Chinese Hoang Sa invasion and North Vietnamese reaction in 1974
Mathieu Bouquet mathbouq at mathbouq.com
Tue Mar 27 05:29:48 PDT 2007
Dear list members,
I am currently writing my master thesis about the lingering oriental Sea
dispute between mainland China and Vietnam.
About the dispute build-up, I wonder if there was any official or
non-official (i.e.: North Vietnamese newspapers articles) reaction from
Hanoi after the january 1974 Chinese attack against the South Vietnamese
troops in the Hoang Sa archipelago. I have seen no mention about such a
reaction until now, although many publications stress that this Chinese
operation was not approved (and maybe be much resented) in Hanoi, but
none of them give any "proof" of their assessment.
Thanks in advance for your help
Mathieu
Balazs Szalontai aoverl at yahoo.co.uk
Tue Mar 27 06:05:37 PDT 2007
Dear Mathieu,
during my research in the Hungarian archives, I found a report written by the Hungarian embassy in Hanoi (date: 17 November 1975) that noted the North Vietnamese leadership's intense dissatisfaction with the Chinese occupation of the islands. As a North Vietnamese cadre put it, the islands "constitute an inalienable part of Vietnam, and they will never renounce their claim for the oil-rich islands that are of strategic importance." In September 1975, Le Duan visited China and raised the issue of the islands, but the Chinese were, predictably, unwilling to return them to Vietnam.
Best regards,
Sidel, Mark mark-sidel at uiowa.edu
Tue Mar 27 06:55:10 PDT 2007
Ramses Amer at Uppsala, http://www.pcr.uu.se/personal/anstallda/amer_ramses.htm might well have more information on this too....
Mark Sidel