This gives me a sad:
The Obama administration announced Monday that the United States would fully lift a longstanding U.S. embargo on lethal arms sales to Vietnam, a decision that reflects growing concerns about China’s military clout and illustrates the warming bilateral ties between the former enemy nations.
President Obama unveiled the new arrangement at a news conference with Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang during the opening day of his first visit to the country. Obama emphasized that his decision reflected a maturing relationship and deepening cooperation on security and economic investment four decades after the end of the Vietnam War.
Two years ago, the administration eased portions of the arms embargo that had been in place since 1975 to help bolster Vietnam’s maritime security in the South China Sea, where China’s move to exert more naval control of crucial shipping corridors has angered Vietnam, the Philippines and other nations that have claimed sovereignty.
Obama said the latest step “was not based on China or any other considerations. It was based on our desire to complete what has been a lengthy process of moving towards normalization with Vietnam.”
Maybe we should focus on the idea that normal relationships means something other then arming them to the teeth with weapons that will inevitably be used in a bad way somehow, somewhere, some time. It’s like Jon Stewart is on to something.
It’s just depressing. Basically, the the federal government’s foreign policy prescriptions for my entire life are fundamentally no different than the NRA’s domestic position, which is that more guns are always better all the time.
rikyrah
sigh.
oh well.
Mike J
If Vietnam wants weapons, they’re going to buy weapons. I don’t see why American companies should be locked out of the market by the United States.
Major Major Major Major
Of course this is about China, and it’s a smart way to push back against their BS in the South China Sea without doing it directly.
This statement of course presupposes that the goal–push back against what China’s doing in the SCS, and do so with weapons–is good.
Patricia Kayden
When I heard that news this morning, I was a little flummoxed but I guess U.S. arm dealers need to sell their weapons of mass destruction to someone. Sigh.
Eric S.
The Military Industrial Complex beast must be fed.
Raven
@Mike J: They were able to make plenty with shit we threw away !
Hildebrand
Worse than Bush! Or, perhaps one might guess that Obama does actually know what is going on, and may think there is something worthwhile in making this arrangement. I would further guess that even Obama knows that having to play arms dealer sucks.
By the way, can we stop looking to Jon Stewart as the font of wisdom? His snark laden Broderism is still Broderism.
Mike J
@Raven: Yeah, but that was forty years ago. I assume they need new shit. They can buy it from American companies or they can buy it from any other country in the world. If we allow companies to make and sell weapons abroad, it’s stupid to refuse to sell weapons to one of our trading partners with a stable government.
Major Major Major Major
@Mike J: But all weapons are automatically bad! /
I’ve noticed a number of people seem to have overlearned their lesson from Iraq.
JPL
Of course, this is about China. Next thing you know, Viet Nam will allow a US naval base.
Raven
@Mike J: I don’t care either way.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
Every time some wingnut shrieks about “them libruls done cost us Vietnam”, I want to grab them by the lapels and shake them while saying “Vietnam has a stable government, is a reliable trade and security partner. What’s not to love?”
Plus, the food is amazing. Can’t go wrong with Bun Bo Hue, with lots of chiles, lime and cilantro…
Raven
@JPL: when the Russians were at Cam Rahn Bay the Vietnamese called them Americans without money. Btw, we built it.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
Vietnam + Philippines = South China Sea.
Major Major Major Major
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class: I got some of that broth in my eye one time.
Ow.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@Major Major Major Major:
You got to be gentler on noodle slurps.
nastybrutishntall
@shomi: Still waiting for you to choke on your own vomit and stop bothering us.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Mike J: Yup.
BBC:
It’s a carrot (“Improve your human rights record and maybe we’ll sell you more stuff that you need”) and a stick (“Xi – you need to stop acting like the South China Sea is only yours”) and it potentially takes money away from Putin. What’s not to like?
Cheers,
Scott.
(Yes, the devil’s in the details.)
eclare
Personally more concerned with arms sales to countries like Saudi Arabia, but still reading about this. Good to know that there is a caveat.
