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From: Cau Thai via Vsg <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Sent: Thursday, November 21, 2024 12:17 PM
To: VSG <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: [Vsg] A Reply to Bill Hayton’s 8 Points
Since a member argued that Nguyễn Đình Bin's view did not represent "the view of the majority of the Vietnamese people", I would like to add a few more lines below.
Days after To Lam became the party chief in August, I shared my perspective with a small group in the West:
1. Nguyen Phu Trong relied on To Lam's assistance to carry out his "anti-corruption" campaign. Lam became Deputy Minister and Minister of Public Security (CA) in 2010 and 2016 respectively.
2. In Trong's last 12-plus months, until his death, Trong did his best to keep Lam from being his replacement. Vo Van Thuong and Vuong Dinh Hue were Trong's two hand-picked candidates for the party chief and president positions respectively.
3. As CA boss, Lam has a proven record of taking bold and ruthless moves. Disregarding international law, he had his people kidnap Trinh Xuan Thanh in Berlin and bring him back to Hanoi, crossing multiple countries in Europe and Asia, to stand trial. Under Lam's watch, the murder of Le Dinh Kinh of Dong Tam village took place. Kinh was a 84-year old man who joined the party at the age of 25 and fought in the Vietnam War. Until his death, he still believed in the party.
4. Lam has access to "dirty" dossiers of all members in the CPV Central Committee. Getting rid of anyone in the party's upper echelon for his own agenda was a simple task for him.
5. After having Thuong and Hue removed from power and after Trong's death, Lam assumed positions intended for Thuong and Hue.
6. There are differences and similarities between Trong and Lam. The main similarity is both are autocrats; the main difference is Trong was a theorist, Lam is not.
7. After taking over Trong's job, Lam said he would continue Trong's anti-corruption campaign. Westerners have written about Trong's anti-corruption campaign for years. However, most of them have failed to discuss the nature of the anti-corruption campaign and the root cause of the corruption problem. Vietnamese have been arrested and imprisoned for bringing these issues up. Simply put, CPV's main goal for the anti-corruption campaign is to help calm public outcry. The campaign has not addressed what Lord Acton pointed out more than 100 years ago, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." While the corruption is widespread at all levels, the party's leadership also uses the anti-corruption campaign to serve their own agenda.
8. Lam has a lot of work to do between now and the CPV's 14th Party Congress in early 2026 to secure his party chief post. Whether other members in the Politburo could put a brake on Lam remains to be seen.
Weeks later came Bin's open letter to Vietnam's leadership, with the statement, "Càng ra sức đốt lò, ra sức chống tham nhũng, tiêu cực, thì tham nhũng, tiêu cực, cũng như các quốc nạn khác, càng lây lan, càng phát triển, càng hoành hành trầm trọng," and with his call for a change in the country's political system.
I stated a fact in the previous post, "many Vietnamese are in prison simply for expressing their opinions or views".
As we may know, party members at Bin's level have received generous pensions and privileges in their retirements. By speaking up, Bin faced the risk of losing these things or even worse.
Therefore, the chance for the majority of people in any society who are willing to take such a risk is probably next to zero.
About To Lam, his deeds, not his words, in coming years will help with our assessment of his role in Vietnam's history.
Best,
Calvin Thai
Independent
From: Cau Thai via Vsg <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, November 20, 2024 8:21 AM
To: Carlyle Thayer <c.thayer@unsw.edu.au>; VSG <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: [Vsg] A Reply to Bill Hayton’s 8 Points
Hi Carl,
You wrote,
"Here is a dose of reality. All the members of the Ministry of Public Service from the minister on down are uniformed state officials who are bound to implement the directives of higher authorities. They are professionals who are motivated to implement policy to gain recognition and promotion within the system for their efforts. In other words, they had a duty to carry out General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong’s anti-corruption campaign under the direction of their boss, Minister To Lam. Other motivations may have been at play but they were secondary."
Your reality is not the reality that people in Vietnam live in!
