How Vietnamese still suffer thanks to America. Documentary

[senheiser]

That's a fact. It caused by former officials by accident ( mentioned that US troops were also affected ).
We could grow more if keep digging on history. We are mending it.

you should be digging more, look at jews. Americans should pay every viet money and give free submarines like we do to israel

 

[Battle of Bach Dang River]

This is why it is important to have a strong military arm, and a strong economic arm. South Vietnam was poised to become an Asian Tiger. In fact, political and economic analysts have written reports that South Vietnam would have been another Singapore or Taiwan, had it not collapsed to the North.

The problem was that tho South Vietnam was economically superior to the North, it had a smaller armed forces; and it did not take advantage of the Cambodian and Laotian border regions for offensive strikes into the North. While the South had such reservations, the North Vietnamese Military Command did not.

Had Vietnam been united under South Vietnam's Democratic Government, no doubt Vietnam would have been a economic power house in South East Asia. She could have been another South Korea, or Japan.

So for preventing this, the chinese tried to support North Vietnam.

 

[Aepsilons]

So for preventing this, the chinese tried to support North Vietnam.

Of course. If you look at your history, China has always been involved in interventionist wars in Vietnam in attempt to disparage Vietnam, preventing her from becoming a powerful state. Remember, it is not to China's geostrategic interest to have a powerful , strong Viet Nam; It would be a threat to her southern belly.

 

[kolinsky]

So for preventing this, the chinese tried to support North Vietnam.

Not only us, now who supports the war machine of viet nam? When the UdSSR is over, there is nobody.

 

[Battle of Bach Dang River]

Of course. If you look at your history, China has always been involved in interventionist wars in Vietnam in attempt to disparage Vietnam, preventing her from becoming a powerful state. Remember, it is not to China's geostrategic interest to have a powerful , strong Viet Nam; It would be a threat to her southern belly.

You are pointing out the core of VN problems. Thanks!

Not only us, now who supports the war machine of viet nam? When the UdSSR is over, there is nobody.

Try to guess whom?

 

[kolinsky]

You are pointing out the core of VN problems. Thanks!



Try to guess whom?

E.T.?

 

[William Hung]

I'll assume your intent is sincere and not mendacious, so I will explain.

"This is not a difficult decision to analyze. America promotes capitalism, and it has no territorial designs on Vietnam. The question isn't why Vietnam is making this choice, the question is why it took so long."

Source: How Vietnamese still suffer thanks to America. Documentary | Page 10

Do you even understand what I was talking about in this key sentence at the end of my quote, which the the crux of my argument?

My comment was said in the context of the topic of this too-often-derailed thread, namely the decision of Vietnam to turn towards the US, which the OP was propagandizing against.

Do you now see why I posted that list showing the experience and benefits that have accrued to other countries who have entered the US sphere of influence? And did I explicitly say the US was the key factor in their development, or only factor? Why do you assume I believe that it was the US, and not capitalism, and the culture, history, and circumstances that placed those nations in the US sphere of influence, that were the key factors?

You're still not getting it.

So why did you give that list? to convince people that VN will also gain those experience and benefits if they enter the US sphere? but how?

Everyone will assume that you believed the US/capitalism is the key/only factor. Simply because that's the only factor you mentioned, you never mentioned anything about culture, history and circumstances did you?

Look at your other statement here, it seems explicit to me:

No, the North Vietnamese were the victims of something far more insidious, namely, the sphere of influence of the Soviet Union. The South was under the sphere of influence of the US. Witness the results, even decades later:

View attachment 73090

According to this RAND study, South Vietnam's GDP grew at a CAGR of 15% between 1960-1967, and in 1968, had a GDP/capita comparable with South Korea, despite dedicating three times the percent of budget to defense that South Korea did. We all know how South Korea turned out, and we can only speculate about South Vietnam, but we do know how a unified Vietnam turned out under the Communists (i.e. Soviet influence).

You gave some data from the 2000-3 period that showed SVN doing better than NVN. You explicitly said this is the result from US influence on SVN in the 60s. This is another way of saying, US influence in the 60s is the key factor why SVN is better than NVN in year 2000. I first thought this is only a joke because it's just plain weird.

I can't defend the straw man argument that you've erected to knock down, because I never made those simplistic arguments. You can set up further straw men to argue against, but I won't be here to defend those, either, since they are not my arguments. If you want to argue that those who say the US was the key factor in West German/South Korean etc. development were wrong, have at it, but it has nothing to do with me, since I never made those arguments.

