Yes, the War Is Over : Senate vote gives Clinton cover on Vietnam

Nearly 20 years after the United States bitterly pulled out of Saigon and slapped a trading embargo against Vietnam, Washington appears to be moving toward resuming trade. It is time to lift the embargo, though this is an especially sensitive call for President Clinton, who did not serve in the Vietnam War.

Today the United States stands alone among major nations in forbidding its citizens and companies to trade with the Vietnamese. International lending institutions have begun to grant loans to Vietnam for major rebuilding projects, but American interests cannot participate directly in the reconstruction.

It is in U.S. economic interest to resume trading. Indeed, a greater American presence in Vietnam might help bring closure to the issue that has festered longest between the two nations--the fate of Americans still listed as missing in action in Vietnam.

The Senate has provided some political cover for the President to move in this direction, voting by a wide margin Thursday in favor of resuming trade with Vietnam. The non-binding resolution calls on the President to end the embargo as expeditiously as possible. The White House said Clinton has not made a decision and is still assessing whether the Vietnamese are doing their best in accounting for the 2,200 Americans who remain missing in action.

Many veterans groups and families of MIA-POWS raised objections to the Senate’s vote. They maintain that the embargo is their only leverage. That may have been the case, considering the recent significant progress on the MIA issue. But as Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), a Vietnam veteran who has chaired the Senate’s yearlong investigation into the MIA-POW issue, said, “If we don’t proceed forward we can lose the ability to get the answers we are getting today.” Lifting the embargo would not end the MIA search. What it would do is benefit both nations.