THREAD: why are there many Vietnamese (not from the diaspora) pro-US - often anti-China as well? First of all, the excerpts from following quora answer is an excellent introduction to the topic which I will quote in full https://genhochiminh.quora.com/For-Marxist-Leninists-Basic-Overview-on-everything-you-need-to-know-about-Vietnam-Work-in-Progress?ch=10&share=618ce5fc

1-There are clues regarding the state of class struggle in Vietnam which could lay the foundation for further investigation:
1/Reactionary anti-communist groups have a sizable following among the petty bourgeois intelligentsia and the comprador bourgeoisie in the urban centers:

2-The median age Vietnam is 30.4. Most of these reactionaries were born after the unification of Vietnam in 1975. Some of them were old enough to face the hardships of the post-unification period (late 70s - early 80s) when the embargo was in effect

3-but too young to understand on a personal level the sheer destruction caused by the amerikan invasion. Then the market reforms came, and consumer goods become more available - which only gives them more of an excuse to justify their reactionary worldview -

4-for instance, they would point to the short term benefits of market reforms to claim that a complete restoration of capitalism would help Vietnam further develop, even into First World status. (This excuse is of course, complete non-sense). These historical circumstances,

5-combined with their class position,
have produced a new generation of reactionaries that could even match the labor aristocracy and the bourgeoisie in the imperialist core in their support for imperialism. Quite often this is masked behind a veil of "anti-Chinese patriotism".

6-The anti-China sentiments among the petty bourgeois intelligentsia and the comprador bourgeoisie has a similar function to the anti-Russian propaganda during the wave of counter revolution that swept the Eastern Bloc and the USSR, or Ukraine during the regime change operation.

7-Below is my other observation:2/ Deterioration in history, geography, and marxism/political education and the use of English as the main gateway: due to the reform and introduction of capitalist elements, it is more attractive to be good engineers, doctors, bankers

8-to earn a good salary and join in the middle class. As a result, natural science (math, physics, chemistry, and biology) is focused much more than social science like history and geography. Even though history is a compulsory course for high school graduation,

9-it is very often to find students just cheat memorize the bare minimum to pass it. There was even a case where a history textbook is burned (yes!) by students after graduation, just because they are now “free” from it. It was even more trouble where there is no serious effort

10-from the gov to correct it, and it gets worse and worse year by year. People like myself who have high interest in history and geography are rare and often surrounded by a mob of student who hates history.

11-Marxism (taught as Civilian Education during high school) faces even a worse consequence, as it is considered as a “minor” course and not so important. I doubt you can find a handful of people today who still remembered anything,

12-even though we are taught about dialectical materialism (contradiction etc), capitalist economy (surplus value), or scientific socialism even at this stage. And proper Marxism course in university (4: ML philosophy, political economy, scientific socialism, HCM thought)

13-are among the most hated / most difficult classes where student usually fails. It does not help as well as all of them are taught in a very dry/academic way, with total disconnection to reality.

14-What is the result of all this: together with points 1-2, it produces a generation of students who are weak in historical and political analysis, yet are so vocal and willing to take up anything “the govt did not say”.

15-In the worst cases, some are out-right reactionary and take CNN/BCC as gospel, and in “best” case, it produces vacillating petty bourgeoisie/intelligentsia who things “both sides are wrong, perhaps we should not kick out the America civilization, etc”

16-which in the end, make them susceptible to history revisionist and western propaganda. On the other hand, it produces the ultra-left who fervently defend anything the Party did (even the right-wings who are pro-US)

17-and strongly oppose China and attack anybody who does not follow their line. Both are weakening the Party position among the petty bourgeoisie.

18-On the other note, the use of English as the main foreign language (understandable in this internet age) makes it difficult for a normal person to bypass the first propaganda layer by western media, especially with a weak ability to analyze them properly.

19-3/ The rise of so-called “red capitalists”, who can be “self-evolve” communists or a new member who join the Party for personal / career ambition and often align their interest with the capitalist classes.

