Introduction

Vietnam has been a subject of intense interest to the United States because history, by chance or design, has brought these two countries together. Thousands of young men from both countries have for years fought side by side. Now, thousands of miles apart, their lives are still, in some curious way, bound together. Hardly a day passes in Vietnam without someone, somewhere in a city district or in a faraway village, mentioning something pertaining to “their presence” many years back, to what they had been doing, rightly or wrongly. And, rightly or wrongly, these are being remembered with feeling and sentimental attachment, as if these moments were part of their past.

But what matters now is how to find the ways and means to establish a meaningful dialogue between the two peoples. What is important is to promote better mutual understanding, with the ultimate aim of achieving beneficial developments in the near future in areas of political, cultural, and economic cooperation.

Vietnam is a small country of some 300,000 square miles with a 3,000-km coastline on the eastern edge of the Southeast Asian peninsula. The population is growing at an annual average rate of over 2 percent and now stands at about sixty-three million people. And with 192 persons per square kilometer, Vietnam's population density is much higher than in many parts of the developing world.

Following the Geneva Conference in July 1954, when it was agreed that there would be a temporary division of Vietnam into two parts pending future national elections, there was a long period of internal strife. Unfortunately, this de facto partition lasted until 1975. But after what seemed like a millennium of fierce and continuous struggle for independence, the country now has been unified for over 12 years.

However, the “temporary” partitioning of Vietnam produced two contrasting economic systems which have only hesitantly begun to be better coordinated on many aspects of life. The socialist system in the North was characterized by collectivization of agriculture (1956) and aimed to build an industrial base and infrastructure on a classical socialist model. In contrast, the economy of the South was patterned on a capitalistic model of nation building and -was heavily dependent on aid and trade.