Well if you believe US capitalism/influence is not the key/only factor for success then there's not much we're disagreeing about so there's no point to take this debate further.

 

[xesy]

Of course. If you look at your history, China has always been involved in interventionist wars in Vietnam in attempt to disparage Vietnam, preventing her from becoming a powerful state. Remember, it is not to China's geostrategic interest to have a powerful , strong Viet Nam; It would be a threat to her southern belly.

You are quite right there, my friend. If you think about the geography of China, being in the center ensure it gains certain benefits, while being exposed to certain threat. In ancient time, when there were no airplane or long-distance capable ships, China's only backdoor was the South, namely Indochina and South China. The North of China was a large grassland with dangerous tribes of Mongolians, the West was the second largest desert on Earth, the East was the vast sea with Japan occupied islands (it sounded bad but I know there were Japanese pirates who raided Chinese sea-side towns). So it's quite clear why it was of China interest to keep VN and other nations from overgrowing. China needs a backdoor, which opens to a backyard that it can have total influence over nations inside that area. ASEAN is that backyard, and Indochina is that backdoor, similar to South America and Mexico to the US.

 

[gambit]

It's not the communist model that dictates the absolute centralized economy, it's socialist model. Communism has a lot of forms. For example anarcho-communism rejects every form of centralized government/management model. Radical democracy is also another model that is theoreticized by left world view which also rejects any form of unitary management model. Those theories were not in practice, never in USSR or China. One should be really careful when talking about communism, since theory and practice had been very different.

The currently known version of 'communism' is the political expression of Marxism. So if we go by what are and have been practiced regarding governmental involvement in the economies, I see no reason to include what are NOT pragmatically applicable.

So here is a simplified scale of the spectrum of economies that are actually practiced throughout history...

The word 'utopian' here mean 'ideal' or 'idealized'.

Utopian communism means there is no free market activity whatsoever, not necessarily by government fiat, but could be from simple consensus among the people that no one will profit from his/her labor. Currently, the only successful utopian communist society is the monastery, which includes the nunnery. This society is the epitome of Marxism: 'From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.' There may be a leader but essentially no one is wealthier than his/her fellow community member.

Utopian libertarianism means every man/woman for him/herself, also not necessarily by government fiat or could be by consensus, and that maximizing profits is the final goal. Just like the monastery, this society can only exists in small scale, such as the criminal underworld.

Anyway...No countries are or have ever been the idealized version of either command or free market economics. All economies in every stages of development have been on this sliding scale. China is leans towards left and the US towards the right.

US and EU had Marxist practices in the past and they have still government interventions to economy. In 2009 crisis US government saved bankrupting companies with taxpayers' money. Normally in a liberal economy that'^s absolute "blasphemy". Since liberal economy dictates a form of "natural selection" among the companies, the bankrupting companies and the economic policy should "fail" and the new companies/policies arise from the ashes of the old one. That's why capitalist economies sees cyclic economic crisis in every decade or two (the magnitude of the crisis depends) and readjust the policies according to learned "mistakes" from the economic crisis. However in 2009 US weren't given that chance and the companies and a portion of non-performing economic policies were simply "saved". That was pretty socialist and exact definition of government intervention to economy.

Periodic interventions does not equal to state capitalism, which require active and constant leadership of the government in all areas of the economy.

There are two paths for a government to have direct leadership and control of the economy under state capitalism:

- State onwed enterprises.
- National champions.

No economies are ever completely free of the potentiality of governmental intervention, let alone direct governmental intrusion. The difference between the free marketer and state capitalist is the fundamental belief in the relationship between the government and the economy. The 2009 bailouts of American companies were not the first time the US government had a direct hand in saving a company. Prior, it was Chrysler who received taxpayers' money back in 1979 in order to survive. Between 1979 and 2009, the only regulations imposed upon Chrysler were the auto safety and mileage standards, which are also applicable to other auto makers as well. Other than that, the US government had no say in how much Chrysler produce, sell where, and at what prices.

Under state capitalism, the government would and does have direct control over what a company produce, where, and how much to charge consumers. Everyone know what is a 'state owned enterprise' (SOE) and China have...

List of State-owned enterprises in China - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

SOEs are the best ways for any government to have direct influence into the economy, for good or ill. The list of US SOEs pales in comparison to China. The most publicly known of US SOEs are three: the US Postal Service, Amtrak, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, aka Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) that is famous for the children's TV show Sesame Street. Lesser known are the Ex-Im Bank or Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which insure bank deposits. But overall, China have tens of thousands of SOEs and through them the Chinese government can literally steers the Chinese economy regardless of free market influences.