20-They often use ultra-nationalism to trigger anti-China sentiment so they can increase public confidence (culminate in PM Dung's quote “we won't trade our sovereignty for useless partnership (with China)”.

21-Other examples including former politburo Dinh La Thang (who is convicted of corruption) who threaten to cut the railway project sponsored by China due to delay, but the same project with even more delay/cost by the Japanese were not touched at all.

22-The media are controlled for this purpose: most common newspaper (especially online) acts as the mouthpieces for the west (by simply translating whatever CNN/Reuters is saying) and often use “hawk newspaper” from China (like Global times) to trigger the anti-China sentiment

23-So how about now? Things are slightly better, because:

Back to the Quora answer:

24-Point 1: On the other hand, the majority of the Vietnamese people reject these reactionaries.
This is fairly obvious really (though it was not obvious to me before because I was blinded by idealism and my bourgeois lived experience):

25-Point 1: On the other hand, the majority of the Vietnamese people reject these reactionaries.
This is fairly obvious really (though it was not obvious to me before because I was blinded by idealism and my bourgeois lived experience):

26-The masses don't care about the meaningless "freedoms" proposed by these reactionaries - which boils down to the class interests of the proletariat and the peasantry. The petty-bourgeois intelligentsia and the comprador bourgeoisie are simply a vocal minority.

27-And while a lot of people have a cynical view towards China - which is understandable because of the border conflict very recent in history, China's questionable foreign policy decisions, and the history between Vietnam and China,

28-you would have a hard time finding someone with a proletarian class position who believes that the "evil communists are selling the country to China".

29-This remains the fantasy of the well-paid "intellectuals" and the real estate dealers. But then in a sense, this is irrelevant: it's not like imperialist-backed regime change ever gets popular support from the masses anyways.

30-Point 3: Any regime change operations would be the result of the alliance between the Red Capitalist faction within the CPV and anti-communist groups (like what happened in Eastern Europe and the USSR)

31-These liberal reactionaries won't be able to mobilize the masses. Also, there won't be any capitalist economic crisis for the reactionaries to capitalize upon, due to the simple fact that the state has control of the commanding heights of the economy.

32-Any crisis would come from the rightist faction in the CPV gaining enough power over the other factions and push the boundaries of the market reforms. But

33-The rightist faction led by Nguyen Tan Dung - the former Prime Minister, is being defeated.
Many of the notable figures associated with the rightist faction are now on trial for corruption

34-. This is not to say that corruption-related trials are just an excuse for line-struggle-related purges and that the Vietnamese court is somehow just a facade for political maneuvering (that's just the type of thinking often found in liberal conspiracy theories tbh).

35-Instead, what I'm saying is that corruption and line struggles are interrelated. Officials with connections that embezzle revenues of state enterprises have their material interests tied to counter-revolution.

36-The complete looting of state assets is the ultimate prize - the prize which will be laundered, legally protected by the new fully developed bourgeois legal institutions after the counter-revolution.

37-This prize would astronomically be larger than the present-day corruption, which is criminally prosecuted under the law, with harsh sentences. (For example, illegal bribery of officials would then be replaced with completely legal "lobbying").

38-My analysis:American / Western dream are being exposed during the Covid19 pandemic. Moreover, the cost of education (stupid student loan) and the grim job prospect made the Western countries a less attractive destination, so only the rich people can afford it.

39-Education topic: there is still no improvement at the moment, and it got worse due to the participation of US fully funded Uni (Fullbright) where Marxism courses are not taught and historical revisionism is widely popular.

40-Part of the education system is “for-profit” at the moment, which makes it even grimmer to see focus to make teaching history/geography/politic/geopolitics more interesting, as there is a very small demand for it.

41-Conclusion: with Gen Sec Nguyen Phu Trong, things are going in the right direction and anti-China / pro-US sentiment are being controlled. However, it can be triggered at any time, so it is important to avoid any escalation in the VN-CN relation. [END]