More than two months ago, Nguyễn Đình Bin, a former Permanent Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Vietnam and former member of the CPV Central Committee, penned an open letter to Vietnam's leadership. He publicly called for a change in Vietnam's political system. Among problems he raised is the following:
"Càng ra sức đốt lò, ra sức chống tham nhũng, tiêu cực, thì tham nhũng, tiêu cực, cũng như các quốc nạn khác, càng lây lan, càng phát triển, càng hoành hành trầm trọng"
https://www.bbc.com/vietnamese/articles/c5ykenx89plo
Many Vietnamese are in prison simply for expressing their opinions or views but we are not subjecting to that risk. Therefore, as friends of Vietnam, let us take things seriously in addressing issues that that country faces.
Best regards,
Calvin Thai
Independent
From: billhayton via Vsg <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, November 20, 2024 5:31 AM
To: Carlyle Thayer <c.thayer@unsw.edu.au>
Cc: VSG <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: [Vsg] A Reply to Bill Hayton’s 8 Points
Thanks for cheering up a cold autumnal day. Funniest thing I’ve read on VSG for a while!
Best wishes
Bill
From: Carlyle Thayer via Vsg <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2024 7:40 PM
To: via Vsg <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: [Vsg] A Reply to Bill Hayton’s 8 Points
Gaslighting, Strawmen, Red Herrings and Foolish Consistency:
A Reply to Bill Hayton’s 8 Points
Carlyle A. Thayer
Dr. Hayton responded to my critique by posting eight points on the Vietnam Studies Group home page. His comments are reproduced below without amendment. Each of his points are followed by my response.
1. Nowhere in the IISS article does it say that the security forces represent a ‘coherent group’ or a ‘unified faction'. Carl has invented a straw man argument here. In fact, the division between the public security goons and the army generals is going to be interesting to watch. But we can be sure that political liberalisation is not on the horizon. There are still a few people who need to be disabused of this assumption.
THAYER REPLY: Dr. Hayton’s Strategic Comments read like a hastily drawn up first draft lacking in nuance. While he did not use the terms “coherent group” or “unified faction” in his article his reply used the term “public security goons.”
Dr. Hayton began his first paragraph in Strategic Comments by noting “eight of the 15 members of the current party Politburo began their careers in, or rose through, the security forces.” He then noted that a “coalition of security personnel and orthodox Leninists [were] at the apex of Vietnamese politics.” He then wrote about “The takeover of Vietnamese politics by the security forces…”
My reply “If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it just may be a duck." In other words, Dr. Hayton is referring to a coherent or unified group of public security officials at the apex of Vietnamese politics. In sum, Dr. Hayton is engaging in gaslighting.
Dr. Hayton’s comment on political liberalization is a red herring. Where is the evidence that if the anti-corruption campaign hadn’t been conducted leaders on the Politburo would have carried out political liberalization?
My stance has always been clear – no member of the Politburo elected at the 13th national party congress in 2021 was an advocate of political liberalization. I do not need to be disabused of this assumption since I don’t share it nor have I ever advocated it. This is Dr. Hayton’s trade mark, a red herring.
2. The idea that the blazing furnace was a saintly attempt to remove corruption from the CPV and had nothing to do with intra-party battles for power is touchingly naive. Sure, the campaign took down some very corrupt people, but that was merely one part of the game. We only need to look at who is still around to know that the other part of the campaign was a vicious battle for power, in which some exceedingly corrupt people remained untouched - mainly those with better connections in the Ministry of Public Security. Carl’s assertion that "Perhaps the main motivation of officials in the Ministry of Public Security and party Inspection Commission was to support the party leader in his campaign against corruption” is very sweet. I bet the boys in the MPS are laughing into their bia hoi...
THAYER REPLY: Dr. Hayton characterizes my analysis as “touchingly naïve.” Here is a dose of reality. All the members of the Ministry of Public Service from the minister on down are uniformed state officials who are bound to implement the directives of higher authorities. They are professionals who are motivated to implement policy to gain recognition and promotion within the system for their efforts. In other words, they had a duty to carry out General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong’s anti-corruption campaign under the direction of their boss, Minister To Lam. Other motivations may have been at play but they were secondary.
