U.S. OKs Calls to Vietnam in Move Toward Conciliation : Diplomacy: Members of Orange County’s Vietnamese community express excitement over prospect of phone links to their homeland.

The Bush Administration lifted the ban on telecommunications with Vietnam in a small but significant step Monday toward normalization of relations with America’s former wartime enemy.

The action, announced by the State Department, will open the way for Vietnamese living in the United States to call their relatives or friends back home. It will also enable U.S. executives to make phone calls or send facsimile copies to Vietnam as they begin to scout for business prospects in that country.

Members of Orange County’s large Vietnamese community expressed excitement that direct phone links to their homeland will soon be possible.

Tony Lam, a member of the Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce of Orange County, said: “It’s a humanitarian gesture for families to be able to communicate with each other” between the two nations.

Vu Phan, president of the Union of Vietnamese Students Assn. in Southern California, sees it as a first step toward normalization of relations between the two countries and perhaps an important one in rebuilding his native land.

“Maybe now all layers of society there can communicate to the outside world, from the students to the government,” Phan said. “And the more the people know, the better decisions they will make regarding the running of Vietnam.”

“The catch,” he said, “is how the communication gateways will be controlled.”

State Department spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler said the action is the result of “positive steps” taken by Hanoi in helping to locate U.S. soldiers missing in action from the Vietnam War and in helping to bring a peace settlement to Cambodia.

Despite Monday’s action, the U.S. trade embargo against Vietnam remains in effect, and the United States still has no diplomatic relations with the government in Hanoi. Many analysts believe that there will be no change in these policies at least until after the U.S. presidential elections in November.

Lifting the ban on phone calls represents a conciliatory gesture toward Vietnam by the Bush Administration at a time when a number of U.S. allies, such as France and Japan, have been urging the Administration to go much further and lift the trade embargo.

The State Department’s written statement Monday asserted that opening the way for telecommunications is “in keeping with the established U.S. policy for a step-by-step process of normalization of relations” with Vietnam.

“We expect the Vietnamese to respond with continued and intensified efforts” to help account for all the Americans listed as missing in action in the Vietnam War, the statement said.

Last month, a delegation of Administration officials headed by Assistant Secretary of State Richard H. Solomon traveled to Hanoi and won a series of promises that Vietnam would step up its efforts to help account for missing U.S. soldiers.

For example, Vietnamese officials promised to give U.S. officials greater access to their central records and archives.

In the weeks since that trip, State Department officials were said to have argued that the Administration should make some new gesture toward Hanoi. But some Defense Department officials reportedly objected, arguing that Vietnam should first provide greater and more concrete help in accounting for those missing.

Some analysts believe that the possible presidential candidacy of H. Ross Perot could make it even harder for the Bush Administration to make any dramatic changes in its Vietnam policy during this election year.

Perot has been active in efforts to locate and rescue Americans thought to be missing in action or held as prisoners of war.

If the Bush Administration moves before the November elections to lift the trade embargo against Vietnam, it could face criticism from Perot for abandoning the cause of locating missing Americans in Vietnam.

Nevertheless, without promising to lift the trade embargo or establish diplomatic ties with Hanoi, the Administration suggested Monday that it may soon announce other conciliatory gestures toward the Vietnamese government.

“Over the coming weeks and months, we will consider additional confidence-building steps,” Tutwiler said in her statement.

Times staff writer Thuan Le in Orange County contributed to this report.