Free Republic

Forty-five years ago, American cargo ships filled this vast harbor, unloading supplies day after day for U.S. troops fighting the Viet Cong. Today, the bay’s azure waters are largely empty, except for local fishing boats. The once-bustling U.S. airbase here, formerly home to fighter squadrons and a combat hospital, is abandoned, a reminder of the U.S. military’s exit from most of Southeast Asia after the Vietnam War. But the Pentagon is plotting a return. On Sunday, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta flew in to Cam Ranh Bay, the first Pentagon chief to come to this deep-water port 200 miles north...

Nyugen Tan Dung, the Vietnamese prime minister, said Cam Ranh Bay, 180 miles north west of Ho Chi Minh city, would stand ready to service ships and submarines "from all countries". Russia is to help rebuild the port as part of an £1.3 billion defence deal signed earlier this year. The move is one of a series of interlocking regional arrangements that are being put in place to counter China's growing might. In October, Vietnam signed an agreement giving Indian naval ships base facilities at its ports. India, in turn, agreed to help Hanoi expand its naval logistics capabilities, and...

One of the first things George W. Bush did as his presidency was getting off the ground in 2001was to sign a bilateral trade agreement with Vietnam. Since then, trade between the US and Vietnam has grown 400 percent to $7.8 billion last year. Last week, the US and Vietnam signed an agreement that paves the way for Vietnam to join the WTO, the World Trade Organization. On Monday, June 5, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was in Hanoi meeting Vietnam's Defense Minister Pham Van Tra and Prime Minister Phan Van Khai. Noting that a US Navy ship will soon...

Saturday February 2, 2:38 PM US eyes Russian base in Vietnam, starts talks with former foe Hanoi Washington has begun negotiations with former foe Hanoi for access to a key Soviet Cold War naval base on Vietnam's central coast after the Russian lease expires in 2004, US officials said here. The US military is seeking an "arrangement" that will allow it to use the base at Cam Ranh Bay for port calls and support for its operations in southeast Asia, Pacific commander Admiral Dennis Blair told reporters after talks here Saturday with Vietnamese officials. But Washington is not looking to ...

Hanoi on Sunday ruled out the possibility of any formal agreement with Washington on its request for access to a Russian naval base on Vietnam's central coast after Moscow's lease expires in 2004. "Vietnam won't sign an agreement with any country on using Cam Ranh port for military purposes," foreign ministry spokeswoman Phan Thuy Thanh told the official Vietnam News Agency. But the ministry spokeswoman left open the possibility of US access to the base on an informal or multilateral basis. Vietnam has allowed port calls at Haiphong and Ho Chi Minh City by warships from a host of foreign ...