PST
The embargo singling out Vietnam was an anachronism not unlike the embargo against Cuba. If we want to have normal relations, which we should, there is no reason to maintain the vestige of an embargo policy that has already been chipped away at. It always had more to do with the domestic politics of appeasing those who believe Vietnam still holds MIAs than anything else.
Betty Cracker
@Raven: My mom had a friend who had been a nurse in Vietnam. While there, she had some sort of health issue that caused her to have to have a hysterectomy (she was in her 20s at the time). Thereafter, when people would ask her why she never had kids, she would say, “I got my uterus shot off in Vietnam!”
Kay
I got a call from the Clinton organizer for the county. I’m meeting with him Friday. He asked me to get “as many Democrats as possible” but Friday afternoon Memorial Day weekend that will be “one” and I’m only going because I took appointments all day so what’s one more? :)
Still, I credit him for trying. He had my cell phone number which means he put some effort in. It’s a secret! Not a very GOOD secret apparently.
Belafon
With China island hopping to try to claim them, and moving its ships around to assert authority in the region, I can imagine other countries wanting to counter that threat. And it’s not like Vietnam hasn’t had to deal with China before.
It’s kind of sad that one of the symbols of our new partnership is the purchase of weapons, but that’s the world. It could be a lot, lot worse.
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major:
I don’t know. I can’t see Vietnam putting up any serious obstacle to Chinese ambitions in the region.
When I heard a radio story about this, I wondered “is there something else we have of value to offer? It just seems to easy a concession to the military industrial complex.
Adam L Silverman
@Mike J: @Major Major Major Major: @Eric S.: @I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: @Brachiator: This is weaponized Keynesianism. Its the only real fiscal policy we allow ourselves anymore: spending on Defense, military, and munitions. Both R&D and actual sales. When you know you need to do fiscal policy, but the institutional gridlock of US political structures prevents almost all of it, you go with the one place you know can get through. We’ve allowed the decision to be made that we’re not going to spend any money on infrastructure, we’re going to spend as little as possible on R&D that doesn’t have a military application, and we’re not going to spend any actual money in a meaningful way on training and education. That leaves weapons R&D and weapons sales. And its also left us with the only real carrot left in many places because we’ve decided we won’t allow ourselves to have anything else to offer as an enticement.
max
Maybe we should focus on the idea that normal relationships means something other then arming them to the teeth with weapons that will inevitably be used in a bad way somehow, somewhere, some time.
Yeah, but they got the money and we got the guns. And we are one of the world’s great arms dealers.
‘I see, Mr. Chairman, that you really know your home defense! Well look at this honey of an access denial system right here! And it’s all yours plus we’ll throw in three FREE fighter jets for a naval base and some corporate access!’
Basically, the the federal government’s foreign policy prescriptions for my entire life are fundamentally no different than the NRA’s domestic position, which is that more guns are always better all the time.
You ever seen the crowds at the international arms shows? ‘WOOOO EEEE! We could really slaughter some rebel scum with this!’ Basically titled rednecks.
It’s just depressing.
What’s depressing is that we have no problem unloading guns on hardcore right-wing Muslim governments that hate us, but at the time we absolutely detest the idea of feeding some starving kid in Africa to the point that it’s a standard attack in every political campaign I’ve ever experienced.
It’s a wonder there’s not a SuperPac called Starve the Children.
max
[‘Whiteish courtesy phone for Mr. Rubio – whitish courtesy phone for Mr. Rubio.’]
Rand Careaga
We were, after all, lavishly arming both sides of the conflict (one directly, the other, as has been noted above, at once-remove) during the 1965-1975 Southeast Asia Games, which we finished up with the silver medal. I’ve long thought that the Vietnamese were pretty good sports about it afterward. Once we quit the theatre of conflict, they didn’t spend a lot of time plotting retaliation on us for the vast damage the USA inflicted on their real estate and people.
