After McCain’s support helped President Bill Clinton’s normalize diplomatic relations with Vietnam in 1995, investment began to flow in and trade with the U.S. and other Western allies began to grow rapidly. Vietnam’s communist leaders embraced capitalism and the country now has one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, expanding 6.8 percent in the second quarter.
McCain long pushed for the lifting of a ban on the sale of U.S. lethal weapons to Vietnam, which occurred in 2016 under President Barack Obama. The two countries have gradually strengthened military ties, with Vietnam calling for greater U.S. engagement in the region to balance the increasing influence of China, which shares a border with Vietnam and has built facilities on disputed islands in the South China Sea.
Solitary Confinement
In March, Vietnam welcomed the USS Carl Vinson to the city of Danang, the first visit by a U.S. aircraft carrier since the fall of Saigon in 1975. Vietnam viewed the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, which President Donald Trump withdrew from shortly after taking office, as key to building closer economic ties with the U.S. and reducing its reliance on China, its largest trading partner.
As a prisoner of war, McCain said he was repeatedly beaten and spent more than two years in solitary confinement. In mid-1968, as his father took over as commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, McCain’s captors sought to hurt PoW morale by offering him early release. McCain refused.
The Hoa Lo Prison was demolished in the 1990s and only the gatehouse now remains as a museum.
‘Good Friend of Vietnam’
Tran Trong Duyet, the prison’s former director, called the American “stubborn” and “very loyal to his country” in a phone interview. He denied that McCain was mistreated, and said the two spoke often. “I thought that if the war ends, he would become a great politician. He has been considered a good friend of Vietnam.”
State-controlled media published and broadcast news of McCain’s death, favorably recalling the politician’s role in improving U.S. and Vietnam diplomatic relations. Vietnam’s Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh signed a book of condolence at the U.S. Embassy, and the foreign ministry said he made “great contributions to healing the wounds of war.”
“Two former enemies are now friends, in large part because of John McCain,” said Tran Viet Thai, a deputy director general at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam in Hanoi, where the country’s diplomats are trained. “We are burning incense for him.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.