O.C. Vietnamese Call Move Logical, Risky : Reaction: Some firms make plans to start trading as soon as the embargo is lifted. Critics fear it will take pressure to reform off Hanoi.

President Clinton’s announcement loosening restrictions on lending to Vietnam was being widely viewed by the Vietnamese-American community Friday as a logical, albeit risky, step toward normalization of relations.

Some Orange County companies have already made plans to start trading as soon as the embargo is lifted.

While some feared it could lessen pressure on Hanoi to improve its human rights record, some Orange County business leaders were hoping that it could soon lead to the end of the trade embargo that has lasted since the Saigon government fell in 1975.

“I think it’s premature,” said Van Tran, a Little Saigon political activist and former aide to Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove), who urges a harder bargaining stance. “We have nothing in return for doing this big favor on their behalf.”

The editor of the Nguoi Viet Daily News, one of the most influential Vietnamese language newspapers in Little Saigon, said he thinks Clinton made a right move.

“It will improve the lives of the Vietnamese people,” said Yen Do. “It will create jobs.” And, he added, the move will help rebuild roads, airports and other public improvements that have deteriorated from years of Western embargoes. Better economic conditions will lead to human rights and political reforms, he predicted.

But Dr. Co D.L. Pham, an Orange County physician and community leader, disagrees and contends the United States will have less financial leverage over Vietnam.

“They get all the money from the World Bank. They don’t need us anymore,” said Pham, who is also president of the Vietnamese-American Chamber of Commerce.

Still, Pham said he supports the quick lifting of the embargo so that American companies have the same chance to compete for contracts as the foreign firms that are already there.

For some Orange County companies, Vietnam, with its population of 50 million, could represent a major new market. And those companies feel they are especially well situated to get contracts because of the proximity to Little Saigon, the hub of the Vietnamese community in Orange County, situated in Westminster and Garden Grove.

Les Hufford, president of a Huntington Beach-based company that plans to build hospitals to serve foreigners in Saigon and Hanoi, said Clinton’s decision is “very good news” and that “it’s time for the healing to start” between the United States and Vietnam.

“We didn’t spend 18 years after the Second World War doing this kind of activity.” Hufford said. “The only ones being hurt are American business.”

Hufford’s company, Real Estate Medical Investment and Trading Co., recently was host to a Vietnamese delegation. And its officials have visited Vietnam as well. He said his company is ready to get started on its hospital project within 60 days of lifting of the embargo.

George Dang, president of an Irvine company that is brokering deals between the Vietnamese and U.S. companies, predicted that the embargo will be lifted by the end of the year.

“There are many businesses that are very anxious to go to Vietnam because the market is very attractive,” said Dang, a Vietnamese-American who heads ALCA International Co. Ltd. “They demand U.S. products.”