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In April 2009, reports surfaced that Vietnam had agreed in principle to a deal with Russia for 6 of its diesel-electric Kilo/ Project 636 Class fast attack submarines. There have been rumors that Vietnam owns 2 ex-Yugoslav mini-submarines for use in commando operations, but the Vietnamese People’s Navy doesn’t own any full size submarines that can take on enemy subs and ships. That’s about to change, thanks to a December 2009 contract. In addition to submarines, the Vietnamese Navy order is said to include new heavyweight torpedoes and missiles (most likely Klub family) to arm them. China’s April 2009 display...

Vietnam aims to counter China with sub deal: analysts By Ian Timberlake (AFP) – 2 hours ago HANOI — Vietnam's major arms deal with Russia, reported to involve the purchase of six submarines, aims to bolster claims against China over potentially resource-rich islands in the South China Sea, analysts say. While much of Vietnam's military hardware is antiquated, it has decided to devote substantial resources to developing an underwater fleet as concerns mount over tensions with its giant neighbour over the Paracel and Spratly archipelagos, they say. "I think their primary rationale is to counteract the military build-up that the...

AL ASAD AIR BASE, Iraq, Dec. 16, 2009 – From the battle at Belleau Wood, where Marines earned the name “Devil Dog,” to the iconic image of the flag-raising at Iwo Jima, Marine Corps history is embedded in every Marine from initial training at boot camp, and it continues to provide inspiration to those who serve. Marine Corps 1st Sgt. Viriato B. Sena stands before his Marines at Al Asad Air Base, Iraq, Oct. 13, 2009. Sena, who joined the Marine Corps in 1973, participated in the evacuation of Vietnam and is now deployed to Iraq for the drawdown of...

A piece of Don Sunstrom's past has been missing for 40 years. While fighting in Vietnam, he'd gotten a fancy engraved cigarette lighter as a keepsake to remind him of a place he later would try to forget. But he lost the lighter in the jungles of Southeast Asia. Two months ago, Sunstrom, 65, who now lives in Blaine, was stunned to learn that the Zippo lighter had been found -- at the bottom of a lake in southern Wisconsin. Scott Mitchen, a professional treasure hunter and author, found the lighter during a dive in Delavan Lake and plans to...

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Vietnam's defence minister, making a rare visit to the United States, met Tuesday with a key US Senator who called ties between the two former war foes "very important." General Phung Quang Thanh met with Democratic Senator Jim Webb, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asia, and was to meet with Senator John McCain, the Senate Armed Services Committee's top Republican. "It is vitally important that the United States engage with Southeast Asia at all levels," Webb, a former Marine who served in the Vietnam war and visited Hanoi in August, said after his...

HO CHI MINH CITY, December 14 (CDN) — On Friday evening (Dec. 11), history was made in communist Vietnam. Christian sources reported that some 40,000 people gathered in a hastily constructed venue in Ho Chi Minh City to worship God, celebrate Christmas, and hear a gospel message – an event of unprecedented magnitude in Vietnam. A popular Vietnamese Christian website and other reports indicated up to 8,000 people responded to the gospel message indicating a desire to follow Christ.

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama had a golden opportunity to become a peacemaker compared to his hawkish predecessor. But he has let that opening evaporate by escalating the war in Afghanistan. Now he is called a "war president" -- a dubious title that former President George W. Bush personally embraced after starting two devastating wars, one in Afghanistan, the other in Iraq. In both cases, the U.S. is touting its exit plans. In Iraq, Obama has declared a victory and plans to pull out many troops next year, though leaving thousands behind to secure the Baghdad government. In Afghanistan, Obama...

Vietnam could become key importer of Russian weaponry Vietnam could become a key importer of Russian weaponry if several contracts on the purchase of diesel submarines and aircraft are signed in the near future, a Russian newspaper said. According to the Vedomosti business daily, Moscow and Hanoi are close to sign deals on the purchase of six Kilo class diesel-electric submarines and 12 Su-30MK2 Flanker-C multirole fighters. The submarine contract, worth an estimated $1.8 billion, includes the construction of on-shore infrastructure and training of submarine crews and will be the second largest submarine contract concluded by Russia since the Soviet...