Amusing story: In 1975 my future ex-wife was renting a room in a so-called Zen monastery, established by an expat Indochinese roshi in downtown Los Angeles. We vacationed together in Maui that September, and she was shocked to discover upon our return that about ten Vietnamese refugees had been assigned the room during her absence. The few possessions of hers that had not been appropriated were stacked outside the door, and she was informed that she would have to arrange for lodgings elsewhere.
“I can’t believe it!” she sputtered. “I used to laugh when they told us that if we didn’t fight them over there, they’d come here!”
In fairness to the ex, she said this in jest, albeit a little ruefully.
raven
@Betty Cracker: Those nurses were awesome.
Cacti
Not sure I follow, dear blog host.
I would say that Vietnam’s concerns over emerging, expansionist global powers are fully legit, and backed by ample historical precedent.
Realpolitik usually isn’t pretty, or the way we wish things were.
Mike J
@Kay:
John was asking on twitter how to get Clinton people to call him. Ask your guy to call somebody in WV and take care of John.
I would think just signing up at the web site would get them in touch with him, but I don’t know exactly what he was looking for.
raven
@Rand Careaga: ” I’ve long thought that the Vietnamese were pretty good sports about it afterward.”
Roger that. I have a right wing buddy who lives on the beach there and he loves it and the Vietnamese seem to love him. The shit was murderous and awful but, in many ways, a blip on their radar. What’s the stat, 75% were born after the war?
BillinGlendaleCA
@Mike J: They could always send him an email, of course in ALL CAPS*.
(Cole loves those the most of all☺.)
Gin & Tonic
@raven: It’s a great place to visit.
raven
@Gin & Tonic: I also have a pal who is there right now doing a motorcycle tour. He’s a guy who has plenty of ghosts but he’s having a great time.
raven
Geeze the last thing I want to do is be on BJ while at the beach but I’ve got at least an hour before the masses vacate the beach and I can chase the evening redfish!
WarMunchkin
I disagree on this. I don’t see this as the same thing as arming paramilitary groups in order for regime change or anything like that. It seems almost symbolic more than anything else.
D58826
Hmmmm. If we had read up on Vietnamese/Chinese history we would have learned the two countries have hated each for 1000 years or more. We could have held in elections mandated by the 1954 treaty and after two two halves reunited supplied Ho with weapons to act as a buffer with China. But he was a commie, so end of thinking and ultimately way to many lives..
You can argue the morality of selling weapons but its been going on for a long time.,
raven
@D58826: If a bullfrog had wings it wouldn’t bump it’s ass when it hops either.
Damned at Random
What drives me nuts is -we sell this shit to a country for “military” uses and they use it to on their own people – tear gas shells -or worse- with made in USA prominently displayed on the spent round. I’d love to know what percentage of our foreign aid goes to the military and police as opposed to say schools and sewage treatment plants.
So why do they hate us?
Amir Khalid
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
Ahem
dedc79
Your general point is much stronger than it’s specific application to Vietnam. If we’re selling to basically everyone else, why not Vietnam?
bystander
I don’t see that anyone has noticed this buried in the story:
Doesn’t that have some redeeming value even if WaPo had to bury it at the end of the story?
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
Or, you know, we could acknowledged that this is not the only aspect of our normalizing relations with Vietnam and, in fact, is dwarfed by the trade and other economic aspects. But it’s a lot harder to get your panties in a bunch when phrased that way.
CONGRATULATIONS!
It was wholly based on China and nothing else, and the domestic optics are horrific. I don’t think I can recall President Obama signing off on anything nearly this stupid before.
Oh wait, I can. Libya and Syria. Damn, dude needs to buy a clue on foreign relations from someone.