3. Of course there is ceiling on cooperation between Vietnam and Western democracies. I’m old enough to remember the days when Western countries were funding all kinds of democracy-promotion activities with Vietnamese partner organisations. That just doesn’t happen any more. The magnificently named 'comprehensive strategic partnerships' with South Korea, United States, Japan, Australia and France are mere pieces of paper. The UK has had such a piece of paper with Vietnam for well over a decade but there is almost nothing to show for it. What has changed in relations between Vietnam and the US in the year since the signing of their 'comprehensive strategic partnership'? Anything?
THAYER REPLY: Dr. Hayton’s assertion that there is a “ceiling on cooperation between Vietnam and Western democracies” is so jejune that a response is hardly necessary. The reality is that there is a ceiling on certain types of cooperation between Vietnam and all of its external partners because Vietnam seeks to maintain its independence, self-reliance and strategic autonomy. As far as cooperation in science, technology, innovation and education are concerned the sky is the limit.
Dr. Hayton dismisses Vietnam’s comprehensive strategic partnerships with western democracies as “mere pieces of paper.” As a specialist in international relations who has long studied Vietnam’s strategic partnerships, some now elevated comprehensive strategic partnerships (CSP), I am amazed by the superficiality of Dr. Hayton’s assertion. All of these partnerships have a dialogue mechanism usually at ministerial level. The partnerships usually function under multi-year Plans of Action that are continually reviewed. The partnerships are comprehensive in the number of sectors they cover.
The comprehensive strategic partnerships with western democracies are all relatively new, the oldest being two years old. It would be premature to rush to judgment as they are a work in progress. For example, the Joint Statement on the Vietnam-United States CSP, signed in September 2023, lists ten substantial areas of cooperation which I addressed at a seminar at VinUniversity in October 2023.
4. If anyone doubts the connection between the anti-corruption campaign and the slowdown in public expenditure might want to read a few articles in the local press:
'Because of the mindset of waiting for decisions from above, many public assets do nothing'
THAYER REPLY: Dr. Hayton has set up his own strawman in his fourth point. As an experienced journalist I fail to see how he misread what I actually wrote, “The IISS article accurately reports that General Secretary Trong’s anti-corruption campaign led to an opportunity cost in slowing the approval of contracts for economic projects.” I am well aware of the pioneering reporting by Reuters journalists Francesco Guarascio and Khanh Vu on this issue.
5. Carl is a bit mixed up on the foreign investment figures. His figures are for FDI disbursed in the period (ie resulting from decisions taken in previous periods). The IISS figures are for FDI pledged in the period and should be disbursed in future periods. In other words, if these pledges become disbursals, China will become the largest source of foreign investment in Vietnam. It’s already the second largest in terms of disbursals.
THAYER REPLY: Dr. Hayton is gaslighting again. I was not mixed up in foreign investment figures. I focused on what had been disbursed rather than Dr. Hayton’s speculation of what might occur. After all, China promised heaps in foreign investment to Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and then didn’t deliver.
6. The general definition of a captive market is one where the potential consumers face a severely limited number of competitive suppliers. Currently, one third of all the things that Vietnamese consumers import - come from China. South Korea is the next largest provider of imports at about half that level and Japan is the third largest with just 6.5% of Vietnam’s imports. Vietnam’s market looks pretty captured.
THAYER REPLY: As noted above, Dr. Hayton’s Strategic Comments read like a hastily written first draft. He did not offer a definition of captive market in his article. My essential point remains – what are the implications for Vietnam of being a captive market? Dr. Hayton infers that Vietnam’s national security will be undermined without elaborating. Until further evidence is produced, Dr. Hayton’s assertion remains unproven.
7. Carl claims that there is no evidence that Vietnam has halted its oil and gas exploration in areas in dispute with China. But there’s plenty of evidence. Back in 2020, I wrote about how the Vietnamese government paid around a billion dollars to international energy companies after cancelling their gas drills because of Chinese objections.
https://thediplomat.com/2020/07/chinas-pressure-costs-vietnam-1-billion-in-the-south-china-sea/
Since then Vietnam has chosen not to drill in any areas inside China’s ‘U-shaped line’. None. How much more evidence is required? Meanwhile, Vietnam has built up its bases on the rocks and reefs and not faced any interference from China - unlike the Philippines, for example. China has turned a blind eye to Vietnam’s activities. This looks like a modus vivendi.