Miss. Survivor Of Vietnam's Hanoi Hilton Dies At 82 Pitchford Survived 7 Years In Prison Camp UPDATED: 3:48 pm CST December 3, 2009 JACKSON, Miss. -- Retired Air Force Col. Jack Pitchford, a fighter pilot from Mississippi who survived seven years in the Vietnamese prison camp known as the Hanoi Hilton, has died. He was 82. The Natchez, Miss., native was shot down in 1965 and taken to the Hoa Lo prison, a hellish place where Americans, including famous veterans like U.S. Sen. John McCain, were tortured. Pitchford was released in 1973. His brother said Pitchford died Wednesday after battling...

I have referred before to the Left’s glory in the American defeat in Viet Nam. To hear them tell it, it was a dirty imperialist war in league with a corrupt South Vietnamese government fought by baby killing, torturing murderers that led to our righteous defeat. Forget for a moment about the enemy that long-ago war. On our side we had a reluctant president, Lyndon Johnson, who wanted to “manage” a war to a draw – not win it - who committed troops but pulled his punches and whose party was vehemently against the war in the first place. If...

President Obama May Not Remember Vietnam Turmoil WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama insists that his decision to escalate the war in Afghanistan by sending in 30,000 more troops is not Vietnam all over again. Well, it sure reminds me of the perils and the price of that unwinnable war in Southeast Asia and the political chaos it wreaked at home. In Afghanistan, the designated enemies are remnants of the weakened al-Qaida network and the native Taliban, which has been growing in strength despite the eight-year war started by President George W. Bush in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 catastrophe....

Staff Sgt. Heriberto Gonzalez, a force protection escort for the 332nd Expeditionary Civil Engineer Squadron, holds the American flag his father and grandfather both carried during wartime. Photo courtesy of the 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing. JOINT BASE BALAD — Staff Sgt. Heriberto Gonzalez, 332nd Expeditionary Civil Engineer Squadron, possesses an American flag that was carried by both his father and grandfather during wartime. "Gonzo," as he is referred to by his flight line coworkers, is on his eighth deployment since joining the Air Force. An avionics craftsman by trade, he volunteered to deploy to Iraq to provide security for local...

Mr. President, it now falls to you to be both former Republican Senator George Aiken and the man to whom he spoke, Lyndon Johnson. You must declare victory, and get out. ... even though the Pentagon is a bunch of perpetually 12-year old boys desperate to stay up as late as possible by any means necessary — get out now. But poll after poll, and anecdote after anecdote, of the reality of public opinion inside Afghanistan is that its residents believe we are fighting Afghanistan. That we, Sir, have become an occupying force. Yes: if we leave, Afghanistan certainly will...

HANOI (Reuters) - A Vietnamese man dug up his wife's corpse and slept beside it for five years because he wanted to hug her in bed, an online newspaper reported on Thursday. The 55-year-old man from a small town in the central province of Quang Nam opened up his wife's grave in 2004, molded clay around the remains to give the figure of a woman, put clothes on her and then placed her in his bed, Vietnamnet.vn said. The man, Le Van, told the website that after his wife died in 2003 he slept on top of her grave,...

Vietnam devalued its currency by 5.4 per cent against the dollar yesterday and raised interest rates by a full percentage point in an effort to cut inflation and underpin the beleaguered dong. The dong has come under pressure recently as inflation started climbing and domestic demand, driven by the country's $8bn stimulus programme, drove the current account deficit to close to $2bn a month. It was trading on the grey market at 19,800 to the dollar on Tuesday but came back to 19,500 after the government move. Analysts, however, questioned whether financial markets would believe the latest move had put...

Those who equate Haditha with My Lai, and Iraq with Vietnam, would do well to remember the last time we gave peace a chance. For millions of innocents, it was the peace of the grave. If there's anyone who condones the deliberate murder of civilians, it is not the U.S. government but the anti-war left and its unindicted co-conspirators in the media. Thanks largely to their efforts, we abandoned Vietnam and ushered in an era of mass carnage, boat people and reeducation camps that resulted in more death after the war than during it. After Saigon's "liberation," summary executions of...

