Log In


Reset Password
Opinion Editorial Cartoons Op-Ed Editorials Letters to the Editor

Closer ties to Vietnam make could have happened long ago

On Monday, President Barack Obama announced that the United States is ending its long-standing ban on the sale of military equipment to Vietnam. It was time.

That reflects an oddity of American history: It seems to take us longer to forgive enemies we do not crush.

In World War II, the United States destroyed Japan’s navy, took much of its territory and laid waste to its homeland – including dropping atomic bombs on two cities. Almost twice as many Americans died fighting the Japanese as died in the Vietnam War.

Roughly five times as many Americans were killed in Europe as were lost in Vietnam. And, unlike Vietnam (or even Japan), Nazi Germany did pose an existential threat to the United States, its allies and to Western civilization.

Yet relations with Germany and Japan became relatively normal within a few years. Fifteen years after the end of World War II, Americans were buying so many Volkswagens that General Motors felt compelled to respond with its own rear-engined, air-cooled car.

Likewise, Japan quickly became an American ally. And while for some time it was seen as an economic threat, any antipathy left over from the war was quickly overcome by American fondness for its products.

But it was a full 20 years after the Vietnam War ended before the U.S. had diplomatic ties with that nation. The end of the arms embargo comes 41 years after the war ended.

Do we really hold a grudge when we cannot be triumphant?

Nonetheless, lifting the embargo is significant on several levels. And critics notwithstanding, greater U.S. involvement can only help human rights improve. The one area where no one expects it to have much impact is in actual arms sales. The Russians have kept the Vietnamese supplied.

The biggest effect is to signal that the U.S. does not recognize the South China Sea as a Chinese lake. That and trade; Boeing and VietJet just signed an $11.3 billion deal. And there is talk of the U.S. Navy returning Cam Ranh Bay.

That all makes sense, but did it really need to take 40 years?



Reader Comments