Asia Sentinel
Written by David Brown
MON,02 JUNE 2014
Sudden shocks have a way of resetting the agenda
It’s been more than a month since China’s deep water oil drilling rig Haiyang 981 dropped anchor in Vietnam’s exclusive economic zone. Beijing’s deployment of the US$1 billion rig and an armada of escort vessels shocked the Vietnamese regime, shattering illusions about its “comprehensive strategic partnership” with China.
Hanoi had hoped that a policy of conciliation would temper China’s aggressive pursuit of hegemony in the South China Sea. Its deferential posture papered over a fragile intra-party consensus that Vietnam’s dispute with China over maritime sovereignty was a rare cloud in the otherwise sunny sky of fraternal cooperation. Come what may, insisted party conservatives, the comrades to the north would not rock the foundations of a brother socialist regime.
But rock them they did.
For several weeks, Hanoi seemed literally stunned. When the central committee of the Vietnamese Communist Party ended a week-long meeting on May 8, it had nothing new to say. Although denunciations of Chinese aggression filled online media and to an unusual extent, the state-supervised media as well, Party leaders with only one exception were inarticulate, seemingly conflicted even on whether to allow citizens to protest.
Read more: http://www.asiasentinel.com/politics/vietnam-turning-point/