Russian Victoria Radochinskaya has won the Mrs World 2009 beauty pageant, which took place in the Vietnamese city of Vung Tau. Seventy-eight participants, aged between 19 and 41, competed for the title of the world's most beautiful married woman. Vietnam, the host country, was represented by two contenders. The final round of the competition took place on Sunday. Victoria Radochinskaya, 31, became the 15th winner of the contest since it was first held in 1985. The PR specialist received the $150,000 jewel-studded crown from last year's winner, Ukrainian Natalya Shmarenkova. First runner-up was Mrs America Andrea Robertson, a professional model....

The lodge where I stay in Kabul was badly damaged on Oct. 8 when a suicide car bomb exploded 80 meters down the road near the Indian Embassy. Seventeen Afghans working in photocopy shops near the embassy were killed and another 60 wounded. The Indian diplomats were unharmed. No apologies were offered by the perpetrators for the killings. Nobody was hurt at my lodge, but 75 windows were blown out. The next day I was talking with the owner, who, for the third time in three years, had to fork out $3,000 to fix his windows. I asked him what...

We all know dogs like to smell just about everything, including other animals' poo. Now scientists have figured out how to put the canines' odd pastimes to work to help sniff out the dung of endangered rhinos in Vietnam. The collected dung will help scientists to figure out how many Javan rhinos, also called Rhinoceros sondaicus, remain in the wild. The rhinos were considered extinct on mainland Southeast Asia until hunters in Vietnam killed one in 1988. Now two remaining populations exist, with an estimated 10 individuals in the forests of Vietnam and between 28 and 56 such rhinos on...

Subject: Vietnam Facts vs Fiction FYI, We do not live in Viet Nam, Viet Nam lives in us. Vietnam Facts vs Fiction. I found this article very interesting. The most notable fact is that 2.7 million Americans actually served in the Vietnam Theater of war. In the last census nearly 14 million Americans claimed they served in Vietnam . Four out of five are lying. I wonder why. Vietnam Facts vs Fiction For over 30 years I..like many Vietnam veterans..seldom spoke of Vietnam , except with other veterans, when training soldiers, and in public speeches. These past five years I...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 20, 2009 – Based on an independent study by the Institute of Medicine last month, Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric K. Shinseki has directed broader health coverage from his department for Vietnam War veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange. Research found that three illnesses – B cell leukemias, Parkinson’s disease and ischemic heart disease -- possibly are associated with Agent Orange exposure. Those conditions join a list of related diseases for which Vietnam War veterans already receive compensation, such as prostate cancer, respiratory cancers, soft-tissue sarcomas, Hodgkin’s disease, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and multiple myeloma. "Since my confirmation as secretary,...

November 17, 2009 MURTHA CONTINUES TO UNDERMINE TROOPS By William RussellIn recent interviews defending President Obama’s slow decision making on Afghanistan, Congressman John Murtha continues to undermine our troops, embolden our enemies, and place our country in greater danger. He does this by drawing on the wrong lessons from his own experience in Vietnam, and endorsing the enemy’s propaganda.  By continually questioning the request for more troops, Mr. Obama and Mr. Murtha are signaling the possibility that America might withdraw as we did in Vietnam. But unlike Vietnam, we do not have the choice of leaving and withdrawing to our...

DA NANG, Vietnam, Nov. 17, 2009 – Nearly 35 years ago, Navy Cmdr. H.B. Le left Vietnam aboard a fishing trawler. He returned at the helm of a U.S. Navy warship when the guided-missile destroyer USS Lassen arrived here Nov. 7 for a scheduled port visit. Navy Cmdr. H.B. Le, commanding officer of the guided-missile destroyer USS Lassen, speaks to reporters in front of the U.S. 7th Fleet command ship USS Blue Ridge in Da Nang, Vietnam, Nov. 7, 2009. It was Le's first visit to Vietnam after leaving the country with his family in 1975. U.S. Navy photo by...