Schlemazel Khan
@Rand Careaga:
One correction, the USMC had armed troops in South Viet Nam in 1957. The war was going on that early. Ike’s people urged Kennedy to send even more troops but he was reluctant but soldiers were killing & being killed there before he took office. It wasn’t until the Navy jinned up the Gulf of Tonkin incident that LBJ was forced to go all in on the nightmare
rp
Why is this a bad thing other than weapons=bad?
christopher murphy
Absent conceding a Chinese Monroe doctrine for east Asia the US needs to develop a capability to deter growing Chinese military strength. Using other nations in the region with their concerns re Chinese expansionism rather than taking the entire burden upon ourselves seems a pretty smart move.
Omnes Omnibus
@CONGRATULATIONS!: First, as a number of people have noted, this is not that big a deal. Second, Iran and Cuba, just to name a couple of things.
BillCinSD
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
didn’t we try this with Malaysia and human trafficking until Malaysia needed to be upgraded to have the TTP go through?
burnspbesq
If Loomis were to show up here, he would argue that we are missing out on a huge opportunity to improve the lives of millions of Virynamese workers by failing to condition arms sales on changes in local labor and environmental laws. I’m skeptical about whether the Vietnamese government has the skill or the will to enforce such upgraded laws, but it would be interesting if we were to put that on the table and see how the Vietnamese react.
Brachiator
@Adam L Silverman:
This makes some sense, but it is clearly a case of the fiscal tail wagging the foreign policy dog. In the real world, the US (and other countries) have to make up some foreign policy initiative to rationalize the arms deal. And one that may actually complicate actual foreign policy needs.
I think the carrot aspect of this is seriously over-rated. And we may also end up contributing to instability by funneling arms to a country or faction who can then turn them on enemies, or shift other resources to assist with some internal or external conflict.
Trollhattan
@shomi:
Stori of your life, clearly.
Hildebrand
@Omnes Omnibus: Forget it, he’s rolling.
Major Major Major Major
@burnspbesq: This part?
Or did you mean labor and environmental more specifically?
Aren’t those in TPP too? Slightly off topic.
Ruckus
@Betty Cracker:
I apologize for this but I b had to laugh at that. I was laughing at the presentation not the subject.
Raven Onthill
The near-total erasure of the policy lessons of 1960-70 is depressing.
Brachiator
@christopher murphy:
Why?
Ruckus
@Adam L Silverman:
THIS
Our wonderful congress is not just woefully deficient in internal affairs but external as well. Trying to “win” like 2 yr olds rather than governing is costing us dearly. It limits what can be done in so many ways.
Cacti
@rp:
Because 5 decades ago, we were at war with Vietnam and because of reasons.
Omnes Omnibus
@Raven Onthill: Yeah, normalizing relations with countries like Vietnam and Cuba is forgetting the lessons of those years.
burnspbesq
@Major Major Major Major:
Workers’ rights are a subset of human rights, and changes in labor and environmental laws would concretely advance workers’ rights. Devil, details, etc.
D58826
@Adam L Silverman:
The short version is the F-35 Flying Turkey with parts suppliers in 46 states. The political leaders of the other 4 states should be impeached for missing out on the gravy train. Even Bernie made sure that Vermont got it’s share.
D58826
@Cacti: And six decades ago we were at war with China on the Korean peninsula and eighty decades ago we were at war with Germany and Japan. Nations have interests and not friends.
D58826
Even North Korean leader Kim Jong Un doesn’t like The Donald. He turned thumbs down on a meeting.
phoebes from highland park
I’ve been to Vietnam twice in the past 10 or so years. Once to Saigon and once to Hanoi. Beautiful places, but if Ho could see Saigon today, he’d be rolling over in his grave. Completely capitalistic; everything and everybody is for sale on the streets. Hanoi was a little less commercial. We didn’t get out of the cities on either trip because we went during Chinese New Year and the planes and buses were filled. I’d have loved to have seen Hue…
Vietnam was MY war. Guys my age were fighting…and dying. I wanted to see Vietnam, though I didn’t have much interest in seeing other parts of SE Asia. As with most things the Obama administration has done in the last seven years, the lifting of the embargo on Vietnam makes sense.
Cacti
@phoebes from highland park:
Meh, Ho was a Communist of necessity. His goal was Vietnamese self-determination.
phoebes from highland park
@Cacti: @Cacti: I think you’re right, Cacti.