THAYER REPLY: This is the third strawman that Hayton has propped up in his 8 Point reply. I did not write that there was no evidence Vietnam halted its oil and gas exploration in the waters around Vanguard Bank.
I argued that Hayton did not provide evidence for his speculation that Vietnam and China worked out a modus vivendi that if Vietnam halted oil and gas exploration inside China’s nine-dash line China would acquiesce in Vietnam’s construction activities in the Spratly Islands.
China’s silence on Vietnam’s construction activities is puzzling and needs further examination. Recently, a senior member of Vietnam’s Border Commission visited me in Canberra. He asked me why China was treating Vietnam so lightly. In other words, there was no modus vivendi between China and Vietnam.
8. Anyone who thinks Vietnam’s current leadership is serious about energy transition and green energy needs to explain why the the country is building new coal-fired power stations, why the ‘Just Energy Transition Partnership’ is going nowhere and why climate change campaigners keep getting locked up https://the88project.org/fighting-for-a-greener-future/
THAYER REPLY: This is another red herring. I concluded by offering a forecast for Vietnam’s future that included policy proposals to be put before the 14th national congress of the Vietnam Communist Party that included energy transition.
Why is Vietnam building coal-fired power stations? Simple my dear Hayton, because Vietnam faces an energy shortage that must be urgently addressed.
Vietnam is also seeking assistance from its comprehensive strategic partners to assist in energy transition over the next five years and beyond. Vietnam is currently mulling nuclear power.
Dr. Hayton’s Strategic Comments repeat common themes found in his past discourse on Vietnam that are heavily normative. Dr. Hayton’s Strategic Comments are a hastily written rehash of old ideas that were not nuanced and offered little original analysis. As I noted in my critique, Dr. Hayton made at least seven tendentious assertions that needed to be challenged. His reply to my critique was based on gaslighting, strawmen, red herrings and foolish consistency (”A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines," Ralph Waldo Emerson).--
Carlyle A. Thayer
Emeritus Professor
UNSW Canberra
School of Humanities and Social Sciences
The University of New South Wales at the
Australian Defence Force Academy
Canberra, ACT 2610 Australia
Phone: +61 02 6251 1849
Mobile: 0437 376 429
Calling Mobile from overseas +61 437 376 429
From: Richard Tran via Vsg <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Sent: Sunday, November 17, 2024 9:30 PM
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: [Vsg] Call for VSG Dues (3/24-3/25 cycle)
Dear VSG:
This email is a call to our valued supporters to pay your VSG Membership dues and/or donations for the March 2024-March 2025 cycle, if you have not already done so. If you have already paid for this cycle, please accept our sincere thanks. Any payment beyond the minimum dues will be considered a donation.
Your relatively modest membership dues support many activities that benefit the Vietnam Studies field, including the Graduate Student Prizes, Annual Travel Grants to the AAS, bibliography software subscription fees; infrastructure costs to host the VSG list-server, and more. Finally, only dues-paying members can vote on VSG-related matters.
Per AAS regulations this year, AAS membership is now required to make dues or donations to country or region-specific study groups, including VSG.
You can renew your annual VSG Membership in three easy steps:
Step 1. THE DUES AND/OR DONATIONS
The dues are the following:
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Any payments beyond the prior amounts will be considered donations.
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2) Checks can be made to the “Association for Asian Studies” with a note that the payment is for “VSG dues/donations.” You can send the check directly to the AAS:
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If you paid by check, kindly let me know the amount and date of the check. This last step is important because AAS no longer provides us the names of people who paid dues or donated. But it does indicate when payment is a check, which helps in keeping track of dues/donations as long as we know the amount and the approximate date that the AAS receives a check.
Thank you again for your continued support of VSG. Do not hesitate to contact me if you have further questions.
Cordially,
Richard
---
Richard Quang-Anh Tran, PhD
Scholar-in-Residence
The Program in Critical Theory
University of California, Berkeley
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