I earned and wore a Green Beret and have sons doing the same now against a different enemy. There still remains a similar Beltway mindset where strategy is planned by military leaders, then discarded by an Administration seemingly bent on the destruction of what we hold dear. I’m a 70% disabled Vietnam veteran and like many suffer migraines, wear hearing aids, groan when arising, and start each day in pain. However, there is no pain as heart-breaking, as the gut-wrenching ache I feel when I see the President of my country and his staff acting like wimps and appeasers to...

As the sane portion of the country looks on in disbelief at the Obama Administration’s decision to give 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed a civilian trial in New York City, the conduct of the War on Terror aborad is equally jarring—three months after General Stanley McChrystal has asked for an additioanl 40,000 troops to properly continue operations in Afghanistan, the President still has yet to make up his mind. Last night, Sean Hannity aired an eye-opening report on one of the influences behind Obama’s foreign policy: Lessons in Disaster by Gordon Goldstein. Goldstein’s thesis is that President John F. Kennedy...

11/12/2009 - SHEPPARD AIR FORCE BASE, Texas (AFNS) -- With the traditional "I do's" and exchange of wedding bands some 54 years ago on Oct. 1, 1955, James and Phyllis Hivner began their life's journey together which, like many young couples, began with not knowing what the future held. That journey was rocked 10 years later, almost to the day, when then-Capt. James Hivner and his co-pilot, 1st Lt. Thomas Barrett, were shot down Oct. 5, 1965, in their F-4C Phantom fighter-bomber over North Vietnam. About 10 minutes after ejecting from the wounded aircraft, the pair was captured by North...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 12, 2009 – Generations of American servicemembers braved and survived the din, destruction and uncertainty of war to return home to enjoy the freedoms they helped to preserve for their fellow citizens. Retired Navy Rear Adm. Robert H. Shumaker is a famous U.S. military veteran who coined the term “Hanoi Hilton” when he was a prisoner of war from 1965 to 1973 in North Vietnam. Any person –- civilian or military –- who thinks they may have emotional problems should seek professional help, he said. DoD photo by Gerry J. Gilmore  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Yet,...

As a nineteen-year-old college drop out, forty years ago on this past August 18th, I was being pushed and shoved off a bus at MCRD, San Diego, California, as we 'boots' were trying desperately to move as fast was we could for what we were all sure was a bunch of rabid DI's. They were after all, foaming at the mouth.

Adm. Jeremiah A. Denton Jr. is a true American hero. The former senator, retired admiral and naval aviator spent almost eight years as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam, half of that time in solitary confinement. When forced by his captors to do a television interview in 1966, he blinked the word "torture" in Morse code. He's the kind of man Washington leaders might want to listen to more carefully than the average purveyor of foreign-policy wisdom.

We must dispense with a dangerous myth. In an effort to pressure the president to send 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan, armchair commanders have dusted off the old canard that "we could have won in Vietnam if only … " Some revisionists contend we could have won "if only" Congress had not balked at the military's insatiable hunger for more troops and more bombing. Others argue that pacification of the countryside and training of Vietnamese soldiers could have carried the day "if only" we had stuck with these policies longer. Still others argue that we could have won "if only"...

Officials said President Obama will not announce his decision until after he returns from his upcoming trip to Asia and stressed that no final decision has been made, even in private. But the plan under consideration would represent a middle ground between different requests made from the top commander in Afghanistan. But the plan under serious consideration would split the difference between troop requests made by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan. McChrystal had put forward a "high risk" request for only 10,000-15,000 troops, and a "medium risk" request of 40,000-45,000.

YOKOSUKA NAVAL BASE, Japan — As South Vietnam crumbled under advancing North Vietnamese forces 34 years ago, 5-year-old Hung Ba Le and his family escaped and eventually found refuge on a U.S. Navy ship. This week, he returns to the land of his birth for the first time. And it is a U.S. Navy ship — the guided-missile destroyer USS Lassen that he commands — that will take him there. On April 30, 1975, Saigon’s fall was imminent. Le’s father, a South Vietnamese navy officer, had just assumed command of the Nha Be Naval Support Activity Base after learning the...