Betty Cracker
@Ruckus: No apology necessary — she said it to be funny! She, like my mom, was funny in a sarcastic way.
David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch
My take is Vietnam made this a condition for buying 100 jets from Boeing.
Of course he could have said no and let the business go to airbus and euro arms dealers.
The Vietnamese would have their jets and guns and the US working class would have the middle of a donut and the good will of unicorn bloggers.
Citizen_X
@Brachiator:
You know they beat them before, right? And us. And France. And Japan.
People opposed to this need to look at a map of claims in the South China Sea. They’re all overlapping, and China’s is the most ridiculous. (Hint: it’s called “the cow’s tongue.”) It is a major seaway. Should claims be settled diplomatically? Of course. But that generally requires some muscle to back it up.
Ellen R
John has a larger point here. If our foreign policy is based on weapons, why should anyone object to the NRA?
Davis X. Machina
@Cacti: Ho Chi Minh? The guy at the Parker House, that little Oriental guy who baked the Parker House rolls? Never heard of him.
agorabum
@Mike J: Right – Vietnam should have the rights of other countries. Cole isn’t saying why, when the president meets with Vietnam and Vietnam asks to have special restrictions lifted that we shouldn’t. It really wouldn’t make much sense for Obama to say “we have to keep restrictions on Vietnam because we believe in world peace” because the Veitnamese would see it as an insult.
It’s the right diplomatic move.
It is the reality of the world that makes Cole sad, not what just happened.
Adam L Silverman
@Brachiator: Sorry for the delay – went to the gym and the dojo. I don’t necessarily disagree on your second point. I think the carrot component is likely overrated. That said, its one of the few carrots we have left ourselves. So overrated or not, we have left ourselves disarmed, so to speak, in regards to the tools we have to exert National power other than military power (Diplomatic, Informational, and Economic).
Adam L Silverman
@D58826: I believe it is officially “The Strategic Strike Paperweight”. But other than that, you are correct!
Belafon
@Ellen R: Because the military of countries has a specific role, and that is to defend countries. A better argument would be why, if we’re selling weapons to Vietnam, we’re not allowing the police to have weapons. but we do.
Terry chay
It’s mostly symbolic. Vietnam can’t afford our weapons. What this is about is access to Vietnamese ports.
Sad because what China is doing in SEA is terrible.
Terry chay
@D58826: it was more complicated then that. It was because the French wanted their empire back, and the US thought that their participation in NATO was worth more than indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia) even though our SEA intelligence predicted that France would lose it anyways.
In other words, De Gaulle.
Jonathan Holland Becnel
Sweet Post, Cole!
One of the reasons I voted for Obama in 08 was his because of Foreign Policy. I mean fuck he won the Nobel Peace Price.
But after 8 years of War with Iraq and Afghanistan, bombings in Syria and Lybia, a CIA coup in Honduras and one unfolding as we speak in Brazil, and drone strikes every day killing thousands, Obama is no different than a neoconservative Republican.
Arclite
The Chinese are being major assholes in the South China Sea, basically ignoring the international standards all the other nations of the world have agreed on, and trying to throw their weight around. The Vietnamese military is no paper tiger, and kicked the Chinese in the ass the last war they had in 79. Vietnam would lose for sure, but would severely degrade the Chinese navy in the process. While we certainly don’t need anymore conflict on this planet, if there was ever a case to arm an underdog against a bully, this is it.
Zinsky
@Mike J: So, if we don’t sell them destabilizing tools of death, someone else will, huh Mike? What a sad worldview! Sorry, I don’t buy that nihilistic point of view. I guess this is why they gave Obama a Nobel Peace Prize?
Andy
Looks like the folks on your blog have come full circle.
Too funny.
Bloix
@Brachiator: You can’t?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Vietnamese_War
cain
I reckon that is what the Vietnamese government wanted in exchange to opening up markets.