AMERICA AND VIETNAM: A NEW ERA : From Business Pioneers in Hanoi, a Toast to New Ties : Commerce: U.S. executives applaud decision, say they’re no longer ‘hobbled.’ But the Vietnamese reaction is muted.
At the Polite Pub, at least, President Clinton is a hero.
“I think it was an excellent decision to normalize relations with Vietnam, and American business has been waiting for this a long, long time,” Frank Kufrovich, president of a Calabasas-based investment fund, said over the din of the noisy bar here.
A group from this Southeast Asian nation’s small but expanding American business community gathered in the watering hole in the Vietnamese capital Tuesday night to celebrate Clinton’s decision to normalize diplomatic relations with Vietnam. When the wide-screen television advised that the President would not speak until 2 a.m. local time, there was a communal groan, as if to say, “How could he do this to us?”
Many of those present came to Vietnam as pioneers long before Clinton was elected and even before former President George Bush began to ease the trade embargo on Vietnam during his term. They have endured bad plumbing, “jelly belly” [intestinal ailments] and the vicissitudes of a Communist bureaucracy, hoping a day like Tuesday would come along to make it all worthwhile.
The President’s decision “means the [Vietnam] War is finally over,” said James Rockwell, who runs a consulting company called Vatico. Rockwell arrived here three years ago a neophyte with regard to the Vietnamese economy but is now the vice chairman of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce here and represents Chrysler, Hughes Aircraft and the engineering company Brown & Root.
“Now Americans won’t be hobbled by the impediments that have existed since the embargo was lifted,” Rockwell said. “The leverage this will give the U.S. government will help American companies really compete with Japanese and [South] Korean firms.”
The Chamber of Commerce here has risen from just a handful of stalwarts to more than 160 business people in the last 18 months or so, with new arrivals nearly every day. Chrysler is expected to open a showroom in Hanoi later this week, accomplishing in Vietnam what it has been unable to do in Japan.
Since the late 1980s, the Vietnamese Communists have gradually jettisoned Marxism in favor of free markets and have opened the country to foreign investment. Yet the United States, the largest investor in Southeast Asian nations such as Singapore, ranks only eighth in Vietnam.
Clinton’s announcement, in addition to opening the way for concrete U.S. federal aid to American enterprises wishing to trade here, “will have a big impact on company attitudes,” said Mark D. Gelinas, an associate at the U.S. law firm Coudert Bros. “For a lot of companies, there will be no more excuses. They can’t postpone their involvement any longer.”
In contrast to the buoyant optimism of the Americans, most Vietnamese appeared to regard the development as less than memorable.
The front pages of Vietnamese newspapers Tuesday made no mention of Clinton’s decision and focused instead on Vietnam’s improving relations with the African state of Mali.
“A lot of people are talking about normalization, but not many people really understand what it means,” said Uyen Phuong Tran, a Hanoi clerk.
Cao Si Kiem, governor of Vietnam’s Central Bank, when pressed for an opinion Tuesday, replied that he thought Vietnamese banks would benefit from the experience and advanced technology of U.S. banks. Bank of America and Citibank have branches in Hanoi, while Chase Manhattan Bank has opened a representative office.
Gelinas, the American lawyer, said he feels strongly that--apart from improving economic relations--normalization will lead the Vietnamese to be more open about the fate of U.S. servicemen who are still listed as missing in this country.
“The United States can exert much more influence by using its economic power,” he said. “I think this will lead to the fullest possible accounting.”
Clinton has come under fire from veterans groups and conservatives in Congress who believe that the Vietnamese have not done enough to account for the Americans who have been missing in action since the war ended in April, 1975.