Tickers in this Article: BP, TLM, COP, CVX, PXP The hunt for oil and gas resources is taking the exploration and production industry to all parts of the globe, as higher-risk exploration is needed to satisfy world demand for these resources. This need for newly discovered resources may become acute as the emerging economies industrialize and bring higher living standards to their citizens. IN PICTURES: How To Make Your First $1 Million Get Free Stock Analysis By Email Exploration In Vietnam Vietnam currently only has 4.7 billion barrels of proved oil reserves, and it had 19.7 trillion cubic feet of...

November 02, 2009, 4:00 a.m. A New Isolationism?A few months ago, Afghanistan was a “war of necessity.” What changed? By Conrad Black The Obama administration’s shilly-shallying in Afghanistan is a textbook case of how not to conduct a war, and how not to lead an alliance. In the 2006 and 2008 campaigns, the Democrats demanded the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, and accused the Bush administration of conducting an unnecessary war in that country while ignoring the original campaign in Afghanistan, where the 9/11 terrorist attacks were planned. As recently as two months ago, President Obama called Afghanistan a...

I support a phased withdrawal of U.S. and allied troops from Afghanistan, starting Jan. 1 and ending no later than Dec. 31, 2012. The Afghan people have suffered enough and the U.S. government should promote a negotiated settlement to the war. Afghanistan has been at war almost continually since 1979. We’ve been over there since 2001. At the end of 2012 we’ll have been there 11 years. That’s more than long enough to achieve our mission. And 32 years of war is too long for the Afghans. Afghanistan is an impoverished country. Sixty-eight percent of its population has never known...

Harry Stein What Mad Men Gets Wrong The fifties, a decade of forgotten loyalty, honor, and patriotism The ongoing frenzy over Mad Men, which recently landed the Emmy for best drama series for the second straight year, has me thinking about my father-in-law and his group of cronies in Monterey, California. I wrote a book about these guys some years back, called The Girl Watchers Club. For over 30 years, they got together every week to shoot the breeze about their jobs, their families, and the world at large and, invariably, to reminisce about the war in which they’d all...

Long-delayed Silver Star to be awarded Andrea Billups It wasn't American soldiers that Capt. Jack Nicholson went to rescue one night in December 1963. But it didn't matter to him that they were his Vietnamese allies.

HA NOI — Three Vietnamese banks will jointly provide a loan of up to US$51 million to the PetroVietnam Exploration and Production Corporation (PVEP) to exploit oil and gas in the Ca Ngu Vang (Gold Tuna) oilfield. Under a credit agreement signed in Ha Noi on Thursday with the Viet Nam International Commercial Joint Stock Bank (VIB), Asia Commercial Joint Stock Bank (ACB) and the Sai Gon-Ha Noi Commercial Joint Stock Bank (SHB), the PVEP would use the five-year loan to pay for the development and exploitation of oil and gas at the oilfield, located southeast of Viet Nam’s continental...

Does the Obama administration understand why we invaded Afghanistan? Does the Obama understand that we have no choice but to remain in Afghanistan until we can establish a stable government that will not allow the country to be a base for terrorism? The Christian Science Monitor has reported that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel told CNN it would be "irresponsible" to send more troops into Afghanistan before the political situation is resolved. Actually it would be irresponsible to wait for the political situation to be resolved before committing sufficient troops to stabilize the situation. We invaded Afghanistan in...

Oct. 20: President Obama shakes hands with Capt. John Poindexter in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington. For Army Capt. John Poindexter, being awarded the Presidential Unit Citation for heroism Tuesday marked an "opportunity to close a chapter" in his life. "The general feeling is a pretty intense level of excitement," Poindexter told Foxnews.com just before he and 85 other Vietnam veterans were honored at a ceremony in the White House Rose Garden. "It will mean to me that I've filled an important duty to the men who I literally owe my life to, men who...

Afghanistan: The president's decision to withhold more troops over the country's less-than-pristine election is nothing but stalling. For our soldiers, desperate for reinforcements, it's a slap in the face. No doubt, a legitimate government, complete with free and fair elections, would be good for Afghanistan. Its Aug. 20 vote was loaded with trouble because the Taliban sliced off purple-inked fingers to discourage voting and because a United Nations electoral watchdog found widespread voter fraud. Yes, correct the problems. But holding U.S. troop reinforcements hostage isn't the way to do it. Elections aren't why we have troops in that country. They're...

