Vietnam

During the past three decades Vietnam had more than its share of crises, but 1978 may, in retrospect, be viewed as one of the most crucial and perilous years in its history as an independent state. Beset with external threats and internal problems, the leader ship of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV) faces what may be their most demanding challenge to date. It is not so much that the gravity of the challenge is any more serious than in the critical turning points in the escalation of the First and Second Indochina conflicts, but rather the novelty of the problems, the complexity of the solutions, and the difficulties of mobilizing a politically fragmented and psycholo gically weary population are greater than ever before. In some ways this represents the delayed reaction and hidden cost of the war, clearly anticipated by Henry Kissinger's celebrated 1969 essay on negotiations in which he noted that a prolonged,, even if ulti mately victorious war might leave Viet Nam so exhausted as to jeopardize the purposes of decades of struggle. Kissinger also remarked that Hanoi's weaknesses are that planning can substitute for material resources only up to a point, beyond which differences of scale are bound to become significant and a continuation of the war will require a degree of foreign assistance which may threaten the autonomy that Hanoi has jealously safeguarded until now (H.A. Kissinger, Viet Nam Nego tiations, Foreign Affairs, January 1969, p. 229). The strategy of grinding down the Vietnamese revolutionaries, depleting their and forcing them into a difficult choice between assistance and dependency did not succeed at the time, but its effects are still being felt. In the face of grave economic difficulties, the SRV once again opted for a strategy which hopes that superior planning can substitute for material resources, but, on the new fronts of political integration and economic development, the institutional and policy changes this will require are much more problematic than the relatively straightforward mili tary field of battle. Choices must be made not so much because their consequences can be confidently predicted, but because the costs of failing to make a response to the increasing problems which beset the SRV are so high. Doing something is risky, doing nothing, suicidal. A major reorientation of the r?gime s basic policies occurred within the past year, and this led to major organizational and institutional changes as well. After a period of gradual transition towards socialism, the pace been accelerated. Collec tivization in the sphere of agriculture and elimination of the major private commercial networks in South Vietnam have required not only new institutions to implement these policies but new methods of leadership as well. Important changes have taken place m the relationship of Party and State institutions, indicating that the previous system was inadequate for the task. Both the policies and the institutions bear che stamp of improvisation. The political and institutional system of the SRV is in transition from the federation of incompatible social and economic systems in the North and South to

Political science · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies