When the War Was Over (77 page)

Thach opened his talk with a question about the amount of aid the United States was prepared to give Vietnam. He caught Holbrooke off balance. Holbrooke had planned to grill Thach on Vietnam's intentions toward Cambodia and China; instead he had to remind the Vietnamese that the talks were being held because of the message passed in Honolulu that Vietnam
was dropping its demand for aid. Thach smiled but did not budge on the aid issue.

At the second and final session Thach continued asking for money Holbrooke said there was no point in further discussions.

Thach smiled, cocked his head, and asked Holbrooke to return to the table. Once they were both back in their chairs Thach said in an even voice, “We have adopted the American attitude. We have no conditions, no linkage. We can sign an agreement right now.”

It was now Holbrooke's turn to demur. “I'm not authorized to sign anything,” he insisted. A tape recorder, which the Vietnamese had placed prominently on the table for both sessions, whirred during the long pauses. Holbrooke told Thach that the secretary of state would be pleased now that the two nations' positions appeared to be closer, that in principle it looked as if the countries could go ahead, but that he would have to consult with Vance; the “environment” was too uncertain for an immediate reply. The American ability to normalize would be affected by Vietnam's relations with other nations. Thach tried to get Holbrooke's signature on an agreement in principle. Holbrooke refused and said he would get back to Thach.

Vance was cautious. On September 28 he wrote his recommendation to the president that the United States accept the Vietnamese offer and normalize but only after the November congressional election more than a month later. It was a sufficiently long grace period to see what Vietnam planned for Cambodia, and it was necessary to avoid a major issue before the election. Brzezinski wrote alongside Vance's recommendation that nothing should be done until the more important Chinese negotiations were settled—that would not be until December, the target date. President Carter authorized study groups to be set up between the Americans and the Vietnamese in New York to iron out details of the proposed normalization—everything from the size of embassy staffs to a comparison of blueprints of the prospective embassy buildings.

Vance's caution needled the Vietnamese negotiator, Nguyen Co Thach, who waited in New York for nearly one month for final assurances. He gave up in October, convinced that concern about congressional elections was a ploy He claims Holbrooke had agreed there would be normalization and that the only problem was a few details. “But after the meeting Holbrooke kept saying he was too busy to see me again,” Thach said. “It seemed to me the United States was not ready.”

Neither Thach nor Holbrooke disagreed on what was said, only on emphasis. But the two men represented countries with completely different
timetables. While Vance was worried about the congressional elections, Thach knew waiting until mid-November was literally impossible for Vietnam. His country was on a war footing and needed to line up support quickly. Thach flew on to Moscow, where he joined Le Duan himself, who found a receptive audience.

On November 3, four days before the congressional elections, Vietnam signed a friendship treaty with the Soviet Union. There was no turning back now. The treaty included a clause that promised assistance should either country be attacked. It was the equivalent of a new military alliance in the eyes of most nations. It was very similar to a treaty India signed with Moscow shortly before its war against Pakistan.

Robert Oakley, Holbrooke's deputy, arranged for the last session with the Vietnamese immediately after the congressional elections on November 7, as promised. By this point, the United States had received solid intelligence reports confirming rumors that the Vietnamese government was behind the exodus of the boat people and that some of the ethnic Chinese had not only been forced out of the country but also required to pay gold for their passage out in wretched boats. Vance told Oakley the normalization talks were off. He should tell the Vietnamese the treaty with the Soviet Union made it too clear Hanoi's intentions were not peaceful.

At the final session Oakley relayed Vance's message. “I said: ‘Don't you see what lies ahead if you invade Cambodia? This is not the way to bring peace to the area. Can't we try some UN instrument, use the UN in some way?' They answered they had to do what they had to do. It was the only way they knew how. It was for me a very, very sad moment. I officially called it off,” Oakley said.

That is what he believed. Vance believes he and Carter called off normalization because of “an accumulation of factors: the boat people, Cambodia, and the signing of the treaty with Moscow.” In Vance's opinion, China did not figure into the decision at all. “China played very little role in normalization with Vietnam. It was the events.”

But Carter and Brzezinski say they are wrong. It was Brzezinski's arguments that won over Carter, not the boat people or the Soviet treaty. Carter said he vetoed normalization with Vietnam because “we wanted to move on China first.”

If that was the case, Carter had played a potentially dangerous game of two-track diplomacy that was deceptive at the very least. Events had played into Brzezinski's hands. On December 15 the United States and the People's
Republic of China simultaneously announced they had agreed to establish full diplomatic relations.

Carter and Vance may not agree on the reason behind America's failure to normalize relations with Vietnam. And Vance is probably correct in saying Vietnam is largely to blame. But what mattered in the weeks ahead was Carter's perception that he had chosen Chinese relations over Vietnamese ties. When Vietnam invaded Cambodia on Christmas Day, 1978, the United States was prepared to accept China's lead in reacting to the Third Indochina War.

In 1978 Vietnam moved completely into the Soviet camp, becoming dependent on Moscow for its survival. Without Soviet aid Vietnam could not have waged war or expected to survive afterward. And Vietnam became one of the Soviet Union's most reliable allies—voting consistently with Moscow at all forums and allowing Moscow a dominant economic and military presence in Vietnam. Asia became divided, as never before, into two clearly defined camps. And the world was presented with a new kind of communist war that revived racial antagonism and territorial conquests rather than any spirit of “liberation.”

The immediate beneficiaries of this new state of affairs were the countries of ASEAN. They were courted by Hanoi, Phnom Penh, and Beijing during 1978 and were asked in so many words to choose sides in the upcoming communist war. ASEAN stayed neutral and won considerable concessions from the two communist states.

