In 1988, thousands of Vietnamese, who had been detained in camps after the war without due process, were released.Footnote 72 Both countries maintained the momentum when Vessey and Thạch agreed to joint investigations throughout the remainder of the year. By the end of the summer of 1988, there was an upswing in US–SRV exchanges.
If the Vietnamese government had anticipated receiving interest sections soon and a sharp improvement in relations with the United States, it was quickly disappointed. In July, Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of East Asia and Pacific Affairs Gaston Sigur testified before Congress, stating the administration’s formal position on interest sections. He explained that the creation of reciprocal interest sections would not “contribute either to improving US-SRV humanitarian cooperation or toward advancing the search for peace in Cambodia.” However, Sigur concluded his statement that the United States looks “forward to the time when we will be able to enter into normal diplomatic and commercial relations with Vietnam.”Footnote 73
The reaction from Hanoi’s leadership implied they had only heard the administration’s opposition to interest sections, not Sigur’s optimistic outlook at the end. Thạch wrote to Vessey that Vietnam was suspending joint-POW/MIA operations and further discussions on the resettlement of Vietnamese political prisoners.Footnote 74 The SRV implemented its oft-used tactic of halting diplomatic engagements to extract greater concessions. Last time this happened, Vietnam stalled negotiations for over ten months. Fortunately, Vietnam backed down quickly, with Thạch stating at the end of August that joint activities could resume. Previous agreements about Vietnamese political prisoners, however, remained on hold.Footnote 75
It is unclear why Hanoi’s leadership resumed cooperating so quickly. Pressures from the Soviet Union and the situation in Cambodia likely compelled the SRV to avoid a repeat of past diplomatic suspensions with the United States. In July, Soviet Foreign Minister Shevardnadze informed US Ambassador to Moscow, Jack Matlock, that he would send a letter to Thạch “requesting full cooperation in the US search for missing POWs.”Footnote 76 Soviet pressure on the Vietnamese in the late 1980s was reminiscent of the periods in 1954 and 1972, when Moscow encouraged Hanoi to soften its hardline diplomatic posture.
Another instance that underscored the profound shifts underway in the Soviet-Vietnamese alliance occurred when Shevardnadze vocalized to Thạch during a meeting in August that withdrawing Vietnamese troops from Cambodia was necessary to achieve peace in the region.Footnote 77 The exchange was the first time that Soviet officials explicitly outlined the requirement that Vietnam needed to alter its foreign policy objectives. After meeting with Thạch in September 1988, Shevardnadze traveled to Washington. The Soviet foreign minister informed Shultz that Thạch believed US–SRV relations were “ripe for progress” and that the Vietnamese understood the importance of cooperating with Washington on POW/MIA accounting.Footnote 78 That same month, Vietnamese and American POW/MIA experts achieved another feat when they participated in the first joint survey and investigation. The United States underwrote the costs of these operations, including food, lodging, transportation, and communications equipment.Footnote 79
With the US and Soviet reconciliation and several opposing Cambodian factions working toward a resolution to the Third Indochina War, Beijing’s leadership felt the situation was no longer favorable to exploit U–Soviet divisions and bleed Vietnam.Footnote 80 China began to decrease its support for the Khmer Rouge. In December, Chinese officials invited Vietnamese diplomats to the PRC to begin an exchange of views.Footnote 81 While PRC leader Deng Xiaoping, who had overseen China’s war against Vietnam for over a decade, linked the withdrawal of Hanoi’s troops from Cambodia to Sino-Soviet normalization, he was satisfied with Gorbachev’s efforts to pressure the SRV for a military withdrawal.Footnote 82
General Vessey met with Vice Foreign Minister Trần Quang Cơ in October. Cơ doubled down on the position that reeducation camp prisoners could not resettle in the United States. Both sides admitted that overall progress since the Vessey–Thạch meeting in August 1987 had not progressed as quickly as anticipated. When Cơ pressed Vessey for further US assistance to reciprocate Vietnam’s POW/MIA cooperation, he replied that Washington was picking up the pace on its end. True to his word, shortly after the meeting, large piles of medical supplies arrived in Vietnam.Footnote 83 Foreign Minister Thạch wrote to Vessey in November, thanking him and the US government for their “timely concerns” about Vietnam’s humanitarian problem. Thạch even suggested that discussions about reeducation camp detainees could continue.Footnote 84 They would continue under Reagan’s successor, George H.W. Bush.
