Clinton Tries to Beat Critics to Punch on Vietnam Ties

President Clinton’s apparent decision to establish normal relations with Vietnam triggered a barrage of congressional criticism Monday, but opponents conceded that they appear to have been upstaged in their efforts to delay it.

The decision to end decades of estrangement with Hanoi is supposed to be announced by Clinton today at a White House ceremony whose timing was strongly influenced by two factors, Administration officials said.

One was Secretary of State Warren Christopher’s forceful urging that Clinton announce the decision before Christopher embarks on a trip to Southeast Asia early next month--a trip that the secretary wants to extend to Hanoi, the officials said.

The other factor--and the one that was the most politically sensitive for Clinton, given that he avoided the draft during the Vietnam War--was a desire to preempt moves by conservatives to force votes in the House and the Senate on measures opposing normal relations with Vietnam until Hanoi has done more to account for Americans still listed as missing from the conflict in Southeast Asia.

Almost as deeply divided over formally making peace with Hanoi as Congress was in waging the war more than 20 years ago, lawmakers have been maneuvering measures into place for weeks opposing normalization and even barring the use of federal money to establish full relations with Vietnam.

Although no formal vote has been taken, opponents had been optimistic that they had enough support to pass a resolution in the House condemning the move. In the Senate, opponents conceded that a vote would have gone the other way. But the Vietnam debate still would have been “very messy,” a senior Republican leadership source said.

Clinton, after agonizing over the decision for weeks, decided to make an announcement before the opposition organized further. “The desire to avoid a resolution [opposing normalization] was a contributing factor” in the decision’s timing, an Administration official said.

One angry critic, House International Affairs Committee Chairman Benjamin A. Gilman (R-N.Y.), said he will continue to seek legislation to block all funding for diplomatic ties with Vietnam until Clinton can certify to Congress that Hanoi has been “fully cooperative and forthcoming” in accounting for 2,205 Americans still officially listed as missing in Southeast Asia.

“Only eight missing Americans, out of more than 2,200, have been accounted for” since Clinton lifted the U.S. trade embargo against Vietnam in 1993, Gilman said.

Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.), a co-sponsor of similar legislation, echoed Gilman’s criticism. Dole said it was a “strategic, diplomatic and moral mistake” to recognize Hanoi when “many credible sources suggest Vietnam is not providing all the information it can on POW / MIA issues.”

The criticism illustrated how divisive the POW / MIA issue remains, despite Pentagon assurances that Vietnam has for some time done all it can to resolve the handful of cases in which there are discrepancies; most of these involve airmen believed to have survived the downing of their aircraft and to have been captured by the Vietnamese.

The criticism also provided a reminder of just how difficult the issue remains for Clinton. That sensitivity was underscored by the caustic criticism of Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove), who called Clinton “a triple draft dodger” and argued that proceeding with normal relations amounts to selling the remains of the still-missing down “the Red River . . . and into the Tonkin Gulf.”

Administration allies, however, countered that Hanoi is doing all it can to account for the missing and that the step will not only prompt it to do more but will open the door to U.S. businesses eager to compete for lucrative development contracts in Vietnam.

Moreover, analysts say that the sting of comments such as Dornan’s has been neutralized by support for Clinton’s move from Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a former Vietnam War POW, and Bob Kerrey (D-Neb.), who was awarded the Medal of Honor for service in Vietnam.