The parade of communist envoys began in January 1978 with the visit by Vietnam's Foreign Minister Nguyen Duy Trinh to four ASEAN countries. He reached an agreement with the Philippines that any future disagreements would be discussed and settled in the spirit of “conciliation and friendship.” In Thailand, the Vietnamese envoy signed a trade agreement.

There was a temporary lull in the visits while Vietnam and Cambodia discussed a Vietnamese peace proposal. Phnom Penh rejected Vietnam's February 5 peace plan. Soon thereafter the Vietnamese central committee met and made their secret decision to invade Cambodia.

Cambodia kept up its attacks at both borders, with Thailand as well as Vietnam. This prompted a Thai proposal to make all Indochinese states part of a zone of peace which would include the ASEAN states as well. Neither Cambodia nor Vietnam thought much of that idea.

The diplomatic dance continued. In May, Cambodia reached an agreement with Singapore for the resumption of economic trade, a transportation
accord, and a telecommunications link between the countries. But ASEAN still wasn't taking sides.

In June 1978 the Cambodians made their peace proposal to the Vietnamese. They said they would hold talks for a negotiated settlement at the end of the year if Vietnam would promise to refrain from “all hostile acts” in the meantime. The Vietnamese called this proposal “ridiculous.” They offered a counterproposal: an immediate cease-fire and the establishment of a demilitarized zone along the common border. Cambodia said this was one more “smokescreen” and accused Vietnam of sending saboteurs to Phnom Penh to stage a coup.

That month boat people started to flood the waters. The ASEAN states issued a plea to developed countries asking them to specify how many of the Indochinese refugees they would accept for resettlement. There was a strong note of blackmail in the request. Later some ASEAN countries would ruthlessly push back the refugees—push the Vietnamese boats back to sea, or push the Cambodians back across mine-laden borders into Cambodia—because, they said, the developed nations wouldn't take them.

The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) said from Geneva that one million people had recently fled their homes in Vietnam and Cambodia, but primarily from Vietnam.

Within weeks, Vietnam sent Deputy Foreign Minister Phan Hien on a new swing through the countries of ASEAN to avert problems over the boat people as well as Cambodia. Phan Hien said he came to discuss the “zone of peace” proposal and show Vietnam's approval of the idea of an ASEAN bloc. He also hoped to dismiss fears that Vietnam had any intention of invading Cambodia, or of becoming a close ally of the Soviet Union.

Soon afterward, Cambodian refugees stole the spotlight. Hundreds of Cambodians managed to flee their country into Thailand to tell of more mysterious changes in Democratic Kampuchea. About the same time a human rights group held a well-publicized press conference describing widespread repression and terror in Cambodia.

By September, Cambodia openly competed with Vietnam for the support of non-communist Asian states. The Australian ambassador to Beijing was surprised when his Cambodian counterpart said his government wished to have normal relations with Canberra. Finally both Cambodia and Vietnam gave the ASEAN states what they had wanted—assurances to end any and all support to communist insurgencies beyond their borders.

Vietnam's renowned Prime Minister Pham Van Dong invited himself on a tour of the five ASEAN states. He spread Vietnam's version of the war and
the boat people, and he promised to end Vietnam's support to any communist insurgencies in their countries. Pham Dong's pledge was publicly and dramatically underscored during his trip to Malaysia. There he laid a wreath at the memorial for those soldiers who died fighting against Malaysia's communist rebels in the sixties. That stunning repudiation of supposed comrades-in-arms underlined how much Vietnam was willing to sacrifice in order to defeat Cambodia.

Ieng Sary was also traveling around ASEAN in October. His most important stop was Bangkok. There he promised the Thais that there would be no more problems along their common border. And he pledged that Cambodia would no longer support the Thai communist insurgency. State-to-state relations far outweighed party-to-party concerns. Thailand was crucial to the Cambodian communists; if Bangkok would not support the Khmer Rouge it at least had to stay neutral. But Cambodia's Chinese friends were already busy wooing the Thais.

China's Deng Xiaoping joined the parade of visiting communist dignitaries who wooed ASEAN; China hoped to promote sympathy for the Khmer Rouge largely by raising the specter of Soviet expansionism in the region. At this stage, China openly called Vietnam a stooge for the Soviets. The Cambodians picked up the cue. Ieng Sary claimed during his Philippines visit in October that the Khmer Rouge had killed two Soviet advisors in the war with Vietnam.

There was no turning back. The region was exploding and the countries were naturally first interested in their own well-being. The states of ASEAN determined to remain “neutral” in the contest between Cambodia and Vietnam.

These orchestrated pledges for ASEAN's support did what all sides had expected—they left the status quo in place. ASEAN did not see any reason to abandon neutrality to either the Khmer Rouge or the Vietnamese. ASEAN protested neither the human rights violations inside Democratic Kampuchea nor Vietnam's treatment of its boat people. Instead, the ASEAN states concentrated their energies on convincing the West to accept the Indochinese refugees—from Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos—and to remove the burden from their shoulders.

ASEAN countries were caught up in the emergency of the refugees. The sudden heartbreaking exodus of boat people had altered the tropical shores and beaches of all the countries. Malaysia gave over an entire island to house the boat people. Thai pirates plied the seas to rob, rape, and kill the helpless Vietnamese before they landed. The soft golden beaches of the region were
studded with broken boats and starving refugees. The Malaysian artists who worked in batiks had a new subject—sorrowful boat people became enshrined in their beautiful cloth paintings.