The other path for a government to exercise control over the economy is through national champions. They are private enterprises but are heavily favored by the government and in return they must obey governmental directives. In Japan, they are called keiretsu and in South Korea they are called chaebol. In Japan, the keiretsu are managed by the powerful MITI.


State capitalism’s global reach: New masters of the universe | The Economist

...national champions that formally are privately owned but enjoy a huge amount of either overt or covert support from their respective governments.

A third path that is not necessary but always a favorite by the state capitalist is the sovereign wealth fund (SWF)...

Sovereign wealth fund - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A sovereign wealth fund (SWF) is a state-owned investment fund investing in real and financial assets such as stocks, bonds, real estate, precious metals, or in alternative investments such as private equity fund or hedge funds. Sovereign wealth funds invest globally. Most SWFs are funded by revenues from commodity exports or from foreign-exchange reserves held by the central bank.

The US does not have a SWF, no signifant SOEs in comparison to other countries, and no national champions. So just because the US government chose to save a few companies from their own mistakes in the short term, that does not equate to a Marxist attitude the US for these companies in particular and to the US economy as a whole.

Another recent example in my mind is Paul O'Neill ex-CEO of Alcoa, and ex-Secretary of Treasury. When he was the CEO of Alcoa, the profits of the company was stagnating. The shareholders were complaining a lot about it. The first thing he said when he started as the CEO was "his primary aim would be decreasing the work accidents". Normally in a capitalist economy the aim should be "maximize profit". However after huge efforts for training the workers and managers for work safety and replacing the old machines that causes trouble, Alcoa also saw a great revenue rise as a side effect because the workers were feeling much more attached to the company and their proposals were simply taken into consideration and that improved the efficiency a lot. Marx also made similar predictions about manufacturing efficiency, if the workers are somewhat "attach" to their work environment the manufacturing productivity will rise. That's what happened in Alcoa and that was pretty socialist.

Sorry, but I see another fail.

What ALCOA did was small scale socialism just like the monastery. If a worker does not like what the CEO did, he has the option to leave the company. If a citizen does not like the large scale Marxism-communism of the Soviet Union or old China, can he leave ? Most likely you are too young to know The Cold War whereas I do. Once I played tourist in East Germany when it existed. What a dump what was supposed to be a "worker's paradise" as predicted by Marxists. I saw Checkpoint Charlie and the graves of East Germans who tried to escape that paradise and were shot by East German guards. Guess once East Germany or today Cuba should have hired Paul O'Neill and may be their citizenry would be too happy to leave their countries ? You are replaying an old saw about a benevolent dictator. Funny how we never got one despite what Marx predicted.

Since Deng Xiaoping, China is a country that can be modeled as state capitalism. By definition state capitalism and socialist economy differs a lot. In both economies there is a centralized form of economic model, and that's their only mutual property. In socialism companies that are controlled by the central body does not seek "profit", but seeks to distribute the surplus as evenly as possible. This is called collectivism and is the main form of thinking behind the socialist economic model. Also in socialist model a community would only share the surplus, not the actual need. What is meant by that is they first produce for domestic consumption, then only surplus is distributed.

That is good -- for the monastery.

If I cut ten cords of wood while you cut only five, why should I give my surplus to you ? Or rather, do YOU believe in coercion in the sharing of surplus ? If that is the case, why should I produce any surplus at all ? The excess from my labor should morally be mine and I alone decide what to do with it.

 

[Lure]

@gambit

Sorry but what I got was you are not trying to make discussion but rather trying to start a polemic. That's why discussing further would be futile. Besides I strongly think that you should read the post again to understand what it's thesis is, what it's supporting arguments are because from your answers I get that you either deliberately or unintentionally misguiding what I've written.

No economic system was neither supported nor denounced in that text. But it had a capitalism favoring tone. So please try to understand, before replying my capitalism favoring text with anti-socialist arguments.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

Even current Chinese miracle is because US world order.
Look! Western colonization free Chinese women from feet bondage beauty.

Lolwut? Are you serious? Please tell me you are trolling, that you are not this dumb.

 

[gambit]

@gambit

Sorry but what I got was you are not trying to make discussion but rather trying to start a polemic. That's why discussing further would be futile. Besides I strongly think that you should read the post again to understand what it's thesis is, what it's supporting arguments are because from your answers I get that you either deliberately or unintentionally misguiding what I've written.

No economic system was neither supported nor denounced in that text. But it had a capitalism favoring tone. So please try to understand, before replying my capitalism favoring text with anti-socialist arguments.