List of countries are not allowed issuing Vietnam Visa: Iran Algieria Cameroon Afghanistan Iraq Nigiria Saudi Arabia Pakistan Jordan Bangladesk United Arab Emirates Lebanon Sri Lanka Malawi Palestin Tunisia Turkey Guinea- Bissau Quatar Triniad and Tobago Ghana Haiti Zimbawe Somali Namibia Xudan Nepal Yemen Kenya Jamaica Oman Rwanda

WASHINGTON, Oct. 20, 2009 – President Barack Obama today paid a long-overdue tribute to the Vietnam War-era soldiers of Alpha Troop, 1st Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment, in a ceremony at the White House Rose Garden. Obama awarded the Presidential Unit Citation, the nation’s highest award for a military unit, for the troop’s actions March 26, 1970, in Vietnam. Eighty-six former soldiers who served in Alpha Troop then were on hand for the ceremony, and although it’s been nearly four decades since many of them served, Obama said, the heroism they displayed will never be forgotten. “Welcome to a moment...

President Barack Obama, flanked by members of Troop A, First Squadron, 11th Armored Combat Regiment, speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Tuesday, Oct. 20, 2009, during a ceremony honoring their service with the Presidential Unit Citation for their actions during the Vietnam War. (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari) From the NYTimes at the beginning of this month: SANTA CLARA, Calif. — On the day Ray R. Moreno came home from Vietnam, the day antiwar protestors called him a baby killer, he decided to pack away his Army uniform for good. Memories and nightmares still intruded,...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Nearly 40 years after members of a U.S. cavalry unit put their lives in peril to save 100 fellow soldiers trapped under blistering enemy fire in Vietnam, they received the Presidential Unit Citation on Tuesday. It's an honor their captain says is long overdue. President Obama awarded the citation for extraordinary heroism and conspicuous gallantry to 86 members of the Army's Troop A, First Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment. "These soldiers defined the meaning of bravery and heroism," Obama said at a White House reception honoring the group's heroics. "It's never too late. You can never say...

AS President Obama and his advisers contemplate a new course for Afghanistan, many commentators are suggesting analogies with earlier conflicts, particularly the war in Vietnam. Such comparisons can be useful, but only if the characterizations of earlier wars are accurate and lessons are appropriately applied. Vietnam is particularly tricky. While avoiding the missteps made there is of course a priority, few seem aware of the many successful changes in strategy undertaken in the later years of the conflict. The credit for those accomplishments goes in large part to three men: Ellsworth Bunker, who became the American ambassador to South Vietnam...

Following Vietnam’s property market collapse earlier this year, luxury apartment prices have fallen sharply, with a 30% drop in places like Phu My Hung and as much as 60% in other areas. The slump has been particularly hard in the luxury segment. Independent financial expert, Bui Kien Thanh, said local developers had focused too highly on luxury properties. He said the luxury segment is set for more trouble since customers have raised complaints about the quality of the apartments they have bought. Former deputy minister of natural resources, Dang Hung Vo, said that property prices would continue to fall if...

The 'clear and hold' strategy of Gen. Creighton Abrams was working in South Vietnam. Then Congress pulled the plug on funding. More than 30 years have passed since North Vietnam, in gross violation of the 1973 Paris Peace Accords, conquered South Vietnam. That outcome was partly the result of greatly increased logistical support to the North from its communist backers. It was also the result of America's failure to keep its commitments to the South. Those commitments... --snip-- By the time of the enemy's 1972 Easter Offensive virtually all U.S. ground troops had been withdrawn. Supported by American airpower and...

In his memoir subtitled "Death In The Dark: Vietnam 1968-1972" Master Chief Thomas Keith, a self-described "Navy brat," tells readers how he embarked on his chosen career as a SEAL. Evolving from the underwater demolition teams of World War II, the Navy SEALs were formally established in 1962 as a "small, elite maritime force to conduct ... clandestine, high-impact missions." The name comes from the fact that they are trained in all environments (sea, air and land), but Keith writes, "historically SEALs have always had 'one foot in the water.' " As involvement in the Vietnam War grew, the U.S....