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Regionalism or Globalism? The Carter Administration and Vietnam

In January 1977 normalization of relations with the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV) was a significant element in the Carter administration's effort to reorient American foreign policy away from its previous preoccupation with containment. For Jimmy Carter, normalization was a symbolic means of ending a disastrous and debilitating episode in American foreign policy. For other policy-makers in the administration it was also the basis upon which to build a new American foreign policy in South-east Asia. In the first six months of 1977, the administration accordingly took a number of initiatives designed to overcome the remaining obstacles to normalization. When these efforts failed to achieve their desired effect, the pace of events began to slow and a further round of negotiations in December 1977 brought no progress. Nevertheless, contacts continued in 1978, and in September of that year the two governments finally agreed terms for the normalization of relations. By that time, however, a number of developments had begun to undermine the administration's initial strategy in South-east Asia, and in December 1978 US-Vietnamese normalization was postponed indefinitely. Only now, nearly two decades later, is normalization with Vietnam once again on the US foreign policy agenda. In the light of contemporary developments it is worth re-examining the reasons for the rise and fall of normalization during the Carter years. Accordingly, the aim of this article is to highlight some of the flaws in existing explanations of the above course of events and, in particular, of the decision-making process within the Carter administration in the last three months of 1978.