Why not ? What are you afraid of ? Being cast as a US supporter, perhaps ?

I read your...ahhh...'thesis'...several times over and I saw nothing new: that someone took isolated pockets of Marxist/socialist policies and implied that the US is a socialist country. The US military is a dictatorial organization so does that mean the US is a dictatorship ? If not, then what make you think that just because the US government bailed out a few companies somehow made US the equivalent -- or nearly -- of China's state capitalism ? The US and China may share the same belief that capitalism is the best method to lift a country out of poverty and to have technological progress that benefits everyone, but that does not mean we are both the same TYPE of countries.

 

[mike2000]

So for preventing this, the chinese tried to support North Vietnam.

Exactly, you got it right. In fact as i said before, had it not been for China(and to soe extent Russia/U.S.S.R), North Vietnam would have been decimated in a few months at most by the U.S and its south Vietnamese allies. It was China and Russia support that kept the war going for so longggg. Also the U.S was afraid of launching a massive ground invasion of north Vietnam since it was too close to China's border, and the U.S was afraid of repeating a Korean war, since they thought by launching a massive ground invasion of the North, this will provoke a direct Chinese intervention like it did in Korea earlier, in support of the the communist North Vietnam.

So Vietnamese should blame China for their current Communist authoritarian government.Since had it not been for China, Vietnam would have been a democratic prosperous country under the U.S by now, and would have avoided all the long vietnam war and subsequent sanctions/isolation that followed. This would have made it easier for Vietnam to be ally with the U.S and Japan together with some ASEAN countries as well. But the Communist North Vietnamese Victory over the South/U.S with massive Chinese/Russian help prevented this from happening unfortuntely.

 

[mike2000]

You need to learn history more, my Nihon friend. The US would not allow SVN to attack the North nor the Lao or Cambodian can afford because of us, China, in the background. Had we not threaten the US of Korea War vII, the US back SVN would storm across the North Vietnam. However, I believe in the long term, the US made a GREAT strategy by not invading the North. Why? First, they lost the South Vietnam but they won over us, China, who at the time were having deteriorating relationship with the Soviet Union, the real US's archenemy. If the US invaded the North, for sure we will enter and that will only bring us closer to the Soviet and the US wouldn't be able to play "divide and conquer" and subsequently weaken the Soviet during Afghanistan War to the point of later collapsing. If you ask American politician, they no doubt made the right decision to abandon South Vietnam and in turn winning a geopolitical battle against the Soviet.

I agree with your point about why the U.S didnt invade north Vietnam. I have red alot about the Vietnam war, and i agree with this point. However, it helped China since it kept Vietnam from turning into a U.S ally/pro U.S government. But it didnt help Vietnam, since had it not been for China, Vietnam would have been a capitalist democracy and much more prosperous than being communist. Its unfortunate Vietnam fought a brutal war, but the wrong side won because of China and Russia. Hopefully Vietnam will get rid of its corrupt Communist government with time and replace it with a democratic one just like south Korea and Taiwan did in the past. Vietnam doesn't always have to follow China's communist political system.

 

[gambit]

Exactly, you got it right. In fact as i said before, had it not been for China(and to soe extent Russia/U.S.S.R), North Vietnam would have been decimated in a few months at most by the U.S and its south Vietnamese allies. It was China and Russia support that kept the war going for so longggg. Also the U.S was afraid of launching a massive ground invasion of north Vietnam since it was too close to China's border, and the U.S was afraid of repeating a Korean war, since they thought by launching a massive ground invasion of the North, this will provoke a direct Chinese intervention like it did in Korea earlier, in support of the the communist North Vietnam.

So Vietnamese should blame China for their current Communist authoritarian government.Since had it not been for China, Vietnam would have been a democratic prosperous country under the U.S by now, and would have avoided all the long vietnam war and subsequent sanctions/isolation that followed. This would have made it easier for Vietnam to be ally with the U.S and Japan together with some ASEAN countries as well. But the Communist North Vietnamese Victory over the South/U.S with massive Chinese/Russian help prevented this from happening unfortuntely.

Even the most obtuse of the Chinese members here know that truth, more so with the benefit of hindsight as to the disastrous communist experiment in their own country. But instead of admitting that China bears the greater blame for being the cause of the Vietnam War as we know it today, they continue to spin it as 'liberating' Viet Nam from 'US imperialism', as if they understand what is 'US imperialism' in the first place. There is no guarantee that this alternate Viet Nam would have been economically prosperous and democratic under US influence, but at least the odds of that would have been higher.