The Foreign Service Journal, April 2015

46 APRIL 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL Normalizing U.S. Vietnam Relations: Preparing for a New Future In 1995, I could sense these solemn sentiments of loss and sad- ness among the Americans in attendance with the late Secretary of State Warren Christopher at Noi Bai Airport in Hanoi for a ceremony attending the repatriation of American remains. I was among the State Department personnel who assisted with Sec. Christopher’s trip to normalize relations with Hanoi and establish a new embassy at President Bill Clinton’s initiative. I thought about the 58,000 American service members who had died in the Vietnam conflict. I also could not help but think about those in my father’s generation—the more than one million courageous and committed South Vietnamese military and civilian officers who died during the war, were sent to concentration camps or were executed. Then there were the subsequent waves of “boat people” who perished in the ocean—nearly half a million by some estimates. The war had continued to take a human toll long after the fight- ing was over. While helping the press delegation, I sensed the energy of the younger generation of Vietnamese, eager to learn and yearning for a prosperous future. The country was changing and had moved on from the war years. Then again, many of them were too young to even remember the war. In fact, the entire Asia-Pacific region was transforming, with increased trade and commerce and greater participation in regional organizations such as the Asso- ciation of Southeast Asian Nations. The international context and the regional dynamics had shifted with the formal end of the Cold War and demise of the Soviet Union. Walking by the tranquil Hoan Kiem Lake in Hanoi, I saw turtles and recalled those I’d seen at the zoo as a child. Symbolic of the dynamics of Southeast Asia, there was continuity and change all at once. As Secretary of State John Kerry wrote in his Feb. 2 op-ed, “From Swift Boat to a Sustainable Mekong,” in Foreign Policy magazine: “Long ago, those waterways of war became waters of peace and commerce—the United States and Vietnam are in the 20th year of a flourishing friendship.” As U.S. Ambassador Ted Osius noted in his arrival in Ho Chi Minh City in February, “A Vietnam that is strong, prosperous and independent, and that respects rule of law and human rights, was, is and will be an indispensable friend of the United States.” The Pham family was sponsored by a local church and Professor Lucien Miller of the University of Massachusetts. In July 1975, from left to right, in the backyard of their sponsor’s home, where they stayed: Don, Maria Cuc (Grandma), Theresa, Paul, Mary (mother), Joseph (father) holding Anne, Tony and John. Andrew Marx/ Amherst Record Newspaper American military personnel help refugees, including 3-year-old Anne Pham, off a plane at Fort Chaffee, Arkansas, in May 1975. U.S. Army