This Ho Chi Minh Trail Ends at the 18th Hole New York Times Golf returns to the People's Republic.
Leaving Vietnam different today Monroe News A Vietnam vet returns to find a whole different country taking shape.
Vietnamese regime scripts its political oppression Seattle Post-Intelligencer A leaked document shows the Vietnamese government is still in the thought-control business.
Inflation Tests Vietnam's Growth Asia Times Vietnam's leaders will have to tame 15 percent inflation if they want to maintain rapid economic growth.
Vietnam calling Computing Vietnam is grabbing an increasing share of outsourcing contracts.
April 23, 2008
A glance the other day at the label on my sweatshirt - 100% cotton, Made in Vietnam - started me thinking. Who really won that one?
Yes, the U.S. failed to contain the once fearsome communists militarily. (And feel free to argue amongst yourselves about just why that was.) But a review of the manufacturing labels on your sneakers, baseball caps and whatall could lead you to decide we defeated Ho Chi Minh and his disciples where it counts, in the war of ideas.
In the 14 years or so since the United States began normalizing trade relations with Vietnam, the country has undergone a remarkable transition, turning what was once a broken and dysfunctional economy into the other miracle of Asia. (Sorry, guys, but China tends to win all superlatives on the continent.)
Its gross domestic product now ranks in the international Top 40, at $265 billion a year. Economic growth over the past decade has averaged 7.5 percent a year, robust enough to qualify as the world second fastest growing economy. There's a fledgling stock market to reflect the ascendancy of private ownership.
And much of the growth stems from manufacturing goods for consumption by the nation formerly known as Imperialist Aggressors. From clothes to toys to semiconductors, a staggering array of import-oriented goods is made in Vietnamese factories. Nike, one of the first major companies to utilize the Vietnamese workforce, relies on 135,000 Vietnamese working for 165 subcontractors. Vietnam's 2007 trade balance with the U.S. totaled $8.73 billion on the side of "Thank you for the sneakers."
To be certain, it's still no picnic in the People's Republic. Inflation lately has been averaging an unsustainable 15 percent. The minimum wage is still a $50 or $62 a month, depending on whether you work in the city or the boonies. People still largely invest in gold rather than trust the country's historically shaky currency.
Yet for a country that once reviled private industry, Vietnam is remarkably far along the way to having a modern middle class. Rates of severe poverty are now well below China or India. Among emerging nations, Vietnam is considered the third most attractive retail market. And when workers feel like they're getting a raw deal -- as with recent realignment of the minimum wage and the ongoing inflation crisis - they go on strike and demand change from a government that once brooked no dissent.
It seems pretty clear, in hindsight. The tons of ordnance and defoliants the U.S. dumped weren't going to change a thing. But the free-enterprise economy America represents to the world - there's a real agent of transformation.
Which might be useful to remember as we pursue change in other trouble parts of the world. Bullets and bombs don't seem to be doing much in the way of changing attitudes in the Middle East, North Korea and other trouble spots. But a flood of 30-inch flat-screen TVs, Nintendo Wiis, icemaker-equipped refrigerators and 300-thread-count linens? Now we're talking some real revolution. Are you listening, Kim Jong Il? Because we think Christopher Hill, asst. U.S. secretary of state, had it exactly right in a recent interview during a tour of Asia:
What (has) the Vietnamese experience...been in getting their economy moving the way they have?...I wish the North Koreans would ask that question and I wish the Vietnamese would answer it in as detailed a way as possible, because what has happened in Vietnam in the last half decade is nothing short of extraordinary.
Vietnam Fights the War on Hamsters Environmental Graffit Cracking down on the black-market rodent trade.
Vietnam prepares for first space liftoff Telecom TV It's not just about making sneakers -- Vietnam has its eye on the sky, too.
Beyond Green Travel: In Vietnam, Emptied Graves Make Room for Mass Tourism National Geographic Adventure They're digging up graves to make room for new beach resorts.
At Ho's stronghold, Dutch minister presses transparency Earthtimes.org Dutch Foreign Trade Minister Frank Heemskerk presses Vietnam on trade, human rights issues.
Who won in Vietnam?
13% 7% 80%
I served in the Marines and fought in 1969-70 in the Vietnam War. In fact, when I returned to the U.S. I became a U.S. Citizen. I have not regretted either of those decisions.
Whether the war was the right war or the wrong war I leave to the scholars of history to debate.
This much I do know: a society that can create a prosperous middle class will hopefully see the benefits of representative democracy to maintain that middle class and it's prosperity.
Who won the war? It appears the Vietnamese people and the American consumer did. Who would have guessed that it would be 33 years after the fall of Saigon (in 1975) to achieve what we were supposedly there for originally: to make Vietnam "safe for democracy". And the Vietnamese people did it themselves.
One day I'd like to return for a visit, but not as a veteran searching out forgotten battle fields, but as an eco-tourist enjoying the Central Highlands. To sit again in that small French cafe on the perfume River in Hue City and enjoy a croissant and French coffee would be the highlight of the trip. I'll bet when I do it will have become a Starbuck's.
I hope the Vietnamese like my J. Peterman duster.......
To be honest, I am happy now, if I can find something like "Made in Viet Nam" on the label. I actively do NOT buy products marked "Made in China." I am so mad at how the Chinese government has treated the people of Tibet. The only way I know how to fight back is with my wallet. So, I look for products that are made anywhere BUT China. That is becoming more and more difficult to do. The other day, I went to 3 stores and looked at 30 muffin pans, before I found one marked "Made in Indonesia." All that work for a damn muffin pan! Every single store I went to had products Made in China. Heck, EVERYTHING was made in China. I don't understand why we have to import everything from China. There are hundreds of other countries where things like clothing and kitchen products are manufactured--and they can do it competitively. For me, there is nothing wrong with buying stuff made in Turkey, El Salvador, India, Russia, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Mexico, Italy, etc...
Expat.....Semper Fi
To: Mr. Peterman,
THANK YOU!
ExPat