US lifts arms embargo on old foe Vietnam as regional tensions simmer

US President Barack Obama (L) attends a press conference with Vietnam’s President Tran Dai Quang at the Presidential Palace Compound in Hanoi, Vietnam 23 May – Reuters

Hanoi (Reuters): US President Barack Obama announced on Monday that Washington will fully lift an embargo on sales of lethal arms to Vietnam, underlining warming relations between the former foes amid rising tensions with Beijing over the South China Sea.

At a lavish state luncheon in Hanoi, Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang toasted Obama’s first visit to the country as the arrival of a warm spring after a cold winter.

Obama, the third US president to visit Vietnam since ties were restored in 1995, has made a strategic ‘rebalance’ towards Asia-Pacific a centrepiece of his foreign policy.

Vietnam, where the United States was at war until 1975, has become a critical part of that strategy amid concerns about China’s growing military might and its sovereignty claims in the South China Sea.

The decision to lift the arms trade ban, which followed intense debate within the Obama administration, suggested that US concerns about China’s assertiveness outweighed arguments that Vietnam had not done enough to improve its human rights record and that Washington would lose leverage for reforms.

Obama told a joint news conference with Quang that disputes in the South china Sea should be resolved peacefully and not by whoever “throws their weight around”, but insisted that the arms embargo move was not linked to China.

“The decision to lift the ban was not based on China or any other considerations, it’s based on our desire to complete what has been a lengthy process of moving towards normalisation with Vietnam,” he said, adding later that his visit to a former foe showed “hearts can change and peace is possible”.

He said the sale of arms would depend on Vietnam’s human rights commitments, and would be made on a case-by-case basis.

Flourishing trade ties

Though the communist parties that run China and Vietnam officially have brotherly ties, China’s brinkmanship has forced Vietnam to recalibrate its defence strategy.

The lifting of the U.S. embargo will tighten the strategic pressure on China while deepening Vietnam’s relationship with the United States. It will also provide Vietnam with leverage in future arms deals with traditional weapons suppliers, particularly its long-time security patron, Russia.

While Vietnam has recently obtained submarines equipped with land-attack missiles, advanced air defence radars and state-of-the-art jet fighters from other nations, it was likely to seek advanced surveillance and intelligence systems from the United States, said Collin Koh, a military expert at Singapore’s S Rajaratnam School of International Studies.

“This is a really cutting-edge but niche field that will help Vietnam better integrate its various forces - and the U.S. can really help fill this gap,” Koh said.

Lifting the ban will likely upset China, which sees U.S. support for rival South China Sea claimants like Vietnam and the Philippines as interference and an attempt to establish hegemony in the region. Washington insists its priority is ensuring freedom of navigation and flight.

China’s foreign ministry said after the announcement in Hanoi that it hoped the development in relations between the United States and Vietnam would be conducive to regional peace and stability.

Underlining the burgeoning commercial relationship between the United States and Vietnam, one of the first deals signed on Obama’s trip was an $11.3 billion order for 100 Boeing planes by low-cost airline VietJet.

China is Vietnam’s biggest trade partner and source of imports. But trade with the United States has swelled 10-fold over the past two decades to about $45 billion, and Vietnam is now Southeast Asia’s biggest exporter to America.

In the commercial hub, Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon, Obama will on Tuesday meet entrepreneurs and tout a Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal he has championed, in which Vietnam would be the biggest beneficiary of the 12 members.

Obama confirms leader dead as Taliban meet on his successor

Hanoi/Kabul (Reuters): US President Barack Obama confirmed on Monday that the leader of the Afghan Taliban had been killed in an American air strike, an attack likely to trigger another leadership tussle in a militant movement already riven by internal divisions.

Obama, who started a three-day visit to Vietnam on Monday, reiterated support for the government in Kabul and Afghan security forces, and called on the Taliban to join peace talks.

The president authorised the drone strike that killed Mullah Akhtar Mansour in a remote region just within the Pakistan side of the border with Afghanistan on Saturday, and Afghan authorities have said the mission was successful.

But U.S. officials had held back from confirming that the Taliban leader had been killed in the attack until intelligence had been fully assessed.

Obama said in a statement that Mansour had rejected peace talks and had “continued to plot against and unleash attacks on American and Coalition forces”.

“The Taliban should seize the opportunity to pursue the only real path for ending this long conflict - joining the Afghan government in a reconciliation process that leads to lasting peace and stability,” he said.

The Taliban has been pushing Afghan security forces hard since the launch of their spring offensive in April, but the attack is likely to disrupt the movement, at least temporarily.

Although some individual Taliban members have been quoted in media reports saying that Mansour was killed, the movement’s leadership, keenly aware of the need to limit damaging splits, has not issued its own confirmation.

“The leadership is being very careful because one wrong step could divide the group into many parties like former mujahideen,” one Taliban official from the eastern province of Nangarhar said, referring to the guerrilla leaders who fought the Soviet in the 1980s and ‘90s before splitting into warring factions.

A shura, or leadership council, has already begun meeting to choose a successor, a task that will be vital to protecting the unity of the movement.

One senior member of the shura based in the western Pakistani city of Quetta said that the choice appeared to be shaping around Mansour’s deputy, Sirajuddin Haqqani, or a member of the family of the Taliban’s founder Mullah Mohammad Omar, such as his son, Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob.

Haqqani, leader of an affiliated network blamed for a series of high-profile suicide attacks in Kabul, had the backing of Pakistan, while Yaqoob had support among members of the Afghan Taliban, the shura member said.

“We prefer someone from Omar’s family to put an end to all internal problems,” he said.