Reagan’s final National Security Decision Directive on US policy toward Indochina reflected Washington’s and Hanoi’s progress on bilateral issues in recent years. National Security Advisor Colin Powell wrote that “accelerated progress on United States bilateral humanitarian issues with Vietnam provides increased opportunities for the United States to exercise its influence to achieve an acceptable political settlement in Cambodia.” The Reagan administration felt that the number of exchanges in other areas gave Washington the ability to take a greater role in resolving the conflict. Powell wrote that “a more active United States posture to influence events is now warranted.”Footnote 85 The steadfastness of American negotiators such as Childress, Griffiths, and Vessey in avoiding discussions of the Third Indochina War proved successful. By pursuing détente with the Soviet Union and remaining firm against political concessions, the United States compelled Vietnam to modify its rigid foreign policy. In his farewell address, Reagan proudly announced the achievement that Vietnamese troops would soon leave Cambodia; a development he helped facilitate.Footnote 86
Conclusion
Several conclusions about US–SRV diplomacy can be drawn from the exchanges from the 6th Party Congress in 1986 to the end of Reagan’s presidency in 1988. First, a change in CPV leadership in December 1986 did not immediately alter Vietnam’s diplomatic and negotiating strategies with the United States. Vietnam’s ongoing occupation of Cambodia and stop-and-go dialog seriously hindered efforts to upgrade its relations with the United States. Only when Vietnamese troops withdrew from Cambodia and a political settlement was reached could the United States take further steps to strengthen various ties.
Another pressure point for the SRV came from reduced tensions after the Sino-Soviet Split and widespread reconciliation between the Cold War superpowers. Over Reagan’s final two years in office, Moscow pressured Hanoi to moderate its diplomacy with the United States and settle the war in Cambodia. The Soviet Union and Vietnam both began to pursue normalization with China. The reconciliation between the two communist camps signaled a broad effort to move beyond the Third Indochina War.
The final, and most important, factor was Vessey’s role in reenergizing US–SRV diplomacy. Negotiations had been proceeding slowly until 1987. Reagan’s decision to upgrade the talks by creating a high-ranking position in the administration dedicated to humanitarian diplomacy demonstrated Washington’s commitment to sustaining negotiations with Hanoi. Overall, Vietnam responded positively to Vessey. He remained in his position during George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton’s presidencies and fostered a sincere friendship with Thạch, who also remained in his position until 1991.Footnote 87
Despite Vessey’s contribution, the record indicates Hanoi continued its counterproductive style of diplomacy, such as initiating and then halting negotiations based on comments from US officials or outlets that criticized Vietnam. It caused frustration in Washington and slowed progress on bilateral issues both sides sought to resolve. The real strides in diplomatic and economic exchanges that Hanoi’s leadership wanted could occur only if it withdrew its soldiers from Cambodia and agreed to a political settlement.
This article challenges the notion that Đổi Mới introduced a new mindset within the CPV toward the United States. In the years immediately following the 6th Party Congress, Vietnam maintained the same diplomatic approach as before December 1986. The change in leadership had no significant impact on Hanoi’s engagement in negotiations with the United States. The most important development occurred due to the Reagan administration’s decision to centralize US negotiations through Vessey. To Hanoi’s credit, Vietnamese diplomats responded well to Vessey’s appointment. By establishing a position to confer specifically with the Vietnamese on humanitarian issues, Reagan reaffirmed Washington’s commitment to maintaining a dialog with the SRV and resolving lingering postwar problems. The decrease in Cold War tensions, along with Vessey’s contributions throughout the remaining Reagan years and those of his successors, created the conditions for normalizing diplomatic relations between the United States and the SRV in the following decade.
Competing interests
The author declares no competing interests.
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