Mugger sues victim
Less than one month after the decision by the Clinton administration to lift its trade embargo against Vietnam, the US State Department announced on March 1 that it is seeking compensation from Cambodia and Vietnam for hundreds of millions of dollars in US properties lost when the US was forced to withdraw from those two countries in 1975. Talks on the issue began in Phnom Penh and Hanoi a few days later.
No, this isn't a sick joke. "We are committed to obtaining compensation for American property that was expropriated after the fall of Saigon and Phnom Penh in 1975", the State Department declared.
Virginia Foote, director of the US-Vietnam Trade Council, says 192 claims by US citizens or firms with property in Vietnam have been approved by a Justice Department commission set up to look into the issue. The claimants' property in Vietnam initially was valued at $100 million, "but now is worth $230 million if interest is taken into account".
Republican Robert Torricelli testified before Congress recently that the Clinton administration has the necessary leverage to force its will on these two poor countries. Torricelli noted that Vietnamese government assets in the US stood at around US$200 million.
This act of extortion against two countries impoverished by a brutal war waged against them by the US is galling in its maliciousness and would be universally condemned in a just world. It is a blatant case of the aggressor suing the victim.
Far from seeking recompense, the US administration should be honouring the US$3.25 billion compensation, now worth US$7.5 billion "if interest is taken into account", promised in 1972 by then US President Richard Nixon to Vietnam. But of course, the US ruling class have no intention of paying compensation to the people of Vietnam or Cambodia. Their smouldering resentment and hatred borne of the historic defeat inflicted upon them by Vietnam is boundless in its vindictiveness.
There can be no more inappropriate home for the Statue of Liberty than the United States of America.