During his first visit to Vietnam, President Biden concluded his two-day trip to Hanoi by paying a visit to a memorial dedicated to his old friend, Senator John McCain. McCain, a renowned prisoner of war who played a crucial role in reconciling with Vietnam, was remembered by Biden at the memorial.
Accompanying Biden was John Kerry, another combat veteran-turned-senator who, like McCain, worked towards normalizing relations between the United States and Vietnam in 1995. The Vietnam War had a profound impact on both McCain and Kerry, shaping their perspectives and careers for years to come.
However, Biden’s relationship with Vietnam and the war differed significantly. Although he was a contemporary of his veteran friends, Biden did not serve in the military nor did he actively protest the war like many others of his generation. He explained that he was occupied with education, starting a family, and entering politics. While he opposed the war, it did not define him, and he carried minimal baggage when he arrived in Hanoi for his diplomatic mission.
For Biden, establishing a new strategic relationship with Vietnam during his trip was primarily driven by countering China rather than addressing the ghosts of the past. It was a pragmatic geopolitical decision, as Vietnam seeks to distance itself from Beijing while the United States aims to expand its network of allies in the region.
The presence of a large bust of Ho Chi Minh during Biden’s meeting with Vietnam’s Communist leader, Nguyen Phu Trong, went unnoticed. The extensive bombings carried out by the United States in this colonial city were also not mentioned. Furthermore, Biden only briefly mentioned the repressive actions of the current Vietnamese government.
Instead, Biden expressed his enthusiasm for reconciliation. During his meeting with Trong, he stated, “I’m incredibly proud of how our nations and our people have built trust and understanding over the decades and worked to repair the painful legacy the war left on both our nations.”
To showcase their progress, both sides exchanged symbolic items. Two American veterans returned a diary recovered from the battlefield in 1967 to the Vietnamese soldier who wrote it. Vietnamese officials presented Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken with identification cards of U.S. troops still missing in action.
If the Vietnam War has any influence on Biden today, it serves as a cautionary tale of the misguided use of force overseas. This lesson played a role in his recent decision to withdraw American forces from Afghanistan after two decades. The chaotic withdrawal from Kabul in 2021 reminded many of the iconic image of an American helicopter departing from a Saigon building in 1975, symbolizing the ignominious end of a disastrous war.
“I think he learned to dig in hard to find out what’s really going on and what the facts are and don’t necessarily take conventional wisdom, but be…
2023-09-11 07:50:53
Original from www.nytimes.com
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