Need for Indo Vietnam Strategic Naval Dialogue by B Raman

aug 3rd, 2010

militarily it makes great sense to ally with vietnam, even proliferate nuclear weapons to them (as china and pak do to all *their* friends). china got a bloody nose from vietnam whose battle-hardened troops thrashed them soundly in 1978 or so. they have not forgotten that and have some respect for the vietnamese.

on the other hand, vietnamese culture is sinic. i remember a cambodian diplomat once asking (khmers had the chams and other vietnames as traditional enemies): why do you support the sinic vietnamese, and not the indic khmer? 

on my last trip to cambodia, i found that han chinese influence (including soft power via TV), investment, and immigrants are flooding into cambodia -- it will eventually become a han colony, if it hasn't already. the result of communist terrorists having ravaged the culture and the land -- so they would have fulfilled their mission of capturing one more land for the chinese/communism.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Sanjeev 

To keep the Chinese under check India will need to collaborate closely with countries of S.E. Asia and the Far East (We need to rebuild people to people contact that existed centuries ago) not to forget the U.S. Hope Pres Obama realizes that China is a natural adversary, a country that recognises the language of strength, economic progress or military power. rgds sanjeev

Need For India-Vietnam Strategic Naval Dialogue 30/7/2010

By B. Raman http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/papers40/paper3955.html

" It is clear that military clashes would bring bad results to all countries in the region involved, but China will never waive its right to protect its core interest with military means."--- From a "Global Times" editorial of July 26, 2010.

After having adopted a soft policy towards China since coming to office in January 2009, the administration of President Barack Obama is showing signs of starting to articulate in public its concerns over the implications of the growth of the Chinese naval power and its likely impact on the freedom of navigation and maritime trade. The public articulation of the concerns of the Obama Administration in this regard were triggered off by China's ambivalence on the question of action against North Korea for allegedly sinking a South Korean naval ship in March and its strong statements in recent months on its rights in the South China Sea and its determination to play what Beijing looks upon as its rightful role in the Western Pacific.

2. Interestingly and intriguingly, the concerns of the Obama Administration over the ambivalent policies of China in this region and over the implications of the increasing maritime assertiveness of the Chinese Navy were voiced by two dignitaries of the Obama Administration, who recently visited New Delhi and Hanoi, thereby hinting that there was a triangular convergence of these concerns  in  the US, India  and Vietnam. Does this presage  the beginning of a thinking in the corridors of power in Washington on the likely benefits of a co-ordinated strategy by the US, India and Vietnam towards the growing assertiveness of the Chinese Navy?

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